Father's Day Camping IV: It Went Wrong

Fiona's legs looked the best

The day after Dec's birthday, I picked him up early from school and off we went to the doctor for his five year well check. Dr. H declared him ridiculously healthy, marveled at his calf muscles, and popped him with two shots so he's legal for kindergarten. Then we hurried home so I could feed the kids and be out the door for D's first night of t-ball. Mike was already up at the campground, getting us set up. We tried the same plan as last year - and hoped it would not go awry. I mean, shots, t-ball, late nights. How could it go wrong ...?

Mike got back to town, swung by t-ball to grab the girls, and then went home to finish packing while I sat in the sun and watched practice. Dec and I hurried home after he was done and loaded up to head to the campground. We got there about 8:30 and the kids were so excited to play with their friends. We were out of the car for maybe 7 minutes before I made them come into the camper to put pants on. And in that amount of time, Dec and Quinn's legs became nearly unrecognizable from all the bites. The mosquitoes were NO joke!

It was a beautiful evening and the kids were having a blast just running around together - so we let them. Until about 9:45 when I declared it was way past bedtime. Ours were not happy about heading to the camper, but once their heads hit the pillows, they didn't seem to mind too much. Then Mike and I headed back out to the campfire to hang with our friends. It was so fun hanging out and was close to 1am before we headed to bed. It started to go downhill from here.

About 3am, Dec woke up crying because his bites were so itchy. We battled that for a little over an hour before I pulled him up to the little couch by our bed. He settled in okay and went back to sleep. But neither Mike nor I slept well either. I was up shortly after 7am to meet Eric and Melissa for a 3 mile run. The kids were just starting to move around then as well, so I left Mike and the breakfast prep. [Both the kids and I were very grateful that Dennis was in the process of delivering coffee to Mike as our running shoes hit the pavement.]

When I got back, Dec was out playing with the kids. But shortly thereafter, he wandered back and told me he was really tired. That didn't surprise me as I knew he hadn't slept well. He and Quinn also continue to complain about their bites. We decided to head down to the playground (it was not super warm yet, so no one was thinking beach in the morning).

Declan asked to take a nap instead - which should have been my first clue that we were going completely off the rails. At the last minute, he changed his mind to park. But when we got there, no one really felt like playing so we wandered over to the beach. Quinn and Dec put their toes in and declared the water very cold. Then Mike found a turtle and helped it back to the water.

By the time we got back to the campsite, Dec didn't look too great. I brought him in the camper to take his temp ... 100.2. I tried to give him some tylenol, but he didn't like the taste, gagged, and then proceeded to throw up (thankfully in the toilet!). He put himself down for a nap and slept hard for about an hour. Then he got up, ate lunch, and asked to go to the beach. This time, I managed to get the tylenol in him and that seemed to help.

After lunch, the crew headed down to the lake. While the water was still very cold and the air was not very warm (maybe low 80s), that didn't stop the kids. All three had a blast playing in the water and playing in the sand. Dec, the Pilcher boys, Matt, and Grayson had some solid teamwork on the world's coolest hole. You've never seen five boys so proud of their hole! My favorite part was when Fiona fell into the water ... her shocked face was priceless!

When we got back from the beach, Dec was spent. Even though he napped again, he was really struggling. He wasn't hungry, his temp kept creeping up, and his mosquito bites were swollen and itchy. As Mike was making dinner, we made the call that after dinner, D and I would head home. I was worried about another rough night and keeping everyone in our camper awake. Mike drove us home in case Dec didn't bounce back - as he would need his car to bring the camper home. And everyone crossed their fingers that Dec and I would be back the next day.

As seems to happen every year, I was once again eternally grateful for friends who absorb our children into their world without a second thought. Even if they give the girls s'mores with two marshmallows and three rectangles of chocolate. The horror!