Camp Bear Den

A few months ago I decided it would be fun to camp for the 4th of July.  The children were less than excited.

Usually, we hang out with Greg's sister and her husband, who loves to blow stuff up, but after he may or may not have set his neighbor's tree on fire, we've had to try new things for the 4th.  My kids still look forward to Uncle Erick blowing things up.  But I already made the reservations so it was too late.

I think they forgave me.

We left Monday afternoon about 1.  I'd been up since 6:30 packing. Camping packing is no joke.

After a lovely drive and some car dancing through the mountains and along the Blue Ridge Parkway (the East's response to the PCH), we arrived at Camp Bear Den.  Initially I was a bit disappointed in our proximity to the other campers.  I like having flush toilets and water spigots near my camp sight, but I also like to have some distance from other campers.  I quickly got over it.  We rented a camping cabin (a 2 room cabin with 2 sets of bunk beds and a double bed), which I do no regret in the least--no kids ripping zippers on tents or stepping on my pillow or dragging mud into the tent--just across from the playground.  After a down pour and some tablet time in the cabin, the older kids disappeared to the playground.  Zora hung around to help make dinner.

 With the help of Becky, we invented the S'more cone.  We used sugar cones instead of graham crackers and Nutella instead of chocolate bars.  There were slightly less messy than regular S'mores.

 After dinner, we went on a walk around the camp ground.  Because all the kids were sleeping in one room, I decided to put Zora to bed first.  Then the rain started in again so I forced the other kids to read with me for a bit and then we played Go Fish until they were actually asking to go to bed.  Then I made them play another hand and then under threat of death if they wake the baby up, we snuck in and I didn't hear another word from them.  It rained all night.  At some point Alice woke up and joined me on the double and then fell off and ended up sleeping under the bed.

The kids slept in nice and late.  We were done and cleaning up breakfast when Zora decided to grace us with her presence.

 Then we headed down the lake path just next to our cabin to the "lake," which was more like a pond.

It also had fishing.  Here's the sad part of the trip: Greg cast his reel out.  Put it down to get one of the kids' poles ready.  Then he heard a swish sound, turned around to see his rod and reel flying over the railing.  A fish caught him.  He spent the next few hours dragging the bottom of the pond to get his rod back to no avail.

 I took the Zora and Henry back to the cabin so Zora could nap.  Henry begged and begged to take a nap.  I finally told him he could, again on pain of death if he woke the baby with his in and out non sense.  He slept longer than Zora.  Meanwhile the older two, zoomed around the camp ground on their bikes, played on the play ground and just had fun.

I forgot to mention that it was the 4th of July and we had made 4th t-shirts.

Isn't this adorable?  Zora playing with her Little People camping set while camping.  So cute right?

 That night we headed into Spruce Pine for their firework show.  It was amazing.  First, it was not crowded in the least.  We went about an hour before the show started to make sure we got a good seat.  No need.  We pulled up.  Picked probably the worst spot out of the several available to park, then headed over to the park where a local DJ was trying to get a bunch of white people to dance.  We ended up getting ice cream.

These two are the cutest best friends and spend all day and night together.  It's adorable.

 Then we walked over and sat on the edge of an old train platform for one of the best fireworks shows I've ever seen.  I was concerned.  Spruce Pine is an old mining town in the mountains.  But they are working on revitalizing their downtown area and put probably half of their annual budget into the show.  We all loved it.  The kids slept like a dream again--except that Zora was up at 6:30.  Boo.

 The next morning we woke up, ate, and packed up to go.  The kids all begged to stay another night and demanded that we come back next year.  And then Alice hit a wet spot on her bike and took quite a bit gravel to the face, knees, and elbows.  Then she was ready to go.

Greg said the cabin was too hot so he slept in the fancy hammock set up he got for his birthday.

Greg's version of the classic stair step picture

 On our way out, we stopped at Linville Falls and ended up doing the entire trail--it was only 0.8 miles up but it was pretty steep.  Greg ended up carrying Zora and I put Henry in the Ergo, until he jumped in a puddle of water and then he cried the entire 0.8 miles back to the cars because no one wanted to carry him.  Also he wasn't wearing socks so ended up with huge sores on his ankles.  Oops.

We had a very quiet drive home. When we got home Greg asked what we were going to do next--are we going to have a movie night tonight?  We all had such a good time we wanted to keep partying, but all the kids were pretty tired so we went to bed on time and I tired to get caught up on laundry.  Boo.