Third Annual Parn Camping Trip

For the third year in a row now, we have taken Memorial Day weekend to go camping in Ohio with our wonderful friends from Illinois.  We always camp in the Hocking Hills area, this year at the Hocking Hills Adventures Riverside Campground.  We're used to a state park campground so this was a little different.  But still super fun!
Jason had been working some long hours and so when the day came for us to leave, we had planned on him coming home at lunch and us heading out.  He got stuck at work though and we weren't able to leave until 6pm.  So we didn't get to the campsite until midnight - which always makes putting up a tent interesting.  It was worth it though. What a fun weekend!
This year we took a canoe trip.  I can not even express how much I love to canoe/kayak.  It is one of my all-time favorite thing to do.  It's fun now also because the girls are all big enough that they don't have to have constant supervision.  Gwyn and Celee can totally handle a canoe, and Lyla knows enough not to tip one.

Who's afraid of a toad?  Not my girls!

One thing we look forward to when camping is the food.  In the past we plan out cool meals and take turns with who brings what.  We still did that somewhat, but we've all decided we just like to make parns. (Pie irons for the lay people)  If it's good, it is better in a parn.  Breakfast, lunch, dinner, and dessert.  Yum-my!

We had a lot of fun with the sparklers.  There was the normal sparkler fun.  But Will also had his camera that he could take slow pictures with.  So we had lots of fun watching them all "drawing" pictures and "spelling" words in the air that you couldn't see until the picture took.

Of course we went hiking.  The caves and trails in Hocking Hills are the reason people go there.  And now we've been enough times that we have some favorite places, like Rock House.

I love that we have such awesome friends that we can camp with.  It takes something special to be able to be dirty and cook over a fire for three days with other people and still like each other when you leave.  We all keep coming back though, so it's working!  We can all be hangry, or gassy, or speak some truf and still have fun together. It is also worth noting that we're the only one with kids, but they all like our kids, so that works out too!  So Robin, Will, Jon, and Sarah - we love camping with ya'll and can't wait until we do it again next year!