Camping Round 2 – Wilderness Lakes

With being late in the booking-camp-sites game this summer we had to quickly find some places to get Sally out and camping! After our lovely friend got us site at Lake Skinner, I asked some other friends about places and decided to try and get a trip to Wilderness Lakes in Menifee together with some of our other friends.

This site was very different than what I have heard other people talk about. When you book your site you aren’t assigned an actual SITE.  Its a “first come first serve” assignment.  WHAT?  So our group of 3 families had to coordinate what time we were all going to arrive to get us 3 sites together.

That should have been the first red flag! haha.

As we pulled in I was both fascinated and scared. haha A lot of these trailers looked like they didn’t move much….or ever.  Like these people are residents of the RV park.  But we got to our 3 sites together and set up.  We are starting to get a routine with this set-up stuff.  Yosh takes 30 minutes to get the trailer in the PERFECT spot in regards to the hook-ups and room for the slide out, etc.  While I corral our usually angry and hungry children! haha Its like THE Christmas Tree Argument in June! haha Good Times.

We got set up, fed the children and then headed to the pool.  Thank God for the pool! It was a very hot and humid weekend.  The pool was so refreshing!

I LOVED how this RV park at little lakes that ran through the campgrounds.  One of my friends mentioned that she was happy we weren’t ON the lake because they’d be uncomfortable with little kids falling in. BUT I thought it was beautiful. I guess the lakes are stalked with fish BUT we didn’t get any fishing in.

With lakes come ducks…and geese.  LOTS of them. They walked through the campgrounds in herds.  The kids loved it…but were a tad scared of them at the same time. We fed the ducks some bread and found some of them to be very aggressive (that ended up being the word of the day…all kids kept saying everything was AGGRESSIVE! haha).

 

With all the lakes…and heat and humidity came little gnats.  Millions of little gnats. Like the annoying ones that try to get into your eyeballs NON-STOP!  It made eating and relaxing tough.  But the guys didn’t seem to mind…they were able to get their relaxation on!!! haha

The kids only whined every once in a while about the flies…we used bug spray…and it seemed to give us a little relief…well until I sprayed it in poor Connor’s mouth. Ooops.

Everyone slept great during night one. And the kids played and patiently waited for breakfast in the morning…all the kids LOVED Baby Haylee, who was a TOTAL trooper on her first camping trip!!!  She slept most of the trip…and Ella begged to hold her BUT she was waaaay to dirty to be touching any babies this trip!

  

Camping is a GREAT place to play with kinetic sand!! Good thinking Taryn!

And bocce ball kept them busy for a bit too. It was cute because even the little ones tried to play!    

I love Owen…he is still a VERY VERY picky eater but it made me laugh to look at his breakfast plate…think he’s kind of a meat-lover…huh?!?  Bacon, sausage, and ham. Breakfast of champions!

The campground had a cute little train that took people for rides. It costed a whole 25cents per rider…it killed some time and the kids liked it.

With the sun hiding behind the clouds we weren’t dyeing for the swimming pool until after naptime. 
With relief we were able to take bike rides, scooter rides and play.  I loved watching the daddies play some street ball with the kids.  Ella is so ready for t-ball its not even funny!!!

Even with the clouds out a dip in the pool was a must..especially since some of our other friends came out to play too! We spent almost an hour playing with the slow-motion option on our iphones.  Yosh got a work out throwing all the kids in the air and we got it all on tape. It was fun!

My favorite part of camping is still the smores…even if my kids don’t like them!! lol I’ll eat enough for everyone!!

The local college had a firework show that night…we brought the kids…was no Disneyland firework show BUT it was still fun to see.  Makes me excited for the 4th of July…made Ella terrified of the 4th of July. Got another scaredy-cat on our hands.

It was a great trip…I loved the company BUUUT don’t think we’ll need to return to that campground again.  The gnats almost drove this pregnant lady OVER THE EDGE…and makes me really excited for our beach trip we have planned next month.

 

Sea World – Nana’s Happy Place

Again with Nana and Granda being away in Ireland for some events and holidays my kids are the first ones to say “We HAVE to bring Nana….(to where ever we go without her).  On Mothers Day we went to Sea World…and Owen KNOWS that’s Nana’s favorite place in the whole world…so we planned a trip for when she got home!

Poor Granda’s back doesn’t allow him to walk theme parks like he once did…so it was a Nana, Mommy, Owen and Ella day. 

These new little touch-pools have been the hot topic of lots of conversations in our house since May.  Both my kids LOVED being able to touch sharks, crabs, sting ray things and these little cleaner fish.  Bernie told Owen she was so excited that she was going to put her feet into the tank for them to clean her feet…he was so nervous she’d actually do it. haha (thankfully she kept her little feet on the group and out of the fish tank!)

We saw every show except the Sea Lion show.  Ella is great sitting and watching. And Owen has come SUCH a long way…remember the days when he’d hold his ears, cry and be terrified of the show regardless of what it was (even if he loved it after).  Now he’s a grown-up boy…its great to see him so comfortable!

 

We walked, explored and had such a great time.  I was SOOOO excited…we actually saw the polar bears!! I have been going to Sea World since I was a kid…and I don’t think I ever actually saw moving polar bears.  I swore they were dead, not there OR they had pretend ones sleeping!! haha BUT it was a great day…we saw them! Up close…moving and very much alive.

 

We saw the shark exhibit…which made Ella cry last time…but she was awesome this time.  She kept saying “I wuv sarks”

We even stayed to see the Shamu show. I haven’t seen the Shamu show in YEARS.  I will say I kind missed seeing the trainers in the water with shamu…and explained to Owen the importance of knowing that even though these animals see nice and are in captivity…they are still wild animals. And sometimes animals can be ANIMALS and do things that aren’t nice.  He’s a smart freaking kid.  He totally understood…I was impressed.

And Nana continued on with our family tradition.  When I was a kid and we went to any amusement park, my parents would let my brother and I both pick out a souvenir on our way out.  Bernie couldn’t pass up the opportunity.  My kids are blessed with those that love them.  Bernie even forced me to get something…haha I guess I AM still her baby! haha

I really do love getting to spend days with my Mom and my kids. I want them to last forever!