Week 2 Day 4 - Monday, May 25th - More tents = More money

What a beautiful crisp day! Or at least our morning was. Do you remember camping when it’s so cold your nose is freezing, and that was the first thing you felt in the morning? That was this morning!

Arnold had a rough night. Around midnight or so Kyler started to cry, like really bad. We asked him what was wrong and he said he was thirsty, when we confirmed he was thirsty he said, no he was hungry. He wanted toast. Arnold said he could get him bread but not toast. Kyler said ok, so Arnold confirmed with him that it was ok and then went to get some bread. By the time he came in Kyler was knocked out! He didn’t wake up until this morning!

I woke up this morning to Quinton asking for Mommy. Turns out he started it when Arnold left to go and shower at 6am. The poor boy! Arnold had to get up for his first ride into work. He has been gone for an hour already. I’m a little nervous for him but I’m sure he will be fine. **ETA - he made it to work in 1 hour and 6 minutes (give or take a bit since it only counts when his wheels are moving) and he did 26.846 trailer to door of work and is feeling good! Average speed is 24.3 Kms/hour**





I was able to run to the washroom this morning before Arnold left so that gave me a bit of time alone. I really enjoyed it! I was thinking about how much I envy boys. As I was walking to the washroom this one kid comes out of the bushes and as I walked by I realized he was peeing on one of the big rocks in the woods. SO not fair that he can do that and not have to walk up those stairs!

When I got back to the tent Q was in bed with Arnold snuggling and Kyler was just starting to wake up. I got breakfast ready for the boy’s right after Arnold left. As they were munching on their Cheerios I made supper for tonight. Once again, I want to take some time to thank those people who gave me Crock Pot Recipes. We are having sour cream chicken with broccoli and rice tonight for supper.

Kyler is watching his movie, Jungle book, and Quinton is hanging out with me reading his books. We don’t have many plans today except for hanging out. Tomorrow and Wednesday, though we have some plans. I hope to get some running around done, and maybe even some zoo time! It will all depend on what the boys want to do!







Ahh nap time! I love this part of the day!

Let’s see after the movie the boys and I checked the weather and it was good enough to go outside to play! So while they played (in the van no less) I aired out their sheets.



I swear the place smelled like pee when I came in this morning so I wanted to make sure it wasn’t the boys’ sheets. I got to put them on our new laundry line! Arnold and I found our one that the Toronto Energy group gave out last summer or the summer before. You can put it out and bring it back in when you are done. It worked out perfectly!



Shortly after play time and me taking away our snack chips, the boys both came into the trailer to visit. Kyler asked for more to eat and this is how he showed up asking for it:



Quinton came in looking for his hat and as he had nothing else in his hands he gave me the option of calling his bowl his ‘hat’:



The boys spent the rest of the morning running around and playing outside. I managed to get the beds cleaned off, re-made and a few more things done, which is good because we have a babysitter coming tomorrow and I want to make sure that he has a clean area to hang out if it’s raining!

Right after lunch, as I put the boys to bed, someone from the Toronto Parks, Forestry and Recreation came by and told me I had to pay for the extra tent. He seemed surprised that we were here for the season ‘already’. I guess ‘normal’ people come by the end of the month or mid to end of June but not as early as we did.

Anyway here is my souvenir from going to the front office to pay for the extra tent!



I’m going to have a chat with the non napping boys and see if we can change that. Have a wonderful afternoon!

Week 1 Day 5 - Tuesday, May 19th Part 2

Part 2

Around 4:45pm I decided that enough was enough and I was STARVING. I was going to stop at McDonalds and get something for lunch but the boys were awake and I didn’t want them to want something as well. I made 2 packs for Mac & Cheese. It looked so good! Just as I was getting the packages out Q woke up and I brought him outside after changing him, since he was naked (yah that’s right. After the zoo and before he threw his huge hissy fit in the car I stripped him of his clothes as it was SO hot). We got some clothes on him and out he went. He was still limping a bit but generally doing ok. I checked out his foot and I couldn’t see anything on it so I think tomorrow I may be calling his Ped. We will see.

Anyway I went and made 2 packs of Mac & Cheese. I was so hungry! Then I put in some hotdogs and figured it would be a good meal. While making supper I got a few other things ready, like the container for the shower water (to wash hands and rinse things), the container for dishes and got all the days dishes ready, and collected garbage and such for our garbage run. It was pretty good. I even managed to fill up the kettle and get it ready to go on after supper was done.

I had to convince K that it was time to get up. It took a bit but I finally did get him going. He got changed and came outside in time to tell me he had to poop really bad. So I quickly closed up the tent and he locked the trailer and we jumped in the car. We drove it to the stairs and K bolted up the stairs. Q and I went after him and when we got up there he comes out of a stall and goes “I peed!” I told him to try and poop because I wasn’t going to do this gain in a few minutes. He went back and tried and he ‘said’ he did it but I’m not sure. He also got himself locked into the stall. K has the same thing as I do. When it doesn’t work and you have tried the normal things he gets frustrated. It took everything I could do to keep him calm and keep Q from running the water in the sink. We finally got him out and I got a big hug! We quickly went back to the van and got back to the campsite in time for the kettle to start whistling at us. (I put it on just before K came out)

I emptied the kettle into the dish container, filled it up again with cold and dumped that in as well. Then I filled it up again and put that back on the stove top. That one was for the kid’s hot water bottles. I’m not sure if I have talked about this before but Saturday night it was SO cold so Nana came up with the idea of putting the kids to bed with water bottles to warm up their beds and them. Wow it worked so well and now they have to have them all the time. I’m slowly figuring out a system that makes it work for us. Right now I think putting boiling water in them at supper time and putting that in their beds is working ok. Especially since by the time they get to bed it’s been a few hours and it is still warm. I’m currently making covers for the water bottles.

We ate supper and I have to say my eyes were bigger than my tummy! I only had 2 bowls and the kids didn’t seem into eating that much, which surprises me since they didn’t eat much during the day. After we were done Kyler was my big helper. He put all the leftovers in the bowls into the garbage, collected the recycle and put it in the car, went around locking and unlocking things and we quickly packed up to head home for a few minutes. Someone had responded to an add that Arnold had put up online and we had to go home to give it to the guy. It worked out ok. We managed to get in our garbage/recycle run and then off we went to the house.

I did a bit of work once we got there, swept out the pink room and cleaned everything else out of there; got the general path of the piano cleaned up; and started to clean the bathroom. Tomorrow we are going back to do some laundry and to bath the boys. I’m hoping we can get everything done generally quickly. It would be nice to be finished everything at the house before Arnold gets home.

Kyler had to go to the washroom when we were at the house and he hasn’t seen it without everything inside and the first thing he says when he goes in the door “Where’s the carpet!” I explained that Daddy and Mommy moved everything to the storage unit. Then he started looking around for the potty seat and I had to tell him that was at the campsite. It took him a bit but he seemed to be ok with it.

Once the man came to pick up the ball and hitch we were selling we went back to the campsite. But since the boys were being so good I figured a treat was in order. We went to Reeds Dairy and got some milkshakes. Then we came home to the trailer. We had milkshakes and got into our pjs and the boys watched Shrek while I got the things loaded into the van for tomorrows early morning trip. The woman who bought the piano is coming over around 7:30am to deliver the rest of the money and I have to be there by then. I set my phone alarm for 6:45 so hopefully it will work and I will remember to get up!

Anyway it is now 9:45pm and the boys are just going to bed. Hopefully this means that tomorrow I will be waking them up rather than them waking me up!

Random thoughts for the day:

-all of us got a tan/burn. Sucky deal!

-I am glad to be giving the kids a bath tomorrow and having some clean clothes

-I think I’m ready for tomorrow I just need to make my to-do list.

-Kyler has been asking for thunder and lightning for the past few nights. It took me a bit to get it but now I realize he was talking about the thunder sound from the fireworks and the lightning was the fireworks! DUH

-there was a HUGE RV that moved in across the way a bit. We all laid on the boys beds and watched it move in. So cool!

-I swear I’m working on getting the photos up. Again any suggestions would be great! Right now we are working on getting about 2 to 3 up every time I’m on the computer

-oh and dang… have you looked at the weather lately! Tomorrow is a high of 28C then Thursday is a high of 30C. I’m so bringing the fans back here tomorrow!

-I realized what a WONDERFUL husband I have today. Or at least another reason he is wonderful! I am SUCH a slob when it comes to cooking on the stove top! I must have had to empty the camp stove out about 2 times from all the water overflowing :) My husband just cleans this up at home and doesn't say a word! Isn't he wonderful?

Week 1 Day 3 - Sunday, May 17th

Our family made it through the rainy day and onto another cold but sunny day.

Sunday morning we woke up and as told the night before, Nana and Papa were sleeping in (my parents). So we got up with the kids around 7am. DH put on a movie for them in our bed and I went up to the washroom. I am kind of dreading this week when I have to not only go pee in the morning but con 2 little children into coming with me. I’m worried they won’t want to come, no matter what I say.

When I got back my parents were waking up and I stopped in to say hi. I got a nice cold jolt (aka Diet Coke) and visited for a while with Mom while Dad got the things ready for our bacon, eggs, and toast breakfast. It was perfect! I went over and made sure my crew was getting dressed, finished that up with them and sent them over to see Nana and Papa.

Arnold and I sat in the our ‘rain tent’ (from now on I think I’ll be referring to it as the RT) and made a quick list of things we needed to get and meals for the kids and I to make until that Wednesday. Our plans are to go to the house on Wednesday when the piano movers come and get some more food, as well as some of our last minute things. Then we can pick up any more freezer meals to make it to Friday when we go back again to get the paper and do some more laundry.

Once we came up with a quick list we headed to the Bus for breakfast. My dad is the BEST cook ever for things like bacon and eggs. Although my mom let us in on a tip for the eggs; last weekend we had a bridal tea shower and we got half and half and my mom needed to use it up so she put it in the eggs. That explains a few things.

As soon as breakfast was over my parents booted us out the door and we took off for the house. When we got home Arnold called back some people about the fridges and we found one. It was on the other side of town but it worked for us. Arnold took off right then and there and went to get the fridge. I on the other hand got left at home. I made piles of things, storage unit; campground; and parents place. Then I started on the cleaning. I managed to get all the walls done and 1/3 of the baseboards done in the boys room. I’m going to quickly do the floors next weekend when Arnold can watch the boys for a bit for me.

Once I got most of it done I started taking loads of garbage and recycle out to the can and eventually Arnold came home. We did our first load to the storage unit and it all fit! Wow were we surprised. Next time we stop by there I will have to take a picture so you can see how well ‘stocked’ it is. We also have to remember that we put things on TOP of the mattress. If we forget it will come crashing down.

After that Arnold dropped me off at the doors of Canadian Tire and off I went. I got some more ‘flooring’ (aka foamish blocks you use in on the floor in kids rooms), duckys (new bootish things) and some weatherproofing. I managed to get it all and get out of there quickly, which was good. And just as I came out the doors Arnold came from around the corner from filling up our propane tank, which was a good thing because it was empty!

We booked it home and got the next load for the campground and headed out. We went past GR and went up to the grocery store and I got some food as Arnold spent about 20 minutes on the phone with Rogers trying to cancel our internet service. It’s going to be an issue I can tell you that!

I slipped into Shoppers Drug Mart and got our mail from our PO box there and then headed back to the car. My mom called shortly after I got into Shoppers and I found out that they took the boys on a ‘hike’ which turned into a 3 hour hike. Mom said that Kyler must have walked about 4 to 6km! I’m so proud of them. We picked up a ‘treat’ of milkshakes for everyone and headed back to the campground.

We dished out milkshakes and then went outside to do a few things and unload the car. A friend of mine, Kristina, called and wanted to come and visit. So her and her husband and daughter came down to visit us. They stayed for about 1 hour or so. It was nice to have them here. Plus they are staying here when we go to my parents house for my friend’s wedding!

After they left we had a super quick lunch then everyone took an hour nap. Or at least that’s what they were told. My kids were out for at least one hour, almost closer to 2! I got out of the trailer around 5:15pm or so and got the fire started for Kyler. We bi-passed supper for that night. Everyone was so full from the late lunch and we had marshmallows, freedos and whatever else we could find! It was a good meal.

We broke up the fire around 8:15 or so after a washroom break and putting everything away. We brought the boys into their bed and put on a movie for them. Arnold and I got a bit of time on the wireless internet he got set up during the day and eventually we put the boys to bed. They slept like a rock. It really helped that we turned the heater on at 6:30. The tent was toasty warm. A bonus since it went down to 1C! It was freezing! We now have the extra blanket and a few other things to keep us warm.