Practicing to be Wilderness Family Robinson

Does anyone know what I’m talking about when I say the Wilderness Family? It was a trilogy on Showtime or HBO when I was kindergarten-ish. (It also happens to be a weird fact about me.) Skip, Pat, Jen and Toby, along with their faithful dog give up the smog and traffic of city life and move out to live off the land in the mountains. They build their own cabin and have to fend off wolves, bears, mountain lions, and more. High quality entertainment, I’m telling ya. The Academy Awards totally robbed them.

Whenever we hear or read about crazy stuff happening, Mike and I say to each other, “Okay, are you ready to build our cabin in the mountains?” Even if we never go and live off the land, I’m starting to get used to the idea that since I’m in a family full of boys I’ll have to suck it up and go camping. For the record, I have already offered several times to go camping at Big Cedar Lodge.

My darling husband chose the perfect weekend for a trial run at camping. He and Kyle set up a tent and built a campfire in the backyard while I put Cade to bed inside. Then I headed down the hill, baby monitor and skewers in hand, and we roasted hot dogs and marshmallows. So fun! Kyle said the marshmallows weren't what he expected - they were stickier and his hot dog was "smoky" i.e., burned, but he ate it.

I left them with a hodge-podge of blankets and pillows, bid them good night and headed up the hill to a quiet, non-smoky house, where I slept soundly until 5 a.m. when little Cade woke me. I lost the bet and my manly-men campers didn't come inside until around 7:30 a.m. I am thoroughly impressed!

Here is a picture of our sad little campfire. The flames in that picture are actually enhanced by some paper plates we had just thrown in. Pretend you don’t see the lighter fluid in the background.