Good-bye, Girls

After a morning of swimming, cleaning, and laundry, Shilo and Mauri are headed off to go camping.  Our neighbors recently purchased a super-cool trailer, and man-oh-man, have they put it to good use.  My family (and other friends and neighbors) have benefitted greatly from that little purchase.
  

Thanks, neighbor!

When we lived in UT, we considered ourselves a camping family.  We went at least 3 times a year.  Most of Bill's family have trailers, so even though we were tent campers, we benefitted from the warmth, air conditioning, bathrooms, kitchen appliances, and televisions contained in those trailers.  We have many happy memories of family togetherness in the wilderness (mostly up Fairview Canyon).  It was a great, inexpensive get-away from everyday life.

Since living in Colorado, a state widely known for it's "vivid landscape of mountains, plains, mesas and canyons," (it's called Colorful Colorado, you know), we have camped very little.  At least as a family.  Bill has gone on innumerable Scout Camps, I've attended 3 girls camps and 2 YW overnighters (Bill's been to those too), and we've managed a few Ward Campouts.  We've also met up with Bill's family a couple of times back in Fairview (UT) to camp, but the last time we tried that, we had a few bouts of spousal frustration mingled with a little murmuring from both of us, and decided that it was too hard to pack enough stuff for a family of 7 to visit the city AND camp with the fam.  That was 3 years ago.

See?  Trailer city.  Our tent is back behind all of those.

As I look through the pictures, I'll admit it.  It's worth the effort.  My bad.

We really should go again.  If not this year (we are seriously so busy!), it needs to make it on the calendar next summer.  We still won't have a trailer... that will come after

fixing the car (wow! that was an expense),

finishing the basement,

painting the house,

remodeling the kitchen (becoming more of a need than a want... a long story for another day),

paying for college (approximately 9 more years until we get a break for a year -- a scholarship or two would help out...),

possibly more missions (girls?),
and (dare I say?) weddings.

But (and as my sister would say, "That is a big but,") it shouldn't stop us from going.  Hey, we're pretty darn good with tents.  We've camped in a tent with a 1-month old before (Shilo).  And we have more adults in our immediate family to help (if they can fit it into their schedules).

Definitely something Bill and I can chat about tonight... we have the house to ourselves.