7 Quick Takes - Camping Style

I'm getting in on today's Quick Takes by the skin of my teeth...posting with only hours to spare...

This is my kind of camping!!

1.  Tis the season...to be going camping!!  That's right, here in the Midwest we go camping any month of the year (or, at least the boys do).  Unreal, I know.  But Soccer Boy wants to earn his Arrow of Light award with the Cub Scouts before he crosses over in the Boy Scouts.  Which means he needs to go on a campout before February...which means camping in December!

2.  Since our Boy Scout troop has rules about "no women on the campouts" it meant Doug would have to go with him (since he needed an adult partner on this one).  Doug is not a camping person, I think he said something to the effect "I pay money for a house and an electric bill to keep it warm too, why would I want to sleep in a tent in December?"  To which I reminded him they are planning a January campout too, if he'd rather do that one instead.  He just gave me a blank stare to that, so I think not...

3.  It's just one night, but getting them ready for it was insane.  I stress out on stuff like this, I want to make sure they have everything they need.  I thought we'd pack early this morning and do our homeschooling in the afternoon.  Well, we pretty much packed all...day...long.  I'm glad we got an early start or we would have been rushing at the end.

4.  Funny what things you need to remind boys to take to overnight events.  Things like toothbrushes appear to be totally optional, who knew?  Flashlights and pocket knives are necessities, but toothbrushes...not so much.  I suppose those are only important to the people who pay for the dental visits.

Best seats in the house!

5.  Doug & I celebrated our 14th anniversary this past week, woo hoo!  My mom & dad kept the kids while we went out on a date and finished our Christmas shopping.  We went to see a movie at the recently opened bistro theaters down the street.  The seats are leather recliners that have a table attached.  Then you can push a button and have a waiter come out to take your order and serve you.  You can order the traditional popcorn and soda or you can order off the restaurant menu, we had a burger and fries.  We had the entire theater to ourselves (since we went to an afternoon showing of a movie that has been out awhile).  It was a cool experience, but we found it a bit tricky to eat "real" food in the theater   One, it's dark so you can't see what you're eating.  Two, it's a bit distracting to try to eat and watch the movie at the same time.  Eating popcorn is more of a mindless activity, I guess.  But still really neat, Doug is planning on taking the older kids there to see The Hobbit.

Princess' Go to character

6.  The kids have really been getting into the Skylanders video game on our Xbox.  I haven't played it much, it seems mom doesn't have time to play video games like the rest of the family.  The game is a marketing genius because it has lots of different characters (each one purchased separately, of course).  They all have different abilities and can open different levels of play, so it keeps the game interesting.  The game is simple enough for the younger ones to play too.  Recently, I asked 4 year old Princess which character was her favorite?  She answered Sonic Boom and when I asked her why she replied "it can shoot out lots of babies just like you"!!

7.  I was nursing Toddler Boy at the time of the above conversation, so I asked if Sonic Boom could nurse her babies too.  Princess just rolled her eyes at me and said, "no, mom, dragons don't nurse their babies"...guess I should have known that.  I should mention that Princess recently "upgraded" her character, so now Sonic Boom can have 4 flying baby dragons instead of just 3, how cool is that.  It is amusing to watch Princess play because she is always backtracking in the game to go get one of her babies (the babies don't always do what they're suppose to and stay close to mom, sometimes they get stuck behind doors).  It annoys whoever is playing with her.  Her brothers tell her to just keep going and "hatch another baby" but she refuses to leave any of her babies behind (a good mom in the making).  Another cute thing is to hear her yell at the screen "attack babies, attack" when she wants them to get the bad guy.

That's all for this week.  I sent the camera with the boys so assuming it survives and they remember to use it I might have some pics to post next week.  Go check out more Quick Takes with Jen at Conversion Diary