Adventures in Camping

One of the things we love the very most about being here in Virginia is our proximity to the beach. Despite my fear of being dragged out to sea and eaten by a giant bull shark, I really love playing in the ocean, as long as I can touch easily(silly, since I know that most shark attacks occur in shallow water anyway, according to a documentary on Discovery channel's Shark Week that I was foolish enough to watch). So every summer we have to make at least one trip to the beach, whether it be a week in the outer banks or a weekend camping in VA beach. Having a new baby and limited vacation time left, this summer we decided to go camping at one of our favorite places right on the Chesapeake Bay beach (and just a 5 minute drive to VA beach.) But being as it is mid July in one of the hottest summers on record and with a new baby, the idea of sleeping in a tent was not appealing to me or Tim. So we looked into renting a camper instead. We couldn't find too many places that rented campers out and those that did were taken the week we were planning our trip. So we turned to craigslist(camper + craigslist= red flag numero uno). We found a woman renting an "older" (red flag #2) pop-up camper on craigslist for a great price. The 1"X1" underexposed photo didn't disuade us; we figured as long as the AC works, what else really matters? Well the week before we were supposed to leave, the woman who owned it called to tell us that the previous renters brought the camper back damaged. She said the mechanism that makes the camper pop up is not working on one corner (big, bright, flashing red flag #3) and that she may not be able to have it fixed in time for us and asked us to make other arrangements. When Tim called me to tell me this I was heartbroken. Having been pretty much stuck in my house for the past two months I needed this vacation! So I told Tim to call her back and tell her that we could not make other arrangements, and ask her to please get the camper fixed in time for us to use it. She agreed.

So the following week we picked up the camper on our way down to the beach. It was not the prettiest of campers to say the least, but that didn't concern us. When we picked it, the lady showed us how to crank it up and down and everything seemed to be working fine. Now fast forward to 9:30 pm. We finally get to our camp site, exhausted and ready to go to bed. But as we cranked the handle, one corner of the camper would not come up more than 6 inches. Three hours and lots of help from our camping neighbors later, the camper was still only halfway up. My kids were begging to go to bed and we were all hot and sweaty (especially Tim, who spent 2 hours lying on his back under the camper trying to fix it with only a head lamp, a borrowed hammer and a small pair of pliers). So we finally decided to sleep inside of it despite the fact that it was only halfway up.


After a restless night of worrying that the camper was going to come crashing down on top of us, Tim made a trip to the local Lowes the next morning to get some tools and some 2x4s so that we could either fix it or get it up make-shift style. Again thanks to our very kind neighbors, we were able to get the corner up using some 2x4s anchored in different secure places with zip ties and rope. Then, as we pulled the two bars down to secure the wing beds, the canvas ripped in several places. Ay carumba! This thing just gets better and better! So we then had to secure two tarps over the ends to cover the holes. Make-shift, indeed! Seriously, I was more than a little embarrassed to be seen near this joke of a camper to say the least. But not embarrassed enough (or worried enough about it crashing down on us and killing us all in our sleep) to go home and miss out on our vacation. So after talking to the woman who we rented it from (who, I must take a moment to defend because this was not her fault- we should have listened to her the first time she told us it was broken. And she felt really bad about all of this and offered to refund our money) we decided to stick it out for the rest of the week. Surely the risk of the camper killing us all was no more than the risk of us being eaten by a shark. And I am so glad did. We ended up having three amazing days at the beach, with perfect weather, perfect waves and perfect water. The kids had a blast. Jace was old enough and brave enough to play in the waves this year, and he loved it! It was so fun to watch him on that boogie-board- he is so light that he can ride even the smallest wave. Ethan just loved to play in the sand and build sand castles and Wesley spent nearly the entire trip in the stroller sleeping, perhaps having nightmares about the sketchy looking place he was sleeping in at night. So despite the stress we went through on this trip, it ended up being a lot of fun and a great adventure. But next time we will stick to renting from more reputable companies and leave craigslist for finding baby stuff and pieces of used furniture.

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The camper, in all it's ghetto glory...

Jace and Ethan watching a movie while we finish setting up camp- check out the giant rip to the left of Jace's head.

Wes chillin' on the couch, which he later fell off of when I turned around for one second to pick up an UNO card. Go ahead, say it- I am a terrible mother. But I have learned my lesson- no more propping little babies up on the couch no matter how stable you think they are.


Jace enjoying the surf

Wesley's home for the week...

Have you ever tried to take a one handed self portrait with a DSLR? It doesn't work very well:)

Look at all of us posers- one of the reasons I belong benind the lens:)

See part 2 below for some more photos...

Adventure in Camping- Part 2

Just a few more snaps from our beach trip- mostly of Jace playing ball. We walked down to the beach every night at sunset to play catch with Jace. This boy is a baseball machine, I tell you! I don't think he has gone a single day without playing baseball in some form(including indoors with wadded up paper) since March. He loves baseball and has become quite the little player.


Just a few snaps of him...

I love this shot...

Such a cheeser...

Ethan playing with our camping neighbors' little boy who he became good friends with. If it wasn't for these friendly people, we would have had to pack up and go home. There is no way we could have gotten the camper up without their help.

Check out the dolphin to the left of Jace's head(click on it to see closer)- we see dolphins every time we go to VA beach- love it!

And that is it for now! Until next time!

More Wes

Some of you may have already seen these, but I wanted to post them here too. Some of my faves to date of sweet Wes. Especially this last one- gives me the warm fuzzies:)

Tired

Last week we went camping at the beach for a few days(a story in and of itself- I will blog it shortly) and it really took a toll on Ethan. I tell you, this kid has a very hard time going to sleep sometimes. While we were at the beach, he would wake up at 7am and play in the sun all day long without a nap so you would think come 9pm he would be so tired that he would fall asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow. But no sir- he still took a good hour to fall asleep. Drove me crazy! But I knew it would catch up to him eventually. A day or two after we got home we sat down to watch a few episodes of Wipeout(we love that show) after Tim got off of work and he tanked it. The big balls and shake-i-later were not enough to keep this tired kid awake! Here's a little snapshot- isn't he cute, all upright and asleep?

More to come...

Flashback

As promised, here is a flashback post from August 8, 2009. Last summer, Tim's parents came out to visit us and Tim's brother Chuck, who was stationed in DC from Germany (strange, huh?). So what better place to take them than to our nations capital!

My kids favorite thing about DC- the Metro!

If I had a dollar for every time I have been in the Air and Space Museum... actually, I wouldn't even have $10, but you get my drift.

Whoa- who is that stranger in the photos below? Some of the very, very few pictures I appear in. Shame on me, I know... Just look at those two willing subjects in my lap:)

Hangin' with my Ethan on the lawn.

Check out this air! My favorite thing about this shot is the bird flying just above Ethan's head, though it looks more like a spec here.

The whole gang...
Good times! More photos of Wes in a bit...

Welcoming Wesley

I can't believe we are halfway through the year and this is only my second post! Needless to say, I am sadly behind. But I have come up with a brilliant plan to catch up and keep this blog up to date: I am going to try to blog current photos/events on Sundays and do a catch-up post (for example, Jace's first day of kindergarten which occurred over 9 months ago and has barely been mentioned here on the blog, making my motherly-guilt feeling a 10 on the mo-guilter scale. Like that term? I am thinking of using it regularly here on the blog since I seem to refer to my guilt level quite often in posts about my kids. Okay, I digress.) on Tuesday nights while Tim is at church meetings. I won't make any promises, but I am really going to try to do better.

So enough talk. Now to our most exciting news, we welcomed baby Wesley Kline Carroll to our family on May 31st at 5:01 am. He was 7lbs 15oz and 20 3/4 inches long and came out looking like the spitting image of his brother Jace (as a baby, not a 6 year old), but with Ethan's chin. Both Jace and Ethan were born one day before their due date, so when Wesley's due date came around, I was super anxious, especially since my mom was flying into town in just one week- I did NOT want to have a late baby! So I came home from church on my due date and, just like I have done with every pregnancy before, I started Googleing ways to induce labor and signs of labor in hopes that I would find some new breakthrough way to get the process started or maybe just reading about it would put me into labor. Well, guess what? It actually worked because when I got off of my computer to go make dinner at 5pm, I started having labor contractions. We waited around for a few hours and my contractions were getting stronger and longer, but were not very consistent. So we waited around until about 11pm when they were so painful that I could hardly breathe. Surely, this was the real thing. So my friend Amy came over to stay with our kids, and we headed to the hospital. Sure enough, I was already dilated to a 7. PHEW- barely in time for the epidural, of which I am a BIG fan! I don't know how you natural child birth women do it- it amazes me! But I was pretty proud of myself for making it all the way to 7cm without pain medication. Go me- now bring on the relief! So that is basically the story- another 4-5 painless, numb below the waist hours, a few pushes and he was here! I will be honest and say that during this last pregnancy, which was very hard on me and my body, I was pretty sure that I did not want to do this again. But after seeing the miracle of birth and spending the first few days mostly alone in the hospital with my new little angel, I fell in love and wanted to do it all again! As much as I hate being pregnant (I know they say hate is a strong word but I will say it again and again!), having a new baby is like an emotional and spiritual high for me. It just puts so many things in perspective for me. And each time I am more and more amazed at how precious my kids are and how important family is and how so much of what I spend my time and energy on just doesn't matter at all. So we will see what the next few years brings- maybe one more is in the cards for us:)

Anyways, here are a few photos of sweet Wesley. I admit that I was a little frustrated that he didn't fully cooperate with my dozens of ideas for photos, and I only got about 8 days out of him, but looking back I really did get some amazing shots of him even if they were not exactly what I was envisioning. (Check my business blog for more, though I may add some of those here later.)

And I still have a few folders of images that I have yet to even comb through. So more to come! This set was taken at 6 days. So sweet...

Enjoy and be sure to check back soon!