Live from Tormville!

Camping * What worked and what didn't

• Worked: My Stanley FatMax Work Station. Having not camped in a few years, one of the things I did remember about camping is how crazy it made me that there wasn't a place for everything - that by the end of the camping trip I couldn't find anything as everything we needed always seems to end up at the bottom of the large Rubbermaids. But this - this made me happy. I had seen the idea online and I knew it would suit my organizing needs perfectly. I picked one up at Home Depot.  My goal was that it would be for all the items that are needed consistently through a camping adventure. Lighters, fire starters, cups, Ziplocs, silverware, etc.  I loved it. It'll stay packed and ready for our next camping adventure. 
• Worked: Having two coolers.  I laid down strict cooler rules before we left home.  'This' cooler was a mom only cooler which contained all the dinner foods. 'That' cooler was for the condiments, milk, veggies, yogurts, etc that the kids would be more grabby for. My mom cooler was still frozen when we came home five nights later. Perfect. I replaced the ice on the other cooler just once. Both coolers were kept in the van the entire week. 

• Worked: Walking Tacos. This was the meal for our first night. With all our meals, I had precooked everything at home and had all the extras - lettuce, tomato, etc... all diced and ready to go. Quick and easy. All I did while camping was heat up the meal of the day. 

• Worked:  All the signs at the campground that kept the kids (and myself) from getting disoriented. They knew we were on Orchid and they always found their way back. 

• Worked:  My lights. I knew going in that we were going to a no electricty campground, so I picked up some solar lights and a couple strings of twilights. They made me happy and made it easy to find our tent in the dark. 

• Worked: Breakfast sandwiches.  mmmmmm.  
• Worked: Before we left home, I broke 15 eggs and stirred them up in a jar that I popped in a cooler. I used those eggs for these sandwiches, and I used the eggs when I cooked up refried pasty on our griddle. (Break up and fry up the pasty, after it's hot, pour on some eggs and stir it all up some more until the eggs are cooked. mmmmmm) 

•  Worked: My new hammock. I told the kids if they don't fight over it and if they treated it with respect, then I'll consider purchasing another one before the next camping trip. They did a good job. 

•  Worked: Reading chapter books during the down time.  We even managed to get a few sessions of his daily physical therapy in. More fun in a change of scenery. 
• Didn't Work: My air mattress. The problem being that we were cozy enough in a tent that it was hard to find a place to set it up that didn't touch a tent wall. My bedding was wet most nights. By the day we left, I had no voice left, I'm assuming just from sleeping in the damp bed each night. We're buying camping cots before next time. 

•  Worked: Having each of the kids in charge of their own to the beach bag. They packed their own towels, toys, snacks and water bottle. Their job. They then threw their packs on their backs and pedaled their way to the beach. If they forgot something, their problem. So when Brian forgot his goggles, it was his tempermental self that had to get his skinny butt on his bike and pedal back to the campsight to get them. Nice. 

• Didn't work: Not having a lantern for inside the tent. I put that on the list for next time. It would make rainy evening activities a little bit easier. 
• Kinda worked: Rigging up flashinglights into the window flaps. In hindsight, I should have unstrung the twilights from outside and brought them in for that night. 
• Semi-worked: Trying to play Skip-Bo on a bumpy pile of sleeping bags. 

• What didn't work: My van. I think someone left one of the side doors open the whole time we were gone to town. 
• Worked: Camping with friends makes for an easy jump start. 

•  Worked: Driving four miles from camp (to recharge the battery) to get a signal for making phone calls while trolling the woods for firewood. 

• Worked: Precooking twice baked potatoes at home and then cooking them over the coals. They were soooooo good and I'm definitely adding them to the do again list. 
• Didn't work: Our firepit. It was so deep that I fought with the fire all week to the point that I was almost doubting my firemaking skills and reconsidering my husband's Boy Scout juice technique. I felt much better when my sight sharers and more skilled campers showed up on Wednesday and had the same struggles. 

• Worked: Greg had gifted me with a new coffee cup a few weeks ago and it was perfect for me. It can take me an hour to drink a cup of coffee some days, and that cup kept it burn your tongue hot for hours and hours. Nice. 
• Worked: My other favorite breakfast. Yogurt (my go-to yogurt is Stonyfield Plain) with granola and the last of last years blueberries. Yum. 

•  Didn't work: Oh, that Van. On this day they were testing the alternator. I had been so sure that it was that darn door left open. The alternator tested fine. 

• Didn't Work: Biking with flip-flops. If I've told them once, I've told them a thousand times, biking with flip-flops is an accident waiting to happen. We managed to save the toenail anyway - but she's got some skin to regrow. 
• Worked: Bringing a dishpan. Greg had tried to tell me that I really didn't need one, but I had even said, that while I might not need it for dishes, it's the best thing for soaking an injury. Vivian had grabbed hers before I could grab mine, but my point is still proven. A dishpan is a necessity for camping. It's a multi-purpose tool. 
• Worked: That make-shift yet small first aid kit I packed in my FatMax. I'll be putting a bigger one together before the next adventure. 

•  Worked: Blowing up all the tubes at the camp before heading to the river, even if it was a puzzle to fit them all fully blown into the vehicles. 

• Worked: Finding a Pizza Hut to eat a late dinner at after a full day at the dunes and the river, rather than heading back to camp and trying to concoct dinner when some of us were getting a tad bit edgy with hunger. Eighteen of us in all. 
• Worked: The air conditioning at Pizza Hut. Most of the teens took their pizza outside, it was that cold. 

• Didn't Work: Oh, that van. In the end, I think there was a light left on. That one that clicks on accidentally above the sliding side door. Mark just happened to see it after the last jumpstart when he was sitting in the hammock at the right angle. I left for home with others so that they could follow me to the gas station and make sure it started again there. It did. I used it all day yesterday on many turn off and on again errands with no problem. Regardless - I'll be running with Greg today to get the car from the car rental spot - just.in.case - before he leaves again on his next work trip. In a couple hours. 
• Didn't make Deanna happy at all:  Opening up her hood to find a mouse. She shook her finger at that mouse like nobody's business while saying things like - 'this is my NEW van!  Get OUT!! NOW!' That worked. 

• Worked: Phone signals. But only on the top of these 167 stairs or a four mile drive from camp. I climbed these stairs about four times during the week in my attempts to get ahold of Greg. He's always tricky to get ahold of when he's deep in the plants. so evening/sunset was my best bet. He was thrilled to learn that he might have to work on the van during his 14 hours at home over the weekend, and relieved to find that he might not - that it might have been the light left on afterall.

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Now to go enjoy my family for a few hours. Greg made it home about 10:30 last night - but has to head out again sometime before 2. According to the text messages that he's currently responding to - it might be sonner than 2. 

That's our typical July. 

be good. 

Camping * Part I

 Last Sunday, myself and three of the kids headed to Manistee for camping.  

July is always my husband's busy month (when Ford has their July shutdown - he goes into overtime mode. He'll be in Ford Plants in Chicago, Kentucky, New York and maybe Georgia. all before the 19th) 

The kids have been begging to go camping for a few years now. We used to go when Allan and Wendy were little, but it's been awhile. The kids are finally at an age where I felt I could tackle it on my own - but by going where I knew I'd know other campers. 

Sight #34. We made it to the campground just minutes after the 2:00 check-in.  
And we set up. 
The tent putting up lesson that Greg gave me came in handy. I had purchased that tent at a garage sale years ago, but Greg has been the only one to use it when he goes with his brothers Memorial Day weekend. 

Tent set up - it was time to make supper. 

And then go exploring. 

Day one completed by sitting around the campfire. 

Day 2 - more time on the trails. 

Snake! 

We spent two full afternoons on the beach. 

Mark was pretty fired up to catch a fish with his hands. 

The iced over lakes in the winter have made for a very high water level (was it 14 inches higher than normal what I heard?) and hardly any beach. The most beach to be found was by the creek.

Sunset, night three. On this day it had rained most of the day - so we headed out to Ludington to hit some stores and check out the town. It rained enough that I didn't take many pictures, but we did make it down to the beach for the sunset. 

The beach by the creek. To sit anywhere else would be to sit in the water or up on a bank. 

We put in quite a few miles on the trails. 

That Mark learned to ride his bike just a couple weeks before we went was HUGE. He was up and down those trails like a champ. 

Originally I was going to tent on Mrs. K's sight. Mrs. K, because she was Mark's preschool teacher, so when he's around it's hard to call her Deanna, even though we've known each other for about thirty years. 

As it turned out, she started thinking she couldn't come at all - so I bought her out, so then it was a bonus when she WAS able to come with her mom and two girls for two nights.  Mark was pretty fired up to be camping with his preschool teacher. 

*happy sigh* 

Fun to wake up to more faces and fresh coffee. 

On Thursday we piled into two vans and a truck and headed up to Sleeping Bear Sand Dunes.  These three had a final race to the top. Mark had seen the dunes and his thought was, Again?  Didn't we just do this last year???  

Julie hadn't been there since her bigs were little. 

Wendy was at the bottom with a toe injury (more on that in the next post) and I promised the boys I wouldn't make them do the whole, 'let's just go to one more hill' thing like we did last year. 

The group did see a young teen/tween who ran all the way up and down in 9 minutes. That was pretty impressive. I then happened to be sitting next to a woman who said she had visited with the boys mother who said he also does the other steeper hill in 9 minutes (down and up) and that they come for a week every summer and he does the hills every day.  

While the rest of our gang walked the next hill, I sat with the boys. Brian dug this pit all the way to his waist during the time the others were trudging. 

Everyone piled back into the vehicles, we then headed to the Platt River for an afternoon of floating. Shoes are recommended on this part. 

There is a bit of van shuttling that has to go on so that there is a ride at the end, so we took a few photos while we were waiting for the drivers to come back. 

It was a two hour float from the starting point to the lake, and it was awesome. The wind got a little chilly towards the end of the adventure - so we were feeling sympathy for the mom and daugher who were starting as we were ending.  I'm sure they were cold by the time they were done. 

It was a great trip. 

We woke up early yesterday and began packing the sight up, and were on the road by 11. I had debated spending some time on the beach, but I knew I'd struggle with tired driving (a 3-1/2 hour drive home) if I did that, and we were really hoping that Greg would be home last night - 

but he called and he's stuck in Buffalo for one more night. We'll see him hopefully tonight for about twelve hours as he passes through on his way to Kentucky. 

The next camping post will be about what worked, and what didn't.  If you can imagine.  For example - that yellow waterproof bag in that above photo - totally worked for toting Brian's shoes/orthotics down the river) 

Happy Saturday. 

I've got some laundry to tackle. 

A great weekend for camping

I felt like it was the most disorganized camping trip I'd ever been on - having sold the camper this spring, our stuff was a chaotic Rubbermaid assortment of stuff at best - but it was a good trip to practice tenting again on, as we camped conveniently in my husband's aunt and uncle's backyard with a gathering of cousins. We couldn't have ordered better weather. Sunny - upper 80's/low 90's in the day, no humidity and cool evenings. Perfect.

 

It was so nice that the older boys slept out in the open air under the double moon and starry skies. Brian, who uses a lot of hand gestures when he talks, is telling the boys all about how he is going to start kindergarten in just a few more days after (va)cation.

 

On Saturday morning, breakfast was an assortment of pancakes, sausage, eggs and velia.  I skipped out at this point because I was heading out to a baby shower and a skip back home to get a few things that we'd forgotten (horribly disorganized) and to water the gardens (and take a shower - such a cheater camper I was)

 

Getting back to the camping took a bit longer then I had anticipated. The Jeep, which has been acting all sorts of crotchety lately, died on me. I managed to irk it to a park & ride which a little bit creeped me out since it was quite isolated and there were a few guys just hanging out when I got there - but, thank goodness for cell phones, I called my mom and made her talk to me until Greg arrived 30 minutes later to pick me up.  He confirmed that the Jeep was dead....all that smoke coming out from under the hood was a giveaway.   He just called a few minutes ago and the garage has confirmed that we need a new engine.  Call us a single car family for awhile - and thank goodness all my appointments were last week.

We arrived back at camp just in time for a game of water balloon volleying. 

 

And a bike show

 

And a rowdy game of smoosh (smush?) ball.

 

The rules were minimal.

 

We wound down the end of each day with some smores and guitars. On Saturday we got to enjoy both Suzie and George.  I snuck (why is snuck not a word when it makes so much sense?) out for a bit when everyone was captivated and got my Saturday night sauna in early.

 

On Sunday morning we gathered around to listen to church via speakerphone while sucking on Tootsie Pops. A trick I learned this weekend - put the cell phone in a metal phone and it acts as an amplifier.

As soon as church was over, it was a race to the pool. Many many hours spent on sauna swims and swims and diving contests this weekend.  My kids are all fish, and today we have sunburned shoulders.

 

We then accomplished the what we thought impossible and fit two vehicles worth of camping gear and six people into one van for the ride home. We stopped at the Jeep on the way to see if we could irk it a bit closer to the garage and got a few miles down the road before it sputtered out completely.

I'll be without a vehicle for at least a week. Once again I find myself thankful for town living - we can walk to open house, walk to the hair appointment, bike to get Allan's books and so on.

Time to get some beach towels and camping gear swinging on the line. I'm not quite up to my normal Monday pep this morning.

I wonder why....

This photo was carefully checked over for stray underwear before posting

Not this photo, although there's no sayin'.....

This past July the kids and I (the hubby is always busy in July and it's rare that he can vacation with us. The work he does generally makes him busier when Ford does their two week shut down - as he's often involved with the updating that happens during that time.  anyway....) went camping at McLains State Park in Upper Michigan.  It's a favorite of ours - and being that I never know if the hubby will be able to come or not until the last minute - I prefer to stay in a cabin.  At least until the little boys are bigger.  I'm a wimp, what can I say.  This cabin, Hemlock, is my favorite of the 7 cabins. The kids made a lot of use out of that ramp - the out house is just to my right - just out of the photo, and, well, I just like it.

Some of you had asked for a closer look.....

(this is the photo. that was checked....)

They are cozy, especially on day five of five of us living in it.  But they are warm and dry.  Two little space heaters, a hot plate, refrigerator....

....a cot, for extra sleeping - but we used the air mattress on the floor instead.  As it worked out - there was only one (or two?) nights when we needed that as Allan and Wendy both spent nights at various places during that time.

It's the renters job to clean back up when their stay is over.  This is how it looks all ready and fresh. It's a bring your own bedding establishment

 

All in all - I recommend them.  Lake Superior is right out the window, the heaters keep it cozy (they actually rent these year round for snowmobilers/skiiers/winter camping nuts) and again - dry.  drydrydrydrydry

 

I just might be up to doing it again next year.

Maybe

(Camping without any other adults and four kids, wasn't quite all that....but memorable)  ;)

 

our cabin in the wood

I have a list taped to the inside of my cupboard.  It says.....

1. Hemlock (this cabin)
2. Cedars
3. Maples

That's the order of my favorite cabins at the park.  This one was ideal for us on this trip as that ramp was utilized extensively by my little boys with their bikes and the big kids with their ripsticks.

I also like this one because it's set back from the road, with plenty of sidewalk for the kids to play on.

Cozy, warm and dry. They rent these even in the winter time for the real die hards. 

Anyway.

Back at the ranch......

it's raining. finally.  my grass is soaking it up.
I'm looking forward to an at home day today - making my list of what to do's
I told the kids that there is no teasing or fighting allowed today.  And I meant it. Dog-gone-it.
Wendy has a sore throat
Markie still isn't sleeping
Today we'll home remedy - tomorrow we'll decide if we have to go to the doctor - again
I'm so sick of going to the doctor I could screech
I picked up some new books at the library last night - a Patterson and a Kingsbury - talk about far ends of the spectrum
My house is a mess
If I were rich, I'd hire a maid to clean and cook
then I might actually get my binding done......

be good!

Company at the Camp

Good Morning
Friday - sunny - a lovely 64 degrees.  I should make a plan for the day.
grocery shopping
exercise
laundry
sew binding on quilt

there. plan made.

now then - how 'bout some more camping pictures?  I didn't realize how many I had until I try to figure out how to share them.  This round is camping company (I just sensed all my company cringing at once)

We'll start with Claire.  Claire was camping two cabins down for one night - and while we have never met, Wendy and Claire became fast friends.  Our families have enough in common with faith, friends and connections that I had no problem with Wendy going to spend the night when Claire left camp for home - and Wendy is excited to have made another friend close to grandma's house.

And then there's my grandma - she came out to visit several times. She likes to watch the action and makes for great company.  Allan really filled her ear with tales when he shared the fire with her.  Hmph.  It seems he told her that when his dad says no, he means no - but when his mom says no, he has no clue what she means.

as if.

The Laakso's came out too - yeah - the ones who live just a couple miles from us here at home.  I don't know what Wendy will ever do if we vacation at different times as she was begging for Elizabeth as soon as we got up north.

These guys showed up with their swimsuits on and towels around their neck.  Apparently it was a few degrees warmer in town. We dug thru Wendy and Brian's suitcases and layered them up a bit for our lake weather.  Then, to keep them busy, I started them on a fort building project with all the cut down wood on the edge of our camp.  They had a ball - until they found all the rabbit poop in their north wing.

They came out with my mom - as they had just enjoyed an overnight there. My mom came out everyday which was a huge help - she had a bit of time off during my stay, so it worked perfect.

This bunch of boys came out several times as well - Allan's cousins plus one.  They enjoyed our ramp for their rip sticks.  (Ripsticks?) 

Speaking of Ripsticks - guess who else tried it?  And who's son needs a few more lessons in panning, but his framing is just about right.  ;)

Those boys came out with this mom - Auntie Sherry - who is Pa's oldest sister and two days older than me.  I think you might have heard me mention that before.....

I returned from my morning walk one day to find Wendy entertaining a passel of Johnsons at our table.  She had made friends with yet another one not pictured here (I went to school with their dad) and loved the novelty of *knowing* people in the campground

This guy wins the prize for my best dressed visitor, and I feel certain that he won't be making any special trips to visit me at the camp in the future.  He didn't even stay for coffee.  ;)

My grandma came again (I think she came four times total) with my Auntie Barb.  They were a huge help as Markie had just fallen asleep, Allan was gone, and I needed more firewood.  Thanks Auntie!

And this is Carl - he came with his mom and siblings, and Aunt Laura and kids on my last night at camp.  The weather had suddenly turned a bit warmer, although Wendy tells me the water was still quite cold.  It was a perfect sunset evening for the beach followed up by smores at the fire.  Mark had just woken up from that nap - and was a horrible bearish creature - so I didn't get many pictures and those I did were one handed.  But I like this one.  We visited Carl out at his farm last spring - but they are just down here temporarily, and have the good fortune to live by that big lake all the time.

While I captured quite a bit of our company - I missed a few as well.  I didn't capture Claire's parents, the rest of Carl's tribe, or Marvin and Cindy as they wandered into my camp by accident late that first night..... but I think I have enough here for a good two page spread in the album.  :)

happy friday!

How to eat a smore Markie style

First off - this is one of my favorite camping shortcuts - I still thank whoever taught it to me years ago. Well, I would, that is - if I could just remember who it was.  If it was you - Thank you!

Fudge stripe cookies make smore making easy peasy. but our Markie is our first to actually utilize it to it's full extent.

So - as per Markies instructions.....

1. Have mom or older sibling cook marshmallow to brown toasty perfection
2. Layer marshmallow between two fudge stripe cookies
3. Insert finger into hole.  mmmmm.  Even better if the hands and fingers are camping grubby

4. Hand posture is everything
5. Nibble way around the cookie/smore
6. Keep wary eye on potential smore thieves portraying themselves as loving mothers and grandma's

7. Enjoy and Repeat


This little guy, who had been sleeping better - had another rough few nights.  Last night was horrid - we were up all night long.  I just woke up - having hired Allan to watch the crew while I went back to bed.  It wasn't quite enough but it will have to do - there's stuff'es to be done - after all.