My adventure habits changed drastically after having kids and I am here for it!

Yes, they’re a little less “adventure-y”

(to read up on one of my all time favorite pre kids adventure, check HERE!)

Yes, they’re a little less risky.

And yes, they are still so much fun!

I see a lot with mommy adventure pages that they don’t slow down at all. They keep doing the same thing. To be honest, I fell into the trap of thinking I needed to do that and instantly felt overwhelmed. It’s too much! Especially because my kids had health problems. Both of them had tubes in their faces that they needed for a long time and because of that, I got super anxious about camping. Especially with my last child, who had an NG tube. Camping with an NG tube baby is a straight up bear hazard. 

Then I started to ponder what the disconnect was.

The disconnect came in my expectations. Before I had kids I expected to be like all the other adventure moms. The fact is, I’m not.

 I am me. 

My kids are who they are and they don’t need to be anything else.

I also started to ponder my childhood camping adventures with my family and I realized… we often never left the campsite! 

So when we planned this specific campout, we planned on staying at the campground and just letting the kids be. 

It was the perfect choice!

Late Thursday night we decided we wanted to go camping over Labor Day weekend. 

My husband looked on recreation.gov to see what was available and found a campsite available at a lake only 2 hours from our house. We immediately booked it and went to bed. 

One of the first things we always do is create a meal plan. It’s generally quite basic and straightforward. 

This trip’s meal plan looked like this….

On Friday we did our grocery shopping and on Saturday, we did all our prep. Patrick prepped all the food. I prepped all the kid stuff and camping gear. We both loaded up the car and off we went!

The kids love to ‘help’ set up camp. We brought bikes so my son and I could shuttle things from the car to our tent site. As soon as the tent was set up and the pads and sleeping bags were laid out, our kids went nuts. What could possibly more exciting than playing in a tent? To be honest. Not much. Tents are always a party. 

Then we got to cooking dinner. As you can see from our meal plan, we brought a prepped tinfoil dinner. These are super easy to make as well as super fun. They take a while to cook in the fire so we spent the time playing and exploring the area. My son and I explored the campground on our bikes to discover what it had to offer. We found the beach!

Bedtime while camping is always a challenge.

In fact, we threw it out the window the second night. The first night, we tried. We did the whole routine, read stories, sang songs, said prayers, laid them down and hoped for the best. But as I said before, the tent makes for a wonderful place to play. And that is exactly what they did. They played and played and played and played. 

Eventually I took the instigator out of the equation; our 20 month old daughter. Our son almost instantly fell asleep after that. She didn’t fall asleep until 1 am. 

I found myself being a little annoyed about her not sleeping until I realized that… she had never really seen stars because she’s always in bed. Furthermore, she had never seen a meteor shower! So I held her most of the night while we watched the night sky show off, all while praying that she would fall asleep. 

She eventually did. But she tried really hard not to. 

It is times like these that I really need to just allow myself to be present and appreciate the moment in time with my kids.

Would it have been nice if she had slept? Yes. Do I regret watching the stars while holding her to sleep? No. 

The next day was our one full day at the campsite and our chance to just hang out and let the kids guide our day. 

Our morning was perfectly slow.

We had a slow breakfast and a slow getting ready. Which is a nice change from the usual always being on the go at home. I was even able to go on a little run. 

We meandered over to the little lake beach and while the kids played, we adults got the water things ready. One thing I try to do as a mom is not direct play too much. I like watching my kids figure it out. They immediately started digging a hole and collecting rocks. When the tubes and paddle boards were ready, those became part of the play. And that’s how the whole day went.

Though we wanted the day to be kid directed, most kids aren’t going to admit they need a nap.

We stashed our beach things and went back to camp. Our 4 year old agreed to lay in the tent with me for his recharge time and my husband decided to take our daughter on a little hike in the pack so she would hopefully nap. She instantly fell asleep in the car on the drive over. Our son eventually fell asleep in the tent. 

The good news? When they both woke up, they were ready to go nuts at the beach again. 

That night, we decided we weren’t going to push bedtime.

We would let the kids stay up to see the stars, roast marshmallows and watch the fire while telling stories.

Oh and of course, play with glow sticks. 

The next day we slowly packed up to leave. 

This trip may not seem all too adventurous. We didn’t go mountain biking or hiking. We didn’t go into the wilderness. We just stayed at our campsite and played. 

Children really don’t need more than that. They are better at remaining in the moment, something us adults can appreciate more. 

If you want to take your kids camping but don’t feel ‘cool enough’ or like you won’t live up to the adventure hype, just know it doesn’t matter. Because all the matters is that you are doing something awesome for your kids. They’ll love it no matter what and you will too.