KJ's Ladies: Camping in a hurricane

Yeap! You read that right, we went camping a couple of weekends ago and it happened to be the time that Hurricane Flo was making it way through NY. It was definitely a different and bonding camping trip... yeap one of THOSE camping trips. One of those kinds of trips were you wonder if it is even worth going camping or suck it up and loose the $40 you paid for the site. One of the kind of trips were you lay awake at night wondering if it is worth it to pack up and go home to sleep... yeap one of those trips!

Our food group decided (after much debate) to try and go camping for the weekend. There were 10 adults and 10 children under the age of 10. The weather was supposed to be rainy on Saturday afternoon thru Sunday AM. So Prince Charming and I packed for rain, we went to Walmart and bought 3 of the largest tarps we could find, we brought rain gear for everyone, and a huge tent that my parents use for parties as a place to keep dry.

To start off with, Thursday night packing got a late start because Prince Charming had to do some work at church first, so we ended up packing the camper in the dark. (We did not get everything we needed because we tried to do it by memory -not a smart move) and I had not done the shopping yet. So the plan was to pack the camper and just put the food in on Friday. So Friday I went in to the hospital to see MomMom and then do the shopping. I got a late start and had to hurry shopping, lost my list so had to do it from memory and then lost my wallet (which I eventually found).... so I was late picking up Princess #1 from school and late getting home to pack the camping food and late getting started camping.... not the best of ways to start a weekend!

So Friday we got a late start camping, and ended up setting up in the dark. We did not get all of the tarps up that we would have liked but we did the best we could and then just went to bed on Friday. Hurricane Flo decided to hit early and a huge storm came in Friday night. At about 4am Grandpa G and Grandpa G decided to call it quits and head home for the night. Their tent was leaking so bad they couldn't sleep. We were up from 3-5am and even though we have a camper, rain in the camper is really loud! So we were dry but awake.

Saturday morning rolled around and everyone came out from the tents a little wet! (understatement). It fortantely had stopped raining. The Archeologist and his wife had left their stuff in the car in case of rain but forgot to shut the sunroof so their car was waterlogged, they also left a window open by the baby's bed for air, but the rain was so bad that it soaked him and the bed, so they had to get him up and changed at 4am so he thought it was time to get up... needless to say they did not sleep. The Builder and His Wife had some pooling due the sloop of the hill and did not sleep well due the the rain on the tarp. There was talk of packing it in that morning because we knew the worst of Flo had yet to come, but we stuck it out. Grandpa and Grandma G returned and The Heating Man and His wife joined us in the early morning. We had a nice lunch and then some of the group had to head out to a birthday party for a short while. Some went to get some sleep and some of us played cards. Then it started to rain... light at first and easy to deal with. But then it started becoming more steady and the large tent we brought for shelter leaked. It also started to get really cold! We planned a nice dinner over the fire for Saturday night, but with all the rain it was not working very well for a good fire. It was about 8pm before we could get anything cooked. We ended up putting all 8 kids (babies with mommies) in our camper and letting them play as it was the only place they could stay warm and dry. It was then we figured out our camper had a leak.... small and minor. The Heating Man and His wife ended up heading home because they had left all of Little Man's(10months)clothes in the diaper bag at the birthday party. We had dinner and called a night. (after an emergency run to the laundry mat to dry some clothes)

The Lord was gracious and the rain stopped shortly after we went to sleep. Then the wind started and everything was pretty dry by the time we woke up the next morning. We had a great breakfast, The Heater Man rejoined us, we hiked up to the escartment and had a beautiful church service together. The weekend ended beautifully!

All in all, I am glad we didn't call it quits. I am glad we were in misery together because now we can look back and laugh. We all have a bonding expierence. Yeah it was hard, no it wasn't the funnest camping trip ever, but the company was the best and the memories were irreplacable.

Saturday morning after the "surprise" Friday PM rain