2nd Annual family camping trip

Last summer, we assembled a full collection of gear for proper family (car) camping. A tent, air mattresses, a camp stove, etc – purchased and trialed with first a backyard campout, followed by our first family camping trip in September. We really enjoyed a mid-week camping trip in September – when it's a bit cooler and campgrounds are pretty quiet on weekdays. Since we homeschool, we have the flexibility to shuffle our schedule, as such.

On the drive south, we stopped by our alma mater, Purdue University, specifically the coffee shop I worked at as an undergrad, Greyhouse Coffee. We ordered crepes for lunch, a latte for me, an americano for Nicholas, and pastries for the boys. They've done extensive remodeling since I was a barista (15 years ago!) but the atmosphere is the same – cozy and nostalgic for us. I mention Greyhouse in my recent post about our wedding anniversary. After coffee and lunch, we got back on the road for the rest of the drive.

This year, we settled on a campsite at Shades State Park, a sort of quieter sister park to last year's pick, Turkey Run State Park. And in mid-September, mid-week, it was quiet. Of the 120ish or so campsites, fewer than 10 were booked. We arrived mid-afternoon on Wednesday and got to work setting up the campsite. The boys were immediately busy with exploring the campsite, helping Nicholas a bit, and riding their scooters. Arlo was happy to move around on a quilt, intensely motivated to get to the dead leaves on the surrounding grass. I knit on a Weekend Headband for Cooper in the happiest orange-red that he chose, and we moseyed about until it was time to make a fire for dinner.

Once we got the campsite and tent set up, we explored the campground a bit. This campground had pretty nice (hot!) showers and the site we chose was a convenient distance to the bathroom, but not too close. The trees were showing just a hint of color, bits of red and gold sprinkled on the ground, like confetti.

We kept meals very simple this year in an effort to simplify things and give us more time and freedom to enjoy other aspects of camping other than heating up water for dishes after every meal. Namely, we brought paper plates and disposable silverware. Here's what we ate for a two-night camping trip:

• grass-fed hot dogs and our favorite uncured brats, cooked in a cast iron griddle skillet over the fire, served on my homemade sourdough hot dog buns made at home (we ate this meal both nights)
• Annie's organic mac n'cheese as a side the second night
• hard-boiled eggs, paired with sausage made in a cast iron skillet on the camp stove, sourdough biscuits from home, sourdough zucchini bread, and fruit packed in the cooler
• lunches were biscuit sandwiches with uncured ham and raw cheese, pretzels, beef sticks, and other snack-y things we could eat on the go.
• s'mores both nights, made with Dandie's marshmallows, Hu Kitchen 's simple dark chocolate, and Simple Mills Honey Cinnamon Seed & Nut Flour Sweet Thins (basically graham cracker in a smaller form factor)
• water from home, as well as a filtered water dispenser
• coffee each morning, made with water heated in a saucepan, coffee pre-ground at home, and brewed in a palmpress. Hot coffee in the chilly mornings was wonderful.

After dinner on Wednesday, we went for a walk around the campground, took showers, did some circuit puzzles together, and finally got into the tent close to 9PM. The boys slept well. Despite daytime temperatures in the mid-eighties, it was surprisingly chilly at night, getting down into the fifties and we were a bit ill-prepared for that.

Thursday morning, after we cleaned up breakfast, we drove to another area of the park with several trailheads. With a baby and two smaller hikers, we opted for trails without ladders this year, although Shades does have some highly rated ravine trails that utilize ladders, similar to Turkey Run State Park. We chose trails 1 and 6, which provided us with many of the neat ravine trail experiences, lots of stairs, a waterfall, and some gravel path hiking, as well.

The boys scrambled over boulders, studied rocks, looked for "signs of fall," and jumped in puddles. Sometimes Nicholas would help the boys find their footing, but they did well with the hiking, overall. Finn did want to be carried for a bit. Between trails 1 and 6, we took a snack break at a wooden playground not far from the parking lot.

After we maxed out the boys' hiking capacity, we hopped in the car to get ice cream, followed by a brief stop at a Walmart to buy socks, since we didn't pack any and we wanted to dress more warmly that night.

We went back to the campsite to build a fire, make dinner and s'mores and got ready for bed. And we all slept well – Nicholas and I much cozier in our newly purchased socks, and the boys very worn out from all the hiking.

On Friday morning, we ate breakfast and made coffee and then began packing up the campsite. We made the drive home and the boys have not stopped talking about our camping trip or asking when we can go again.

A few notes about this year's trip versus last year's trip

Meals were much simpler, as I mentioned above. Also, I had a master camping packing list from last year (heavily influenced by my friend Kathleen) which I only needed to tweak this year. We store much of our camping gear in bins, which is great for storage, but also transport. Sure, it's still a huge amount of work to get everything organized, but for our second annual trip, it felt so much less overwhelming to me. After a few hours in the car (lots of knitting time for me!) and several loads of laundry later, and the work was basically done. Nicholas and I both agreed that this length of trip works well for our family in this stage, and that this year's trip was so enjoyable, all around. Next year, we'll pack socks.

Until next time!