Fathers and Sons

Fathers and sons has come and gone. For Fathers and Sons all the boys get together and go to one wards campout which is usually our ward. Sherman and Darren left Thursday to go set up camp and rough it for 2 days instead of one, they are real men! Later that night I call Sherm up and ask how it's going. To my surprise Sherman say's it sucks, there are millions of gnats and misquitos, and that they were leaving. Needless to say I was very disappointed the camping spot sucked so bad because I had taken time off work for this and Bodin had been waiting for this camping trip for a while. While these thoughts were going through my head Sherman further states the camping trip was not over and he and Darren were going to stake a claim in the Pinal mountains were we had it last year. This got me more excited as that was the place we went last year and it was a great camping spot.

Bodin and I started our trek Friday morning and arrived at the camp ground at around 1100 am where we met up with Sherm, Darren, my dad, and the kids. As soon as we hit the dirt trail up the mountain I let Bodin bring his booster seat to the front seat to help me navigate, this was the thrill of his life. "You mean I can sit in the front with you?" He had the biggest smile on his face. As we arrived at the camp sight I was surprised to see they were able to get the exact spot we had last year. After we got settled in I decided to take a couple of snap shots. The kids kept yelling "BOOM, BOOM, FIRE POWER" (from the new night at the museum commercials) and striking the pose! There were still a lot of flies but Shem said it wasn't even close to what they had at the other location.

I took all the kids out for a couple of hikes in the forest and it was fun watching them explore and make their own conclusions of how a tree fell or what animals were in the woods. It reminded me of the times my dad took us on Fathers and Sons and other scout campouts.

That night we got the Dutch ovens out and cooked up some sliced potatoes, hamburger meat, and spiced up elk sausage. The food was great and the peach cobbler my dad cooked up was an awesome finish to the meal. I forgot how exciting it is for kids to start a fire and "play" in it with long sticks. You couldn't stop them from throwing more wood on the fire. I wonder what it is about fire that attracts man to it? What ever it is it is strong as we were all mesmerized by it. Sherman busted out the smores to finish the kids off before bed. The night wasn’t cold but it made me remember just how much I hate to sleep on the ground, man was I sore. In the middle of the night Bodin wakes me up and asked when the sun was going to come up. I look at my watch and saw it was 1:30 am!!! Bodin, it won't be up for a while so go back to sleep and don’t wake me up again! What I didn’t know was “a while” was only four more hours! Why is camping the only time kids want to be up at 5:30 in the morning?? The morning went smooth. We ate, tore down camp, and left early so we had most of the day with the rest of our families.

All in all it was a great outing with screaming kids, battle wounds, and good food.