Surprised to see me already? Yeah, I'm as equally surprised to be here typing. I'm also disappointed, upset, pissed off and frustrated. I'm sure I'll come up with more along the way.
So let's get the play by play.
We're suffering through a nasty heat wave right now. The temps are in the 30's with the humidex putting it into the 40's. It's hot and sticky and through in smog and you've got a shitty bit of summer day. But our campsite had late afternoon shade and it was also backed by a nice wooded area that wasn't brush and didn't have a lot of poison ivy so the kids had a great place to play while Sean and I got everything set up.
So we set up the dining tent (thanks Brian!) and while Sean got lunch cooked I set up our other tent. (and yes, thank you, I rock! I set up that big ass ten man tent all by myself!) and got our air mattresses blown up and beds made.
All the while Connor, Mary and Emily are playing in the woods, running around the site and....complaining about the heat. This is where it starts. Emily with her drama complaining about how hot she is, her head hurts, she doesn't feel good....(yeah, try setting up a 10 man tent in full sun girlie!)
So we eat, get changed and head to the beach. It was a lovely lovely day. The water was bath tub warm. Lake Simcoe is the best. It's shallow for quite a ways out so the kids can have a large area of swim and play without us worrying and they even go so far as to mark off swim areas with buoy lines. Love it.
So we get back to our campsite feeling refreshed. Sean starts supper, I take some pictures, we play a bit. After supper we walk down to the park, the kids play (and I met a kid, who I think was probably the politest little boy ever. He was about Mary's age and every time Mary came on to the climber he would stand back and say, "Ladies first!" He was also eager to help Connor on the big slide. I seriously wanted to go over to his mother and say "First off, BRAVO, on raising such a fine young man, and second, what's your secret??!!") We then went for ice cream and headed back to out site.
Now this is when all hell broke loose. On the way back Emily started crying. She wants to go home. Please can we go home. I just want to sleep in my own bed.
Back at the campsite, I get Connor sponged off and into some pj's. Now his meltdown begins. He is afraid of the air mattress. After some coaxing I manage to get him to lie down and I sing him some songs, rub his back and tell him I have to go get my pajama's on. He's laying in the tent, playing with his lovey and glow worm and is, while not asleep, content. Every now and then he'll call out to me that he's all done and wants to come out but going back in there settles him. It would have been a late night but he would have eventually fallen asleep.
Emily on the other hand is outside by the fire with Sean crying hysterically, begging and pleading to go home and hyperventilating. She went as far as throwing up in the woods.
So, at about 8:30 Sean and I weighed the options. We could make her stick it out. Connor would have fallen asleep by about 10. Mary and Emily would have gone to bed after that and Mary would have fallen right to sleep and Emily would have had more panic attack (as she's prone to do (think her past sleepover-itis and we would have heard an hour of her crying, I don't feel good, I can't sleep, my tummy hurts.....) so we opted to do what we really really didn't want to do. At 9:30 last night we packed up our tents, our air mattresses, our defective Coleman stove (more on that later) and we went home.
And now, I sit here stewing about how much my 12 hour visit to Sibbald Point Provincial Park cost me.
$30 new air mattress
$80 two nights campsite fee
$80 I didn't get paid for my one daycare child who is not here this week because I wasn't supposed to be here this week
$75 food for camping
$40 gas there and back
$20 treats and whatnot while we were there.
$8 bag of wood that we only used 1/4 for campfire....
And though sleeping on an air mattress in nature with bugs is not high on my list of loves, I LOVE camping overall and can tolerate the uncomfortable mattress and bugs so now....I'm really, really disappointed. And Sean is too. This is his first holiday in a year and he was so looking forward to this week.
So we've decided now that we'll go camping again, in late July or August, just Sean and I (and maybe Mary because she was truly upset (and in tears) when she heard we were leaving and we'll have fun.
We did have one milestone even though. Connor fell asleep in the stroller on the way back from the beach. He was without a diaper and when he woke he was upset and kept saying "pee tree" It took me a minute to figure out what he meant and I asked him "Do you need to pee in the tree?" (I had gone pee not long after we got there. We intentionally don't get a site near bathrooms (stink factor) and none of us has an issue with dropping trou and peeing in the woods.) He said yes so I took him over to our designated 'pee tree', pulled his pants down and my little boy peed in the tree (and I'm talking LOTS of pee, like he'd held it for a long time!) This is a milestone event. Never before has he peed standing up (he's tried at home but hasn't) and never has he been willing to pee anywhere but a toilet - (long story but I tried to get him to pee in the backyard once...I had a good reason and it's not as bad as it's sounds...honestly)
So, I guess I'll go look at some of my camping pictures, of when it was fun. And I can wish I was there, swimming in the bathtub warmth of Lake Simcoe and roasting marshmallows.
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