Memories are made of this.

Our camping weekend was a lot of fun. We didn't have the greatest weather for camping but it could have been much worse. Setting up tents on Saturday afternoon with gale force winds and intermittent rain was interesting. But it cleared around dinner time and a beautiful double rainbow came out.
 
Sunday was a gorgeous day if a little cool and breezy. The nice thing about the breeze was that it kept the mosquitoes away.
 
I am the youngest of four with my brother Scott being the eldest and 10.5 years older than me. My sisters, Pam and Brenda are 5 and 4 years older than me and almost exactly a year apart. I wasn't exactly an afterthought but the combination of the age differences and the fact that my sisters were practically twins meant that I quite often felt like the outsider growing up. There wasn't a whole lot of the "beloved baby sister" thing going on. (That could also just be because I was a total pain in the ass!) My mother is also the youngest of four (all girls) with a sizable age difference between her and her sisters. I remember her telling me that someday we'd all be the same age and the differences wouldn't matter anymore. I guess that day has finally come. It started when we all started having kids. Scott's kids are all adults now and it is fun having them around. The rest of the kids are all very close in age. Actually the five cousins are all one grade apart in school. Starting in 2011 with Heath (Pam's oldest) we will have one graduation every spring until Emma finishes in 2015.

We used to do this family camping thing when the kids were younger and then lives got busy and we took a few years off. It was so fun to see the teens all hanging out together and playing games (and eavesdropping on their conversations. Teen boys have the funniest things to say about teen girls.) It is also so much easier to camp with kids that can go to the bathrooms and pool by themselves, sleep in their own tent and help set up the campsite. The first time I took Emma camping she was still sleeping in a Pack-n-Play and I forgot a booster seat and feeding her was interesting. I think she ate more dirt that trip than food. The next year she was potty training and we had the potty chair next to a tree because I knew if I tried to get her to use the Porta-Potty she would never get out of diapers.

The Wood Family is also a family of storytellers. My Grandpa told stories of his youth and when his entire family drove Model A Fords from Michigan to California when he was 13 years old. (He also started keeping a daily diary on that trip and made an entry every day until he died in his 90s. My dad has all these diaries in his safe and someday I hope we can have them transcribed) My Dad tells stories about farming and truck driving and trail riding and people he's met and anything and everything else. My siblings and I also tell stories. Memories of camping trips from our childhood.

Remember when we took the truck top camper to the steam engine show and it rained all weekend and there was a river running through the campground? And the "hit and miss" engine was across from our campsite? And Pam got stung by yellow jackets?
What about the time Beth peed on Pam's pillow?
Or the year we camped next to the big family from Detroit and then we went to visit them? Their Dad was a minister at a church and something weird was going on at their church that day. Wasn't there a dead body found behind the church or something?

These family stories are fun to share. I remember listening to the last two generation's stories when I was young and they made me feel connected to a time and a place as well as the people. My kids are growing up away from that place and most of those people. It makes me sad at times that they don't have that sense of connectedness. Little things like holidays together and trips like this one help ease the gap and hopefully help them stay connected with our family heritage. Monday I took the girls up to Traverse City to their other grandparent's and left them there until Friday when we'll meet up with them for a family reunion with Steve's siblings and cousins.

         

Funny, I look at the few pictures I took this weekend and realize there isn't one with my own children. I did take them, they just don't like me in public and don't allow me to take their photo. I hope my sisters have at least one picture of them.

Edited to add:
The best part of the trip was getting home yesterday to find the house clean (Steve stayed home to take care of the dogs and because he had to work) and a full case of diet Pepsi in the fridge. Now all I have to do is repack the tent after it dries out and store all the camping stuff until next year.