A Birthday Campout

What makes a birthday fun?  Is it the cake and ice cream?  How about the surprise of opening a present?  Maybe it’s just that one day that you seemingly get to yourself as YOUR special day.  All of these things definitely make birthdays fun but I want to let you in on what my family is figuring out about birthdays…it’s about the people…the time you spend with family and friends that help you celebrate.  

My youngest son just turned 6 and for the first time we gave the option of having a birthday party (like we do every year) or spending the day doing something he wanted to do.  You see, his birthday happens to be on Fall break.  The kids are out of school for a few days and it's challenging to have a party when everyone is going on vacations.  So he chose camping.  I couldn’t have been more happy.  In fact, this camping trip was something the whole family looked forward to.

As a mom and someone who loves birthdays, I wanted to make this camping trip a little more special than the usual.  So I bought extra glow sticks so we could try making glow-in-the-dark bubbles (which didn’t work but it did make my fingers glow) and go glow bowling by putting glow sticks in water bottles which acted as the bowling pins.  They simply used a soccer ball to bowl them over.  
  

My parents went with us in their RV which made it all the more special.  On a side note we were glad to have the RV as a wind block because it was crazy windy the whole time!  We let the birthday boy open a few presents (Legos and books) and I made a cake that looked like a campsite with a stream running through.  The candles were the campfire.

The kids rode bikes and we took them on walks both individually for one-on-one time and in groups.  We went by the water and explored nature, finding treasures such as shells and rocks. 

There was a hill right by us that the kids used for kicking their soccer balls.  The ball would come right back down for them to kick again. 

We tried fishing at the dam but I think it was a bit too windy for us.  We didn’t last long.  

One of my favorite things was watching the kids learn how to whittle sticks.  They watched their Papa whittle an old cedar walking stick (that he has been whittling for years) and got to try it out themselves.  

Each time we would get away from camp for some activity they always looked forward to getting back to camp to whittle.  And I loved watching them!  They learned how to be safe with knives (only requiring reminders here and there to not run with an open knife as they would get excited about how well they had done and would run to show Papa their whittled stick).

As I think about all that occurred on this camping trip I believe whole-heartedly that you could have taken away the cake and presents and even the glow-sticks and we would have had just as much fun celebrating the little guy’s birthday.  He was surrounded by people that love and care for him and that alone made his birthday fun.  In fact, he was pretty sad that it all ended. 

Learning how to "dump" the RV.

My Take-Aways:

1. Birthdays are worth celebrating.  It shows that person that they are special and worth having their very own day (or camping trip).  
2. It’s not about the stuff.  Don’t get caught up in all the tangible items of a typical birthday party.  Create a time that people can come together and celebrate just by spending time together.
3. Tent stakes are vital to camping in a tent when the wind is 20+ mph with gusts up to 40 mph.  I am surprised they held as well as they did!