Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't trade that day for anything in the world! I love Ricky more today than I did then and we are so blessed to have three beautiful children who fill our lives with joy and excitement... Maybe a bit more excitement than we anticipated six years ago, but who doesn't like a little excitement in their life? Which leads us to the story at hand...
Ricky decided to surprise me with a camping trip to St. Augustine for our anniversary. The only catch was that we had to take the kids. A little ambitious, I agree, but we were feeling He-man-ish (or delusional, one of the two) and had been looking forward to the day to we could take our family on a real camping trip.
After 14 hours of packing and 3 hours driving, we pulled up to the spot we would call home for the next 3 days. The site was much smaller than I had hoped and the first thing I noticed was the nice and neat little pop up camper nestled right beside our tiny clearing. Our neighbors weren't home when we first arrived, but I imagined what they would look like and described them to Ricky. A retired couple, probably in their 70's, who would wake up before dawn and go to bed before dusk.... I couldn't have been more right! They pulled up in their 92 Buick station wagon and slowly made their way over to greet us. My kids gathered around them like long lost grandparents and told them everything from the toy they'd gotten in their happy meal, to our plans for the weekend. That poor couple had no idea what the night would hold, and neither did we.
We began to set up our tent as far away from the neighbors as we possibly could.... which wasn't far at all. Ricky unrolled our air mattress and found that we had been housing a squirrel in the garage. A huge hole and a bunch of acorns was all that he left us as a thank you. Frustrated but determined not to get discouraged, we packed all the valuables back in the truck, loaded 3 dirty kids up and headed to the nearest Wal-Mart to purchase an air mattress and some sand toys (since the campsite was basically a sandbox...a mother's worst nightmare.)
By 9pm we were back at the campsite starting a fire for dinner, unpacking the truck (again) and at the same time trying to explain to our three tired and hungry babies that they need to use their inside voices outside. (yeah, try explaining that one!) While Ricky worked on the fire, I attempted to blow the new air mattress up...but because we only had 2 batteries and needed 4, I wasn't getting very far. 10pm rolled around and I found myself watching the fire die out while feeding the kids cold hotdogs, waiting on Ricky to get back with 2 blasted batteries. Yes, I was discouraged and ready to go home... and if we'd known that all "pail"s would break loose in the middle of the night, we would have never stayed. It started with Luke and eventually made its way around the whole camp. We somehow caught the stomach bug for the 4th time since January and brought it with us on this trip. Remember the buckets I mentioned earlier that I added on our Wa-mart list? The Lord knew I would need them. Each kid slept with a bucket and Ricky got up and emptied them outside through the night. It was a long night. Between puking kids and raccoons stealing our stuff, I was just happy to see daylight!
The next day seemed a little better, so we ventured off and went to the beach for a while before heading home. We had planned on staying another night, but decided that camping just isn't a good idea right now. Not for at least another 5 years. Or maybe ever, we will see.
