A-Camping we just went

We spent the weekend at my FAVORITE campround, Airplane Flat. I cannot express to you how much I love that place. It's probably mostly an emotional attachment from all of the good times had with good friends. Not to mention it's beautiful. It was basically a 3rd Ward reunion. I have to mention that not a single Dewitt showed up...those bums! That's right Derek, tell your family that they stink! There were (these are the 3rd Ward kids) 3 Greens, 2 Mlyeneks, 2 Flakes, 1 Abbott, 3 Reeds, 3 Biggs, and ZERO Dewitts. What's up with that?!

Anyhow, on to the good times. The kids had a blast exploring and just getting dirty. Aiden was glued to Tyla, of course. Grayson was glued to Aunt Rosie, of course (and true to Grayson form, spent much of the time in his chonies). And Mabel, she was covered in dirt. We arrived to the campsite around dinnertime on Thursday. John and Rose made some YUMMY steak salads. We took Aiden and Ty down to the tree swing then on over to the Flats part of the creek. We hiked on over to the Meadow and back up over the hill to the campsite. It was a nice little jaunt. We drank hot coaco, listened to Rosie read a book to Gray, quoted A LOT of The Incredibles (and pondered why on earth there was no part 2????) and then I was beat, so we hit the hay.

Friday Todd and Christina made omelets with all the fixin's and fresh fruit. You know how I love my omelets...MMM, Heaven. Then Bret and I gave a short tutorial to John and Mom on how to play Rook. Then we headed down to the creek. We walked back up the path a ways and Mae and I sat at the edge of the creek while Gray and Bret headed back further to find where Todd, Tyla, and Aiden had gone fishing. John and Rose came in later. There was a little part of the creek that came up to just past my knees. The water was c-c-c-c-cold as usual, but John kept talking like he was gonna jump in just to wash his 'pits'. I told him...multiple times...it's not deep enough to jump in. But as I was climbing out, John, being the slow one that he is, jumped in. He landed with his hands down and scraped them up pretty good. He thought he was being a funny one splashing me, but that kind of backfired now didn't it??

We headed back to camp for some taco soup. I think Kendra may have left out an ingredient when giving the recipe to John, so that her taco soup will always be THE Taco soup. I'm just sayin'. But it was still tasty. The kids wanted to go back to the tree swing. On our way there, we found another tree swing rigged up at a campsite. It kind of scared me....I wasn't gonna sit on it. But the kids each took a quick turn and then it was off to the good swing. Aiden would have spent all day there if we'd let him. We came back to camp and John and I attempted to play the game he is developing. But it started pouring. The canopy we were under wasn't big enough, my back was in the rain still, so we put the game on hold but never got back to it. Then it was time for Bret and I to cook up some dutch oven chicken and taters. The chicken was a bit chewy (I HATE CHEWY CHICKEN. It makes me angry) and the bacon was a bit black. Other than that, good. Bret hiked to the top of the hill and found about a dozen elk so he came back to get me and we walked back up to see them. I'm not one for walking/driving around looking for elk, but they are beautiful animals. We made some dutch oven for the dessert sharing that night. I was nervous, we'd never made it before without burning it. But it turned out beautifully golden. All the 3rd warders met, talked, and shared desserts.

Saturday morning we had pancakes a la Todd with ham steaks, eggs, and more fruit. Did you know they make pancake batter in those spray cool whippy type bottles?!! Pretty genious, I must say. Fancy!! I was quite taken with this contraption if you can't tell. We packed up camp after breakfast and then had some lunch, hoagie sandwiches. We drove down to the creek for one last hurrah for the kids. The kids didn't seem to mind the cold and were jumping in all over the place. I was walking over to see where Ty and Aiden had gone and I lost my footing and fell in. Awesome. After a quick change at the van, we headed back to the heat.....oh the heat!! Is it time for another camping trip yet???

A hodgepodge of pictures:

Just a bit of the beauty that is Canyon Creek:

The path down to the tree swing. Isn't it gorgeous??!

The creek was covered with these little purplish/blue butterflies. There seemed to be more than usual. You would step into the greenery and they would flutter all around you. I had one land on my toe. It stayed there for quite a while before flying away.

These trees were in bloom. So pretty. Does anyone know what kind they are???