Last Sunday we were sitting on the sidewalk eating popsicles. We were on the sidewalk because grass here in Texas can be a little pokey. I thought, "what we really need is a picnic blanket." And then I got a wonderful idea.
For years I've had a dream to make a quilt out of old pairs of jeans. I've never done it, because . . . you know . . . I want it to look AMAZING. But I'm not an amazing quilter, in fact I'm not even much of a quilter. So I always save my old jeans and then end up throwing them away in frustration when I dejunk my projects.
My wonderful idea was to make a picnic blanket out of old jeans. A picnic blanket doesn't need to be amazing. In fact the less work that goes into it the better because then I wont feel bad laying it down in the dirt/mud/grass/other things I don't want to sit on.
And so with that happy thought I went to work cutting up the pairs of old jeans that I'd been hording.
[I've moved the description of how I made the quilt over to a more detailed post about the quilt. Click here to go to that post.]
I'm so glad I finally made a jean quilt. And I'm equally glad that it only took 26 seams to do it.
I was motivated to get the quilt done so fast so we could take it with on a little camping trip we planned for the weekend.
Brandon had the day off on Friday so we packed up the camping stuff and drove to Lake Georgetown which is not even an hour away from our house. I picked this campground because it had shade and there was a swim beach at the lake. The swim beach turned out to be closed which was okay because we happened to pick a really cold weekend to go camping.
The first thing we did was set up the tent. The kids were so excited to see it and play in it. Derrick immediately started picking up handfuls of dirt and putting them into the tent. (He's at the put-stuff-inside-of-things stage.)
The picnic blanket ended up becoming the "save the tent floor from being ripped up by little rocks blanket."
Once the novelty of the tent wore off the kids started playing with the toys that we brought along for the trip. Everyone played with the tractors I bought at DI for Christmas presents - good thing I bought three.
Brandon started making dinner and discovered these really big, scary looking daddy long leg spiders. They looked like baby versions of the ones from the movie Jamangi. We brushed them away, but Lydia and Charlotte kept spotting more throughout the rest of the trip.
We had stew and bread bowls for dinner. We like to eat this because it's easy to make. Camping with toddlers is not the time to try to make time consuming camping meals.
Here is a picture of our whole camp site. I loved how shady it was. I also loved the pavilion for our picnic table. I can't believe this site was only $12.00. There wasn't even an online reservation fee.
After dinner the kids spent a lot of time playing by themselves. Charlotte filled up this bus with dirt and drove it around.
Lydia collected rocks and put them on the table. She didn't stop until the line of rocks spanned the whole table. And then she moved on to filling up the tent pockets with rocks.
Derrick spent most of the trip pushing this tractor around. He would mostly push it around on the cement, but occasionally he'd get off the pad and crawl through the dirt, rocks, and pokey grass. He basically had the time of his life playing in all the dirt.
We lit a camp fire before it got too dark. The kids loved looking at the fire, but they listened to our warnings about staying a safe distance from it.
Brandon had a lot of fun building the fire. He's slept outside a lot during the past several months, but he hasn't been "real camping" in a long time. He was so excited to go chop down dead wood with his hatchet.
For safety's sake we didn't let the kids roast marshmallows. Instead Brandon roasted them all for us. All the firewood was from cedar trees so the smoke smelled really good. It was kind of fun to eat cedar smoked marshmallows. The kids sort of liked them.
Mostly they just enjoyed watching the fire.
They thought camping was the coolest thing ever.
Soon it was time for bed. The weather forecast said the night would get as cold as 38 degrees so we planned accordingly. Each girl slept in two sleepers. We brought the cushion from the window seat for the girls to sleep on. The girls also laid on top of a heavy quilt. They each had their special pillows and blankets that they sleep with each night (plus their bears and babies). I folded the rest of the quilt over them and put a sleeping bag on to top it all off. They were very warm.
Derrick likes soft plushy blankets so I brought my Korean Mink Spiderman blanket for him to lay on. Then I covered him up with a blanket, a child sized sleeping bag, and another blanket. He was also in two sleepers.
I worried that Derrick would have a hard time falling asleep outside of his crib, but he actually fell asleep right away. I liked watching him drift off to sleep while his little fingers stroked his teddy bear.
His sisters were another story. They wouldn't stay laying in their beds long enough to drift off to sleep. Eventually they each ended up with their heads on my knees. I sang them primary songs and told them stories of when Mommy and Lindsey were little. Lydia fell asleep and I put her in bed. Charlotte stayed awake so finally I just put her in bed and let her play with my phone until she fell asleep.
Brandon and I went out by the fire. We talked and roasted a few skittles. Then we came back in the tent and blew up the air mattress. We'd left it deflated while the kids were awake because we are pretty certain they contributed to the leak in our last one. We had three sleeping bags, double socks, and thick pajamas. I also had my black fleece blanket that I love to take camping. We were toasty warm.
Charlotte worked her way out of her blankets and woke up cold in the middle of the night. So I brought her into bed with us to warm her back up. She wasn't annoying so I let her stay the rest of the night.
In the morning Derrick and Lydia joined us. We could have all stayed in bed for a while, but I really really really needed to go to the bathroom. The girls insisted on coming with me so all three of us went on a walk. They kept up pretty well and we made it to the bathroom in time. On the way back to our campsite we moved at much leisurely pace. I wish I had brought the camera. The girls looked so cute walking down the road in their pink sleepers.
Derrick had wet through both his sleepers so despite the morning chill I changed him into his clothes for the day. He cried the whole time I changed him. But once he was in dry clothes I wrapped him up in my black blanket and held him. Only his face was showing and he had the most content and peaceful look on his face. It was like he was thinking, "I'm warm, and mommy is holding me, I'm warm and mommy is holding me." He laid perfectly still in my arms for a long time.
Brandon made hot chocolate and got a fire going again. We all sat by the fire and got warm. We were sitting a lot closer than we had the night before. A small ember popped into Lydia's lap. Before I knew what had happened Lydia said, "pretty fire" and touched the ember. She started crying and I brushed it out of her lap pretty quick. After that we moved the chairs back a foot or two.
Brandon made fire while I wrangled the kids. We had eggs, sausage, and hashbrowns. The kids only ate the eggs.
The kids seemed to be getting a little "camped out" and I was craving a shower so we started packing everything up. Lydia was crying a lot so we ended up putting her in her seat in the car with the windows down. She fell asleep almost instantly. Derrick and Charlotte played around while Brandon cleaned up every thing outside the tent and I cleaned the inside. Then we took the tent down.
After everything was packed up we said goodbye to the campground and drove down to the lake. It was a pretty lake. I hope the swim beach opens up soon, I'd like to come back and play at it.
Then we went home. We spent the rest of the day doing laundry and doing pretty much nothing. I was sore from the hour or so spent on my knees rolling up sleeping bags and blankets in the tent. So I took it easy the rest of the day.
By Sunday afternoon though we were ready to get out of the house again. We drove out to a near by reservoir called Stillhouse Hollow Lake. This is the view of the lake from the dam.
We were out there to check out the model airplane park. Brandon is hoping to fly his model airplane there one day.
We had a little picnic snack while we were there. Here are all the kids crowding around me waiting for their turn. I felt like a mother bird.
Charlotte and Lydia found some chairs and had fun with those.
Derrick had more fun with his tractor.
The grass was really pokey so Derrick bear-crawled his way through it. He would also stand. I kept waiting for him to walk, but he never did.
Earlier in the week I'd filmed him crawling. I realized I hadn't filmed it yet. He learned how to crawl right around the time I went to Georgia. He's become very very fast. So here is a video of him crawling. Keep watching for some video of the kids playing around in the field at the model airplane park.
So those were our great adventures from the week. The rest of the week was not so great or adventurous. I've noticed that if the girls take naps after 3:00 they are up until 10:00 or 11:00. Monday night Charlotte was up with me until 12:00 - not cool! I came to the conclusion that I would rather have ornery kids all afternoon than have them staying up late. So nap time is pretty much over for the girls. That's led to some "interesting" situations, but they usually fall (literally) asleep around 6:00 and stay asleep all night. Some days they still sneak in a nap, but for the most part I have control of my evenings again.
There were some cute pictures amid all the changes to sleep patterns. Here are the girls playing together on the upside down lego table. They pretend it is a bed, or a car, or whatever else they need it to be.
Charlotte LOVES to vacuum. Which has it's pluses and minuses. Here is an example (that also happens to be the craziest 5 minutes of the week and possibly of the month). Lydia spilled a box of crackers on the office floor. I told her to pick them up and instead she started stepping on them. (Lack of nap defiance). This earned her an immediate spanking and she started bawling. I told her we needed to vacuum the crumbs up before the ants came. Charlotte immediately yelled, "I do it!" And ran to get the vacuum.
All the commotion woke Derrick up who started crying. I got him up and then found Lydia in the hall with a gallon of milk. She asked me for some cheerios. (Lack of nap munchies )To keep her from doing anything dumb with the milk I took her into the kitchen and gave her a bowl of cheerios.
Derrick was still crying and so I went into the hall to change his diaper. By this time Charlotte had wrestled the vacuum out of the front closet and was trying to bring it past me while I changed Derrick. Finally Derrick was changed and Charlotte could take the vacuum into the office to vacuum the floor. She did a great job and got up every crumb.
Both girls love to build castles with all our mega blocks. Charlotte also loves to build with the cans of food that I keep at her level for this very purpose. Here is her latest castle.
Thursday was a nap day. After the girls woke up they stayed up late playing dress up in the front room. Charlotte loves to put on her Halloween tutu and say "I Princess Fiona!, Lil-la Shrek, Dewick Donkey." And Lydia will say, "I Shrek!" with a happy little smile. Shrek has basically passed up the Hulk as Lydia's favorite green person. She wants to watch Shrek every day. But she still has a special place for the Hulk and watches the Avengers a lot too.
One last thing for this post. I had a doctors appointment today. The baby is doing fine. And I lost two pounds! Yeah it's been a great week.
