*Beware picture overload, the pictures are for my own journal so excuse the amount of them

This past week we had the opportunity to go camping with some good friends of ours up in Sedona. We left on Thursday and camped until Saturday. And we had such a great time, especially the kids. We arrived really late Thursday night, so we just got our tents set up and put the kids to bed and then us adults got to sit around the camp fire visiting and laughing until someone from the next campsite over finally told us to be quiet, what can I say we were having fun. This year I made the amazing purchase of an airbed. Wow that sure does give camping a whole different experience. We slept great on that thing and we even set up the pack and play in the tent for Maylee to sleep in, it made bedtime a whole lot more enjoyable.

Eating breakfast Friday morning... David brought a hammock for the kids to play on.

David and I took the kids for a walk down to the creek by our campsite. It was all I could do to keep Savvy and Dutch out of the water.

Hiking around by the creek...

Playing in the meadow... Racing... Friday afternoon we headed over to Slide Rock to play. We realized something early on about Sedona and that is that everything has a stinking fee that you have to pay. So we finally parked on the side of the road because we refused to pay more money and then spent the next 30 minutes or so trying to find our way down to the river and then we just hiked in to Slide Rock. The kids loved playing in the water, despite the fact that it was freezing cold. We all took our socks and shoes off, as well as the kids pants so that we could wade in the water. But within a couple of minutes Dutch wanted to take off his shirts, and then of course Savvy needed her shirt off as well. So we had two kids in just diapers playing in the freezing cold water. I am sure we got a bunch of crazy looks from everybody else that was there.

The camp ground that we stayed in had a very fine, silky sand that was blended with the soot from the campfires and Maylee kept herself entertained by playing in that dirt. She was so filthy. At one point she found an empty water bottle and she sat herself down in the dirt and filled that water bottle with all the pebbles and rocks that she could find. It kept her completely entertained for about an hour but oh my gosh she was so gross afterwards. Dutch and Savvy played so well the entire time. We hardly had to break up fights. They just ran up and down the road and played in the bushes. And the really kept themselves entertained by playing by the trucks. They figured out how to open the gas door and they thought that was pretty cool.

Good Morning...

The boys kept themselves busy chopping wood...

The babies practically lived in the camp chairs...

Over all it was such a great trip and I was very grateful for the opporunity that we had to go. It was so much fun to go camping and to watch the kids enjoy themselves. Hopefully we will start doing this more often.