Camping- Day 2

I had a really awesome, very last minute idea to make tee-shirts for our "Family Reunion Camp Out".  I designed it (which took me hours, seriously, but was so fun) and then got a little sticker shock!  It was going to be almost $200 for 13 shirts... so needless to say, I wasn't willing to fork that over.  I didn't even know if anyone else would like my crazy idea.  I put my parents as the center fire, and each one of their kids in a tent, with the grandchildren circling the tents :)
Who knows- maybe I can get my brothers and sister in on this next time around!

The last day we were up in the mountains we decided to have a little paintball game!  It had rained off and on the entire time we had been there, so the ground was very slick, and the mosquitoes could eat through our layers and layers of clothes :(

Jeremiah and Josh really wanted to try paintball, and Alex and I figured playing with family was the best way to  inaugurate them.  We had to share guns, gloves and cameo, but they were so excited!  I have never played on the side of a mountain like this, the shooting dynamics of one team starting at the top and one down hill, all racing for "the flag" in the middle was very interesting.  Definitely changes the way you shoot your paint :)  We took our crew out of the populated campsite and up the hill of a nearby mountain, and played right by the side of the road.  The mosquitoes here were huge, and could almost careless that we had bug spray on.  We even brought two spray bottles down with us, and re-coated everyone each time we reloaded our hoppers, and still winded up with huge welts from being bitten!  Jeremiah sat out the first game while Josh played on the uphill team.  He hung back, a little shy at first, as soon as he had found his "cover" he was content to sit and wait, but soon drew the courage to start shooting :)  He made his first round unharmed, which only inspired Jeremiah to be more impatient about playing.  I don't remember who, but someone was having trouble with their gear, so they gave Jeremiah a gun to play with.  In Jeremiah's first game he was not as stealth and shy and his brother and soon found himself shot a few times.  Oh the screaming!!!!  I thought he was done for sure, scarred and never coming back again.  After many high fives, and congratulations from my brothers he was asking to play again :)  My tough little man!  I'm pretty sure that's when Alex took this picture of Jeremiah and I:

 

We played quite a few more games, poor Alex's gun was giving him so many issues- he really needs a new one.  So instead of playing, he spent most of his time on the road shooting pictures and videos of the games...it's really fun to watch!  It was a pretty smooth game, with only a few of us tripping on unseen fallen branches and rocks, or the slick underbrush.  The only major hang up I had was a misunderstanding with one of my brothers... he thought I had continued to shoot him after he called out, only seconds before I grabbed the flag to win the game, and as I was walking away he shot me a couple of times in the back!  I was supper mad at the time, and really yelled at him, I mean, who does that!?! When we had both calmed down enough to talk about the situation, we apologized, but man paint balls hurt at close range :(

It had been raining again when we got back to the camp site, no surprise here, so the little kids were watching a movie to keep out of the mud :) 

After a quick clean up, and eating dinner my brothers and sister left for home.  I wish now that we had followed suit and left then too, but hind sight is always 20/20.  The rain kept coming on and off all night, the adults finally had to call bed time because the rain was getting blown in under our canopy, so the only dry place would be in the tents. I have to say that thunder sounds incredible echoing through the mountains, I'm not sure how the boys could sleep through it there and not at home, seems to me we are a whole lot safer in our big house!  We tried to pull everything away from the tent walls, but that is nearly impossible with 6 people and all their things!  In the morning we did wake up to quite a few puddles in our tent and all the bedding was wet, mom and dad's tent nearly had a river running through it!  Due to our lack of sleep, and overall grumpiness of everything being so wet, we skipped breakfast, quickly packed and left, just before it started raining again!

Despite the bad ending, the kids had a wonderful time, and kept asking when we were going to do it again!  Thanks for all the memories Nana and Papa :D

 

Here's our Camp Out crew :)

I have one brother, his wife and son that couldn't make it, hopefully they can come next time.