Alyssa's Party Camp Out

For the past few months Alyssa has been asking for a Party Camp Out for her birthday. I'm not really sure where she got the idea, but she insisted on smores and ghost stories and a camp out.

Friday morning Joe had to go to a training in Fort Collins so I took the girls on ahead to grab a spot. We went to the Olive Ridge campground which is about 45 minutes from home. It's about 20 minutes south of Estes Park, CO (if you know where that is). We got there about 10:45 and found a spot. I was thinking that it wasn't as bad as everyone around here says. They say if you don't get there early you have no chance of getting a spot. They were right. About 15 minutes later cars started pouring in. It was hilarious because they were racing each other to grab spots. The whole place filled up within minutes.

While we were waiting for Joe to show up I set everything up and we went for a walk over to the playground. Joe suprised the girls with fishing poles for both of them when he got there. They sat and played with them for so long. They had little rubber things on the end so you can practice casting.

We took a drive up to Lilly Lake and walked around a little bit. We pretty much just hung out all of Friday and relaxed. It was nice not to have anything to do.

Kayla at Lilly Lake. (Aly was asleep in the car)

Alyssa spent most of the time digging in the dirt.

This is a cool old church that was down the road from where we were. On Saturday there was a wedding there.

The animals are so used to people that they pose for pictures.

Saturday we woke up and went fishing in Estes Park. Everyone around us was catching tons of fish, but we didn't get a thing. Kayla loved fishing though. Alyssa wasn't too excited when she learned that you just sit there.

The birthday girl eating breakfast. (Nasty Cookie Crisp. I let her pick a special cereal for camping. I don't usually let her eat that junk.)

Sitting and waiting for nothing to bite.

We went back to camp and had lunch and let Alyssa open some of her presents. She has been asking for a dinosaur that bites her finger for months now. Grandma Churchill got her one and she was so excited! She named it Sara and had to introduce it to her puppy that she carries around everywhere. When you pet it's back it growls and purrs. She has already worn out the batteries!

Camping didn't end like we thought it would. Around 3 o'clock it started to thunder and rain and then eventually pour. We thought that we would just hang out in the tent until it passed, but around 4 I noticed that our tent was leaking pretty badly and that Kayla's sleeping bag was soaked. So, we put the kids in Joe's car and rushed and threw everything in the van. (Literally threw everything in there soaking wet!) By 5:30, we were home, unloaded and taking showers while waiting for a pizza to show up. I'm so glad we were only 45 minutes away so that we were able to do that. We would have been miserable Saturday night if we would have stayed.

The storm coming in. The clouds got darker and it rained all night.

Alyssa got to open the rest of her presents after dinner and then we all were in bed and asleep by 8:30. What a day! Alyssa had fun though and that's what matters.

I made Alyssa's cake on Sunday. I've had bad luck with trying to get cakes out of pans lately so I just left it in. Alyssa's on a dinosaur kick and wanted them on her cake so I just threw some plastic toys on. Boring cake I know, but that's what she got and she loved it. You'd never guess I used to decorate cakes by this one!

Grandma Stradling got her a Snow White dress. She loves it!