Weekend Recap: Adventures in “Camping” aka the Sleep-in

“I have an idea” started the conversation.  I slowly turned my eyes toward the voice of FatherWinter and held my breath.  We were laying in bed, me reading my book, he watching Sportscenter, and suddenly he had an epiphany.  “Let’s go camping…tonight”. What did you say?

It was now about 6 PM.  The sun was down and it was ridiculously cold already.  My husband is not a fan of the great outdoors, so I had no understanding of how he could suddenly suggest a camping trip and I told him so.  He replied that he knew I wanted to go and had mentioned it a couple of times.  He thought it would be fun.  The entire family camping…and then he continued.  “We’ll be indoors.  Let’s grab blankets and pillows and watch movies all night long”.  I smiled.  It was a cute idea and I knew that SuperBug would love it.

So, since it was FatherWinter’s idea, I let him tell Superbug.  He was so excited.  So, sure enough, after dinner (FatherWinter bought crabcakes YUMMO), we brought all our blankets and pillows to the basement, set up the big screen, and settled in.

Super Bug all ready for his indoor camping adventure

Christmas movies are always the best

We started with Christmas movies on the Disney channel.  Tonight’s suggestion was Arthur’s Christmas, a cute story about the Claus family and the dynamics of being Santa, the generations or Santa, and the desire to be next in line.  The heir apparent, Steve, have done away with all of the “old-fashioned” way of doing Christmas deliveries and has everything wireless, with apps, and technology leading the way.  Under Steve’s watch, the Christmas gifts are delivered in a sleek new ride and in record time…except for one thing.  One of the gifts gets lost in the shuffle and isn’t delivered!  A child will not have a gift on Christmas!  Santa is of course heartbroken as is the clumsy and nerdy Arthur, but the heir apparent Steve simply considers it a minor anomaly.  Arthur makes it his and Grandfather Claus’ mission to deliver the gift and have to focus on the old ways to get it done.  Along the way, Steve and Santa get wrapped into the business as well.  In the end, a great lesson is learned and a really good  story is shared.  I definitely recommend it.
                                                                            After we watched Arthur’s Christmas, we settled in for Spider-man 2.  Yes, I know.  I know.  It’s not a very Christmas movie, but we’re always ready to celebrate super heroes saving the world.  Plus, with everything we had going on this pas summer, we were not able to see it.  Again, we enjoyed the movie, but by the time it was over, I was TIRED. No joke, I was struggling to keep my eyes open.

As soon as the credits rolled, I got up to check on Honeybee (who started the evening with us until her bed time).

Honeybee was all in for family fun!

Finding her still sleeping soundly, FatherWinter and I bade Superbug to go to bathroom one last time and then, after we all returned to the makeshift campground where I settled in for my winter’s nap.  By now it was 2 a.m. and I let the men keep it going.  I was exhausted.

Now, I have to say in theory sleeping out on the basement floor seemed like a great idea.  Unfortunately, my hip and back proved otherwise.  I found pretty quickly that I am not as young as I used to be.  Still feel like it!  But FatherWinter and I definitely woke up the next morning with more than a couple of bruises and aches.  But it was worth it to fellowship as a family.

When we woke the next morning, everyone was in the greatest of spirits.  We talked about making this a new annual tradition and how we couldn’t wait until Honeybee could join us all night as opposed to sitting with us until her bedtime.  Next year, God willing, she will be a vibrant 1 year old, close to turning two, who will look forward to a “camping” journey with the family.

And since I LOVE planning these kinds of events, I plan on going all out!  Next time, we’ll have a camping trip inspired menu.  Bring down the air mattresses to go with the actual sleeping pallets.  We’ll have a bit of kettle corn to eat while we watch the movie.  The next morning we’ll have a breakfast’s casserole.  Sausage, eggs, cheese, onion, peppers, and hashbrowns.  It will be awesomely yummy.

I’m already excited about it and it hasn’t happened yet, but I am really looking forward to it and hope Honeybee will too!