The Olson Odyssey: Camping in LaConner, Washington

Aaron, Elijah and I went camping the second week in June with five other couples to celebrate my good friend, Deborrah's, birthday. I love to camp and Aaron tolerates it for my sake, which makes me ecstatic! I was so excited about it being Elijah's first camping trip, but I was also a bit nervous. I didn't want everybody to wake him up at night and I also didn't want him to wake everybody up in the morning. He can get pretty cranky if he is not well rested and that did not sound fun.

My nervousness was confirmed when I saw our tent was going to be right next to both fire pits.... you know, the place where everybody hangs out having fun until the wee hours of the morning! The first night was pretty difficult to get him to sleep with the new environment, but once he finally zonked out, with the help of the mattress pump, he stayed asleep quite a while. When the batteries ran out and the loud noise stopped as a result, he woke up soon enough with all the voices outside our tent. I tried to get him back to sleep and decided to loosen up and let him join the party for a bit.

He got so much attention and love. He was passed around until he demanded to go back to sleep. Aaron and I whisked him off to the clubhouse when he woke up early the next morning to keep him from waking everybody up. It was a treat to feed him at a table in a high chair instead of on the ground at each breakfast. We were pretty spoiled with this extra nice camp ground! It was a step up from the norm.

So, he did wake up a bit throughout the entire weekend because it was impossible to expect everyone to be quiet, but he slept well enough. His typical nap schedule got pretty off, but he amazed everybody. People commented all weekend about what a happy, content baby he is. As a mom, I couldn't help but love those comments and feel complete relief. It is funny, he rises to the challenge whenever people are around and I assume it is because he is such a social little guy. He LOVES people and is always smiling and giggling when people relate with him. Next time I will be prepared with some white noise to help him better sleep, but he did great considering and he slept great that entire way home in the car!

Over the weekend we ate some of the best camping meals of my life...Dad, notice I said SOME! ;) I felt like we ate and ate and ate. We also went for walks, played volleyball, took naps and just hung out with everybody. Most of the people who went are friends of Deborrah and we met them at her and Bruce's wedding. Aaron officiated their wedding and I was a bridesmaid so they are good friends. But addtionally, Michael and Itzi, our good friends and neighbors went with us also. They got to meet a lot of new people. The only two bummers for the weekend were that Aaron had to leave early Saturday evening for work/church and I ended up feeling horrible because of allergies. That is pretty typical though when I spend that much time outside even when I am taking stuff. Well, enjoy some of our memories through these photos!

We had just finished setting up this bigger

tent we borrowed from friends since we
had Elijah's pack -n- play with us. We had
to leave a lot of our camping equipment behind
at home since it wouldn't all fit in our little
Honda with Elijah's stuff!