One of our friends oldest children was turning 5, and for his birthday he wanted to go camping. So, 16 of us headed up Mt. Lemmon to celebrate Noah's fifth birthday, one I am sure he will remember for a very long time.
The number 16 isn't a typo, there really were 16 of us. Eight adults, and eight boys. All of them ages 6 and under. This may or may not sound like complete chaos to you. What about a 6 year old, a 5 year old, three 3 year olds, an almost 2 year old, a just barely 1 year old and a 4 month old sounds like chaos? Did I mention they were all boys?? Within three minutes of all the boys getting out of the cars things like "we need a stick rule" and "don't throw rocks at anyone" were already being heard. Zack, of course, is still sweet and innocent and perfect, and was not participating in any stick fights or rock throwing. He did, however, manage to completely cover himself in dirt.
Friday we all had a great time. We somehow managed to get all of the boys down for the night in their respective tents, and then the adults got to play a lively game of "Things", mixed in with some mouse chasing. It was fun. Then, we went to bed, and that's where it all went down hill. I would prefer to block out 10pm-2am from my memory completely. Zack cried on and off the whole time. He would stop crying when I was holding him. And standing up. In my bare feet. In the tent. In the forest. And all I wanted to do was sleep. At one point his crying woke up another child, so we had two crying/screaming children in camp. Good times. Finally, around midnight, we decided to see if Zack would do better sleeping in the car. So, he and James headed out to the car...an hour later they were back at the tent, and we made a completely logical decision. We decided to drive home. At 1am. Being tired with a crying baby in the forest makes you do funny things. We got home at 2am. Zack, of course, slept the whole drive home. When we put him in his crib, he gave us a sweet giggle, rolled over, and fell right asleep.
He woke us back up around 6:45 that morning. James and I are not cut out for 4.5 hours of sleep. We're pushing 30...30 year olds need sleep. 1 year olds are unaware of this need. They just want their mom's to hold them. And give them milk. And feed them nothing but blueberries, cheese and cheerios. Maybe that's just my 1 year old. But he's cute. And perfect. And I want 15 more just like him.
James and I were staring blankly at one another over some coffee. Zack was happily chatting in his high chair. James and I were debating what to do. All of our stuff was still up on Mt. Lemmon. We surely didn't take time to pack anything up at 1am. That would just be nonsense. He didn't want to go by himself, I didn't want to go by myself...all we wanted to do was sleep. In the end we decided that all 3 of us would head back up Mt. Lemmon, we would stay for the day, and then come home after dinner. So, we showered (yessssssssssssssssss), then got back in the car and headed back up the mountain. Our friends were glad to see us, and bummed that we had such a horrible night. When they were all up with the sun, and there wasn't a peep from our tent, they were all jealous that we were sleeping so great. Then, Adam went up to where the cars were parked and noticed that ours was missing. Ahhhhhh, so much for sleeping in!
Overall, we had 2 wonderful days and 1 completely miserable night. James says, "we will never camp with a 1 year old again." I could not agree more. Though, I don't know if you can call it camping if you don't stay overnight.
No comments:
Post a Comment