CAMPING...or as we like to call it, way too long without a shower

The view from our campground

Our fancy new

pop-up trailer

(its actually not new, but was new to us!)

Our feet in infamy

The first big catches!

Wave jumping!

Underwater deep lake divers....

Marshmallow munching!

Picture taking!

So we set out on our Banuelos Family "staycation" to beautiful Lake Cascade State Park on wednesday morning. We were packed and loaded on Tuesday and only had small things to load in the morning, headed up to the mountains on a beautiful, cool, August day. We arrived at our scenic location, site unseen, and were pleasantly surprised. We had a great view of the lake, grass and little-to-no neighbors. It was a quiet and pleasant arrival. We partook of the usual camping necessities; s'mores, jiffy pop popcorn, fishing, swimming, bug repellant and subsequent bug bite anti-itch ointment, board games, afternoon siestas and a little quiet time by the campfire. The girls have officially learned the art of fishing and casting, which within seconds of the worm hitting water each girl had caught something, usually a perch about an inch long. Needless to say, I ran from pole to pole releasing little fishies and putting on new worms. They each did catch at least one big perch and had fun reeling those babies in. Those little princess poles can sure put up a fight. We spent three full days doing this. By Friday night and our last fish caught, we were all showing our desire to get back to the "real world".

Saturday morning was a hilarious in and out of the camper, trying to figure out how to put it down and secure it for the first time. We made it out of Cascade alive, but barely. We reached our beautiful north end home in enough time to run in and shower quickly and then we were off to the annual Tour De Fat. All in all, we had a wonderful family vacation and my two little ladies are now Monopoly Deal experts. Olivia is even playing her own hand and winning. Sydney finished her second or third chapter book of the summer, all of which she is reading silently to herself in bed with a book light (yes, I caved...I couldn't sacrifice her eyes when I know the desire to read outweighs the desire for good eyesight). Apparently she will be joining us all shortly on goodreads.com and giving her opinion on her faves. The other day I actually had to tell her that you cannot walk and read unless you enjoyed getting black eyes from running into walls. She agreed, but she really had to weigh the options.

Now it is back to reality for me. School starts tomorrow and I am running a full-load this semester. I am excited though, since these classes all apply to elementary teaching and I will even get some time in the classroom! I did end up getting a B in my Biology class and an A in my History class for summer school. I do not recommend Biology for summer to any of you, it is a bear! Cant wait for apple picking next month and pumpkin patch in October! How time flies when you are having fun!