Camping!

We have been camping with the Busches since before we had kids, but we keep the tradition going now. It was harder when we had babies crawling in the dirt, but we've reached the point where now it really is so much fun and keeps getting easier. They love having friends being built into the adventure, we love that we get real down time because they have friends to play with too. We take turns cooking for each other's families so we cook bigger meals but are not cooking all of them, it is such a great arrangement. Love this family and all the memories..Somehow I haven't blogged our camping the last few years.

I decided this year not to take my real camera, but just my point and shoot, well that promptly died on me, so these are all just phone photos, maybe not the best quality but left me with more freedom to just participate and less weight to carry or worry about leaving it in the tent or car. I still was able to capture some memories :)

Our wonderful long time friends, David and Susan enjoying the breakfast we made.

This was the year that we finally got smart and had the kids start doing dishes! They LOVED it, it was a highlight for them and meant one less chore for the grown-ups! So sad the photos of Arran and Mo were on the camera that died.

So much fun; dishes, bike riding, play doh, scavenger hunts, water balloons, hanging with friends, board and card games. They all did so great.

We love Spring Lake. It's a great camp site with all the amenities plus the man-made lagoon.

They were always able to find something to do.

Just proof that I was actually there.

4th of July

The 4th of July is kind of a big deal around here. Americans celebrate their independence and freedom and there are parades and fireworks, as well as our good friend Alice's birthday. Double celebrations, great memories.
For the last couple of years we have all headed out to Sonoma for the afternoon and evening. It's a bit of a trek but they put on a great firework display and we all stay up far too late and then fight the horrendous traffic to get home. I'm not kidding when I say it can take an hour just to get out of the parking lot and inch out of town. We love it though.

So fun having so many friends join us.

Alice and one of her cakes - I think we ended up with 3?

So fun, 'Uncle' David brought sparklers...but then a policeman rode up and told us were weren't allowed to use them :( oh well they got a few minutes in before finding that out.

As we were losing light I put my real camera away to enjoy the show with everyone else and just grabbed a couple more snaps with my phone. It got pretty darn cold but the anticipation and blankets help.

Iphone photos in the dark are not great, but one of me and my love!