Camping to Paul and I is kind of like Las Vegas. We don't really enjoy it or seek it out, but every once in awhile, when we've finally gotten the smoke out of our clothing finally, we say, "Hey, other people enjoy camping and Las Vegas! We should try it again!"
So I reserved a
yurt based on my parents' recommendation for 2 nights. They were going all of Memorial Day weekend, but since Paul had to work and, as I mentioned before, we are not really sleeping outdoors people I thought Saturday and Sunday night would be plenty. Plus, they were kind of pricy. Think flea-bag hotel price. So we headed off to enjoy time with my parents, their neighbors and my brother and his friend.
I will start by saying I did enjoy that it was close if we needed something. I also liked that there was no cell service or wifi or cable as I needed to unplug for a weekend. I liked sharing a lovely meal including preparations and cleanups with everyone. I liked having extra hands around (I did actually get a nap!) It was very pretty and quiet. I liked not feeling pulled to do any of my housework or ongoing projects (I actually finished 3 of my 5 books I had in progress at the start of the weekend). I liked actually talking with people and playing games with enough adults to actually play a board game. So there were some good points.
So we got there and it was not raining, but cold. There was a fire going every minute because my dad loves smoke and fire and my brother apparently lives for cooking over a fire and having no idea how long things will take to cook and the excitement of risking food poisening. While they loved their fire, the rest of us alternately coughed and screamed, "my eyes, my eyes!" everytime the smoke came in our direction (which of course it constantly did) and we got to play an amusing game of musical canvas chairs trying to change our position with relation to the smoke. Note that the first thing Paul and did upon arriving home was lather up trying to remove the smoke smell. Paul got to go first while I settled the babies and I tell you the smell of Irish Spring never smelt so good to me. But I digress.
The adults took the boys
geocaching and Henri loved pushing around his "motorcycle" wearing his "motorcycle hat" whether or not he was actually in the middle of the road riding. We played lawn darts (well, weighted ones, no pokey ones) in a large, open field & cooked meals on a stove. I also found out my brother thought Paul was his age and not 2 years older than me.
Our yurt was quite nice. 200 square feet, 3 double beds, 2 with twin bunks on top, all new, vinyl 4 inch thick foam matresses (made me think of summer camp). The best parts? A radiator/heater that kept us toasty, power, lights and our own non-shared bathroom (across the way, but our key only opened our own shower/toilet/sink combo).
We snuggled in our beds. Carter asked if we could stay 3 more nights. Henri realized we were sleeping here and said, "I want my pillow pet and I want to get in the car and drive to my bed" after 3 recitations of Bedtime for Teletubbies from memory, he finally fell asleep and slept all night. Carter watched Paul play a game and fell asleep next to him rather than on the top bunk he'd been so excited about. Valerie woke up about 1:30 and couldn't go back to sleep (we'd brought a pack 'n' play), I suspect because we'd not brought a proper feeding chair and she was starving, so she laid next to me to nurse all night. Well, Paul took one look at an exhausted wife on a slippery plastic mattress with a concrete floor and he decided it wouldn't be a bad idea to sleep on the other side of her to keep her from rolling off.
I take a moment here to explain that, like many parents of 3 small children we sometimes end up with 1-3 of them in our bed. However, at home, we have a king size bed. So Paul, Valerie and I on a double size bed was not quite the same. Then Paul cranked up the heat because he'd been freezing, I slept with my arms above my head because there was no room for them next to me. There were dogs howling and barking from 2:30-3:30 am, then at 4:30 the volunteer fire department alarm went off. We awoke early because the skylight has no cover.
I took the babies down to the campsite my parents were at, Carter then happily bounded down about 30 minutes later, in his pajamas across the meadow separating the yurt village and camp sites and looked thrilled. I took a short walk with Paul to check out the big posts coming out of the ground when he came down looking haggard about 30 minutes after that and said, "well, we'll just change x, y & z tonight so we'll be more comfortable." He replied, "Um, I'm not sleeping there again tonight. I'm sleeping in my own bed." Where is this man's sense of adventure? (Maybe hidden in his common sense?) I felt a little sad about it since we'd already paid for the second night, so I suggested we offer it to my brother and his friend and mentioned it to my mom who agreed, maybe Paul and I were better suited for civilization and that his friend would enjoy not freezing all night. So we stayed all of the second day until we got the babies in pajamas and put them in the car. My brother moved to the yurt, my parents kept Carter and Etienne in the trailer with them (the neighbors, not being able to reserve a spot had headed home after breakfast).
The babies and Paul and I got in our packed car thinking happily about warm showers and beds. When Henri kicked Valerie in the head with shoes on and we got to hear her scream all the way home. She still didn't calm down until home when she finally passed out so Paul and I could watch a Netflix movie on the large screen and after it was over she was still screaming. I finally realized she was still starving, so I shoved peas and yogurt into her as fast as I could and put away the cooler items. 2am-8:30am this morning, we all slept the sleep of the dead.
Henri was quite happy to wake up this morning to his TV and microwaved milk, so maybe he's not a camping guy either. He loves the outdoors, but doesn't seem quite ready to embrace the sleeping in it part....
