"High Maintenance"

Might be good words for mommy and daddy. We like traveling and staying at resorts, eating at nice places, showering at least once a day, having clean restrooms, and tile or carpet under our feet. To us, that is fun. Well Kayden loves going to Dick's sporting goods and going inside the tents and pretending to camp. SO we decided it was an experience he needed even if we aren't really "camping ppl". For our vacation in San Luis the Inn that we were staying at wasn't available until Sunday night and we wanted to leave on Saturday, we decided it would be the perfect chance to show Kayden what camping was all about. We looked for campsites at Big Bear lake and they were 100% sold out!! Who would have known that so many ppl liked to camp!?! Then we looked on the beach North of LA b/c that would be close to San Luis and we ended up finding ONE, yes, ONLY ONE open camp site. I guess alot of people like roughing it...I was totally amazed. So we packed the tent along w/ all of our stuff for the week in San Luis Obispo and headed to Gaviana Campsite. On the camp info it said that they sometimes experience high winds, up to 50 mile an hour gusts! Guess that is why they were the one campground on the beach w/ 1 availability. We decided to test our luck and do it anyway. We stopped at a Trader Joe's and bought charcoal in Santa Barbara and arrived shortly after at Gaviana.

I was a little shocked at what Californians call camping. To me it was a big dirt lot. In Nebraska a campground is usually by a lake, with lots of trees and pretty green grass. So putting a tent up in a dirt lot was not what I expected, but I put on a brave face and sucked it up, it was only 1 night, how bad could it be? On the plus side we were a short walk from the sandy beach and could hear the waves crash as we slept:)

We started putting up the tent and must have looked pretty silly doing it b/c our campsite neighbor came over to help:) Then Kyle attempted to blow up the air bed..........and realized he had brought the wrong pump for the air bed. At this point I was a little upset, being 25 weeks pregnant and sleeping on the hard ground was not what I had bargained for! Especially b/c when your pregnant you can't sleep on your back, so that meant hip digging into the ground for the entire night.
On to roasting hot dogs over the fire. Well....we haven't camped in 9 years. The last time we camped was at Country Stampede for a 3 day concert festival and drinking party. So we are not very experienced campers. I had all the food supplies we needed for hot dogs and smores and Kyle got charcoal. Well...charcoal does not make a fire. It makes smoke and burns hot. So not so good for roasting things. Our neighbor came to the rescue again and gave us some firewood that he had purchased from the campsite convenience shop before they closed at 7pm. As we were waiting for the fire to start Kayden and I read books in the tent and then came out to go potty....when he stepped out of the tent he looked up and said "Mama LOOK, SO many stars" and he stared up in amazement. At that moment all my frustration from our camping trip that was a bust melted away. Seeing his innocent little self look up into the sky and be utterly amazed at the beauty made the whole mess worth it, even if he didn't get to roast hotdogs and marshmellows (my main reason for wanting to camp!) BUT finally around 10:30 or 11pm the wood caught fire and he got to roast his hotdogs and marshmellows. He didn't love the roasted marshmellows so mommy at his share but he did love his hotdog:)
The night was long and I didn't get much sleep but Kayden loved sleeping in a tent and sitting by the campfire. He kept coming over and giving Kyle and I hugs and kisses b/c he was so happy.
SOOOOO I guess your 2 high maintenance parents might have to get dirty every once in awhile and take you camping so that you can see the stars and sleep inside a tent on the ground.
But we packed up camp early the next morning and headed to San Luis Obispo to find the comfort of modern convenience!:-)