Can you stand one more camping post?? Pretty please? It was our last adventure before school and sports started in full swing.
For several years, we have camped at Addison Oaks County Park over Labor Day weekend. It's only 10 miles north of town, but the rustic sites make you feel like you're really up north. Our tradition is for me and the girls to set up camp on Thursday, and we have a girls day til Friday night, when Chris joins us after work.
We set up early on Thursday morning, like usual, so we could pick out a prime spot. We headed home for lunch because a huge line of thunderstorms was coming. We came back to the campground after dinner, because the storms were gone. Or so we thought! As we got to the park, it got really dark, then rainy, then stormy. It popped up out of nowhere! I parked at our site, but we didn't get out because of the storm, of course. While we waited out the squall, there was a loud crack and then a tree fell down right in front of our van! Oh, the screaming! I think I already blogged about this, but here are a few more pics:
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| So close to hitting our van! The main trunk is on the ground, you can only see the little branches here |
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| Flooding all around our tent, which never leaked!! |
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| We had to wait for the county park workers to come out and clear the tree so we could get out. We were totally blocked! |
Naturally, we went home for the night. This is the perk of being so close to home! The girls were totally freaked out.
We came back Friday morning, though!
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| See the big dead tree next to the girls? You can see how close it was to our tent and our van! |
Then the fun ensued. This county park has the best kids activities in the world! And it's all within a short bike ride of the campsites.
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| Playing with clay. This is a snowman, not a turd |
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| Lunch = grilled cheese hobo pies |
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| Look at the luxurious lunch! |
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| More arts and crafts |
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| Paddleboat ride |
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| My fellow passenger |
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| New this year was ziplining! It was $10 for unlimited ziplining, and we were the only ones there on Friday afternoon. The girls ziplined for 2 hrs straight! |
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| The best part was the huge swing when you hit the bottom. See Meg?? |
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| I even tried it! |
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| S'mores at night |
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| Breakfast with Daddy! Our favorite camping breakfast is eggs in a bag. Thanks for teaching us that one, Justin! |
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| Nerdy girls did a lot of reading. So did I! |
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| Our campsite. |
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| Also new this year was the huge inflatable slide. Here's Jess |
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| Katie |
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| Meg |
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| We got the wristbands so they could go over and over and over |
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| Dinner time! |
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| Look at all the modern conveniences. This is camping in luxury! |
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| Wagon ride around the park |
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| More nerdy reading |
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| Katie bought a color changing fire packet, which was cool |
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| More nerdy reading by headlamp |
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| Kids dodgeball game |
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| Bingo with friends from church |
We packed up on Sunday afternoon, which is also our tradition. It gives us all day Monday to rest and get ready for the first day of school! On our way home from the park, we stopped at:
Such fun that zip lining was so available! Always wanted to do it. When we were in the Dells, one trip that had multiple stops was over $100 per person, and it was fully booked while we were there!
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