Spontaneous Adventurez

 It's been a busy week! It has just flown by. I haven't even posted an update since last Thursday... and that just never happens.

Quick recap: Friday we had "Family Fun" night.
Saturday we had soccer first  thing in the morning and enjoyed lunch with friends... which led to a play date.
Sunday was our usual church day, but we didn't make it. Time change, exhaustion, hubs had to work so mamma didn't take the crew by herself.
Mark got home around 2 o'clock in the afternoon from working... and I was inspired to get the kids out for a boat ride.
(Future post entitled "Spring Break Gone Wild" will follow- as soon as I finish writing it!) So, off we went.

The boys love to get out on the water, and so does their mamma!

It's hard to beat a day (or a few hours) on the boat.


Especially, when you come upon your very own little island. We found this spot and got out to explore, because we are Adventurers like that.

I got to looking around and decided that I just needed to stay. So, at 4 o'clock in the afternoon- we rushed off to get the camping gear!

So, it was rush rush to get what we needed and get back to set up camp before dark! And....we actually pulled it off! I am so glad we did.  This is the view just before dark as we headed back to our little island.

And this is the view that I woke up to the next morning:

It may have been a little nutty to head off "wilderness camping" at 4 p.m. but it was well worth the effort! The key to getting it together so quickly is that I have a couple of camping bins organized and ready.

 The first bin has our sleeping bags and matresses with a battery operated blower- cause mamma is happy to rough it- but not on the ground. We have a family size tent, and a couple of smaller ones to choose from. (The smaller ones are very handy for when it's just me & a couple of kids.)

The next big bin contains our little camp stove, an extra small pro-pane tank to run it, a cooking pot, a coffee pot, cooking and eating utencils, camp plates, mugs, bug repellent, lanterns, lighter, extra batteries and a few other necessities that make life a little easier in the great outdoors.

I have a large pillow case in which I keep our "camp pillows". I made them out of inexpensive pillows from Walmart. I just cut them into 3rd's, covered them with a plastic bed liner to keep off the dew, and then re-covered them with cheap cotton pillow cases that are attached with velcro for washing. It really makes a difference to make things as compact as possible on these adventures!

I threw long pants, long sleve shirts, and pull-overs at the boys to layer up over their bathing suits. I grabbed extra undies, T-shirts, and toothrushes. I grabbed a large aluminum bowl for washing dishes, water, hot dogs, chips, and marshmallows..... and we were off on our impromptu adventure!