Most everyone has a different definition of camping.  Here is the definition my family had of camping:

• Sleeping in a trailer.  (We had a family of six and there was a bed for each of us.)
• Cooking every meal in the kitchen of the trailer.
• Storing all food in the trailer fridge.
• Eating meals off of real live plates with real live utensils that are kept in the trailers cupboards and drawers.
• Spending every evening at the trailer kitchen trailer playing card games with the trailer lights on.
• Eating the same meals we would have eaten if we were at home.
• Taking a daily shower in the trailer bathroom and using the toilet as needed.

I know, I know, most people wouldn’t refer to this as camping and I totally understand.

At some point we did buy a little tent.  But we used it to keep our luggage in.  For reals.

My aunt and uncle and their family would usually go camping with us.   Sometimes even my grandma would bring her trailer and meet us.  We would park our trailers next to each other.  We’d take turns riding bikes and ATV’s.  I think maybe once we took a hike ON A PAVED WALKWAY.  While we weren’t roasting marshmallows and sleeping in sleeping bags, we had fun.  I truly enjoyed all the summers we spent up in the mountains with my family.

(circa 1985)

As a teenager I never really thought about why we didn’t sleep in a tent, pee in the woods and cook over a fire.  I knew my mom had no interest in it and I guess I just assumed I’d have no interest in it either.  And so, I never even imagined camping in a tent.

I was only married to my first husband for a year and that summer we were married we went camping with some of his friends one time.  It sucked.  I didn’t like one single minute of it.  I chalked it up to just not liking camping in a tent, just like my mom.  Looking back I think it was more of “I didn’t like my husband or his friends” and not really “I hate camping”.

After that one trip with the ex, I put the idea of camping out of my mind and never thought about it again.  Until last summer when we got invited to go camping with a group of our really good friends.  The King and Babboo were very excited about going camping and so I put a smile on my face and agreed to go with them.

We borrowed a few camping supplies from The King’s parents and bought ourselves a tent and Babboo a sleeping bag.  The King found some awesome mattress thingys at the REI basement and we were set.

We camped for a weekend with three other families.  All together there were five kids and eight adults.  We slept in our tent, kept our food in a cooler, cooked all of our meals over the fire, went without showers, hiked with the kids, participated in our first geocache, and played in the river.

I had a blast.  (Minus the hike and my fear of falling off a cliff.  Or my kid falling off a cliff.)

(Pictures from our hike last weekend.)

We ended up going camping later in the summer with one of the families.  Again, we slept in a tent, cooked over a fire, hiked, geocached, and went sans showers.  And again, I had a blast.

We’ve been waiting all year for another chance to go camping this year.  Last weekend was our first camping trip of the season.  I was a little nervous about going camping while 32 weeks pregnant.  I tried to ignore my nerves and didn’t share them with anyone else.  I figured I was tough enough to handle a few nights sleeping on the ground in the tent.  The King set us up with a blow up mattress and I booked a camp site near the bathroom to accommodate my THREE nightly trips to the toilet.  The King found a hike that we figured was safe enough for me and my huge belly.

I’ll be honest here.  I slept better in the tent then I’ve been sleeping in my own bed at home.  The weather was perfect.  And I didn’t have to use the potty AT ALL during the night.  And the hike?  Well, it was actually just about perfect.

(Woody and Juggernaut didn’t like the hike as much as we did.  Those silly guys got in a fight while the rest of us found a geocache.)

And let’s not forget the food.

Why is it anything cooked over a fire tastes 100% better.  I mean dude, hotdogs cooked over the fire are AWESOME.  Not to mention s’mores or French toast.

The boys did take a bath in the FREEZING water.  (But not us girls!)

Babboo did end up going sans clothes in the lake.  Or rather, NEAR the lake.  It was just too cold for him to actually get in the water.

Before we left for home we did eight geocaches.  It had been way too long since we’d done them.  I forgot how much fun it is to geocache!

On the drive back to our house on Sunday evening The King and I got to talking about tent camping.  I told him that I loved tent camping way more then trailer camping.  We tried to figure out what it was about tent camping that my mom hated.  And what it was about trailer camping that she liked so much.  We couldn’t really figure it out.  Maybe it was because there were four of us kids and so maybe camping in the trailer was easier.  Or maybe she just hates going without a daily shower.  Or maybe she can’t physically squat to pee.  Although I really doubt it’s any of those things.

Maybe she’s just never tent camped and doesn’t know how awesome it is.

This weekend we’ll be visiting my family in Utah.  During this trip I plan on sitting my mom down and getting to the bottom of this.

So tell me, do you prefer tent, trailer, or hotel camping?  And why?

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OH MY GOSH, we’re going to see The Old 97’s tonight.  It’s been almost two years since we last saw them.  We were able to see Rhett Miller in concert when I was about this far along with Babboo, so I think it’s pretty cool that Rerun will get to attend his first Old 97’s concert while in utero too!

Out of nowhere this guy in his twenties walked by, covered in awesome tattoos from the bottom of his face to the tops of his feet. His ears had those crazy huge earrings in them and he was wearing a pretty hip beach outfit. (I’m not exactly sure what made it a “hip beach outfit”.) People were high-fiving him as they past him.

Clearly this guy was somebody.

Mr. Somebody walked over by us at the pool. As if out of nowhere about five blonde chicks joined him. They all were beautiful, had the same long hair, and were wearing sexy (double sexy!) bikinis. The group got in the pool right in front of us and proceeded to hang out there for the rest of the afternoon.

The King and I had no idea who this guy was.

One of the hott ladies had an adorable kid who was playing in the water with them. She seemed to be a very good mom and quite attentive to her child. Honesty, they all seemed super nice. We couldn’t help but listen in to what they were saying.

They were there for a wedding.

We were pretty sure the wedding was between Mr. Somebody and one of the blondes.

Mr. Somebody and his entourage were there with us during our entire stay. Any time we were at the pool, they were there with us.

And yet, The King and I could not figure out who he was.

One night, after a day of pool time with The Entourage, we got online and tried to figure out who this guy was.

We googled everything we could think of in every order we could think of:

• Tattooed rockstar
• Rockstar wedding May Maui

We started naming bands trying to think of one that he might be a member of. We then realized we’re not hip enough to know the majority of “Top 20 Bands” at the moment. The King got online and googled that. Yeah, we didn’t know most of the bands, let alone who one of the drummers might be and if it was Mr. Somebody.

I texted Carrisa and was all “we’re staying in the same hotel as some rockstar, but we’re too lame to know who he is.” To which she replied, “it’s probably someone from Bon Jovi and that’s why you don’t him.”

Um yeah, I would know EVERY SINGLE MEMBER of Bon Jovi. I could even tell you some random facts about each of them.

He wasn’t from Bon Jovi.

The next day, at the pool, (I just typed “poop” instead of “pool”. Tee-hee!) I tried to take a picture of Mr. Somebody by trying to make it look like I was taking a picture of Babboo.

Clearly that didn’t work. (One more reason why I’ll never work at US Weekly.) You can see two of the hott blondes from The Entourage. (Check out the back tattoo of the one in the black suit. Awesome!) (Mr. Somebody is in the pool directly behind Babboo’s head. Go Isabel!)

We quickly learned that most of The Entourage’s rooms were next to our room. Look, you can even see one of them behind us in this picture we took outside our patio door.

(Oh my gosh, look at me posting a picture of myself IN A BIKINI WITH A HUGE PREGNANT BELLY. Whateves. I figure if I could spend a week on vacation looking like this for everyone in Maui, who cares if the interweb sees me too.)

(I’m nerdy enough to say that I wore a different bikini every day of our trip. Oh yes, I own that many and they all needed their chance in the sun.)

After a few days trying to figure out who this freaking guy was, we gave up and hung out with Mr. Somebody and The Entourage at the pool. We didn’t give them any special attention or treat them differently. They were seriously all very lovely and respectful. (You know, not like you’d expect from rockstar types.)

Dude, mostly because we weren’t sure who in the heck they were.

The day after the wedding, down at the pool, we heard how nice the wedding was and about how one of the hott blondes got so drunk she ended up outside with her bedding in the middle of the night. Apparently she passed out before she made it to the beach. She wanted to sleep near the water.

Hey, I don’t blame her.

So tell me, do you know of any tattooed rockstars that got married last week in Maui?

Oh hi.  We got back from Maui last night at about 11 and quickly went to bed.  We woke up 5 hours later to rain and not even a hint of sun and quickly got ready for work and school.

Our bags are still packed and on the bedroom floor.  Our mail hasn’t been sorted through.  Our iPods are all out of juice and we have no milk or bread in our refrigerator.  Our DVR is full to capacity of all our missed shows.

The worst part?  It’s so cold here in Seattle that I couldn’t wear a skirt to show off my tan.  I hope the weather gets better before my tan fades.

Besides that, we had a glorious vacation.

Glorious.

Me: I’ve never been to Hawaii. Let’s go there!

The King: Perfect. I’d love to go back.

We immediately start looking at plane tickets and hotel prices in Hawaii.

The King: Holy crap. We could fly to Europe IN THE HIGH SEASON for these prices.

Me: Just look at these hotel prices. We can get a hotel in Berlin for $30 a night!

And then we book flights to Europe and forget about Hawaii. At least until we start planning for our next vacation. In which we repeat this process.

So I’ve never been to Hawaii in my entire life. The King’s only been the one time when he was in college. And he went with his family so that doesn’t really count. My family was way too poor to ever go to Hawaii. In fact my own parents didn’t go until a few years ago. They had a blast, although my dad had this to say about Hawaii; “when you get off the plane you might as well just open your wallet and give them all your money. They’re going to get it anyway.”

Ah, words to live by.

The King was unemployed last fall when we decided to go ahead and try to get knocked up. We were okay with the decision, but were a little nervous about how others would take it. You know, that maybe we weren’t being fiscally responsible. We knew it was okay; we had insurance, money in savings, and all of Babboo’s hand-me-downs.

So I got pregnant.

After that we were all; “hey, this might be our last chance in a few years to go on a Big Vacation. We should plan one.”

Again, people might find this fiscally irresponsible. We did not.

Plus we had a crap load of hotel points a travel vouchers that were about to expire. And honestly, we did not want to lose those.

It started this way:

The King: Let’s take a beach vacation without Babboo. Just the two of us.

Me: Sounds perfect. I can rock out with my pregnant belly in a bikini and just relax.

The King: Where should we go?

Me: HAWAII!!

(See, the plans always start this way.)

Me: But this time, let’s actually go to Hawaii. Let’s just suck it up and pay the money and DO IT.

We asked The King’s folks if they’d watch out kid for a week. They agreed. And so planning began.

First we needed to figure out how to best utilize the hotel points we had. We had something like 5 free nights in ANY hotel, up to $400 A NIGHT. Naturally that meant we needed to find a hotel that cost no less then $395 a night. Hey, might as well get our moneys worth. We searched and searched for the perfect hotel for our needs. We found that one of the nicer hotels was also offering a FREE night for every 3 nights you booked. The all you can eat breakfast buffet was also included in this special.

Double score.

We ended up getting 7 nights in a 4 star hotel RIGHT ON THE BEACH for less then we would have paid for some crappy hotel in the middle of the island, blah, blah, blah.

(I must admit The King’s a little nervous that we’ll get used to that kind of hotel and be afraid to stay in our usual $30 a night hotel in Berlin. He has nothing to be worried about. I’ll never be okay with spending $400 a night on a hotel room.)

Then we started looking at using our frequent flier miles and vouchers.

Long story short, Babboo is coming with us and we only had to buy one ticket. (Buy one, get one plus a travel companion voucher.) It’s okay. I sort of like the kid, so I’m sure it’ll be just fine having him there.

At this point we were like .75 cents into our week in Maui.

(Maybe a little more then .75 cents, but you get the picture.)

The King is now gainfully employed, so no more worries about being fiscally irresponsible. Phew.

Yesterday The King put me in charge of finding a cheap rental car so I headed over to biddingfortravel and saw that people were getting FULL SIZED rental cars on Priceline for $9-$11 a day. A DAY. I immediately put in a bid for $8 a day. (Hey, if I’m going to go for it, I might as well go for it.)

And then my bid was accepted.

Yes, you heard that right. I got a FULL SIZED CAR in HAWAII for $8 A DAY. (To be fair, it’s more like $15 a day when you add on taxes. But still, SCORE!) I’m pretty sure this is a screaming deal, because I know my parents paid more then that for their car when they came to Seattle a few weeks ago. HAA!

Since our month in Europe in 2008 I’ve expanded my bikini collection by about a dozen. I won’t be buying any new suits for the trip. Babboo has his one from last year as well as the one he got as a birthday present last week. I’m not sure we’ll need much in the line of actual clothing. I found some sunscreen on sale at Target the other day. We borrowed snorkeling gear from my aunt and The King installed our new home alarm last weekend and we’re got someone from church to stay at our house during the night.

And we’re set. We leave in like a week.

(We’ve yet to decided if we want to shell out the dough to see a luau while we’re there. I’d love to hear everyone’s thoughts on it. Is it worth it? Is it just a crappy tourist thing? WHAT, what, what?)

I’m not kidding when I say I might actually start packing tonight.

Oh wait, NOT tonight. Tonight my bestest friend May, who deserted me and moved to Reno, is in town and we’re going out to dinner with all the ladies.

Packing begins tomorrow.

So tell me, any advice on Maui? Or rather Maui with a kid? Or just Maui being pregnant? Or Maui on a budget?

Or you can just hit me over the head for not being very fiscally responsible. I probably deserve it a little bit.

Yep, that’s how my family hiked; we went on the same hikes that people in wheelchairs could manage.

(I’m embarrassed to even share this with the interweb.)

(And yet, I’m about to share more.)

After I graduated from high school and moved away to college I never returned to Zion or went on any hikes, handicap accessible or not.  I married my first husband shortly there after.  When I married him I knew I was marrying into a family that enjoyed spending time in the outdoors.  (And by “spending time in the outdoors” I mean “spending time hiding behind trees and bushes killing defenseless animals.)  (Let’s try to not turn this into a discussion on hunting.  I’m just saying that the ex’s family was not like my family in that regard.)

While my first husband wasn’t a hunter, he did like to fish and hike.  He went fishing almost daily….sans me.  He rode his mountain bike and hiked with his friends occasionally.  Again, sans me.  here towards the end of our marriage I remember going on one hike with him.  I can totally see the picture he took of me during that hike.  I did not look like I was having fun.  Maybe it was him, maybe it was the hike, I can’t be certain.

That last hike had to have occurred somewhere around 1998.  That’s about 12 years ago.

When I married The King I knew that while he liked the outdoors, he wasn’t planning any hikes up Mt. Rainier in his future.  Fine by me.

This summer something odd happened.  The King decided he wanted to go camping as a family…in a tent…out in the open.    And oddly enough I thought it sounded like a good idea.  On this first camping trip (to Mt. Rainer, strangely enough) the family’s we were camping with wanted to go on a hike at Mt. Rainier.  Dude, I did not want to be the one person that was all “dude, you want me to walk up a mountain, while I could be back at our camp site eating s’mores, FOR NO GOOD REASON?!”  So I went along and acted like hiking was no big deal to me.

Whatever, it was a big deal.  First off, it was hot out.  Secondly, THERE WERE SHEER CLIFFS.  Thirdly, dude, the trail was long and straight up.  I was tired and sleepy and just feeling a general sense of laziness all around.

While I enjoyed spending time with friends, I was pretty sure it was going to be my last hike. At least for another 12 years.

The thing is, The King loved the hike.  My Sweet Babboo loved the hike.  LOVED IT.

Thankfully, right about that time, I found some new meds that started to work.   Gone was The Tired.  We were also introduced to Geocaching.  And made some new friends in our church congregation that loved to hike.

Put this all together and what do you get?

A family of hikers, that’s what.

We started to stalk the returns section at REI (referred to as “the basement”).  We found The King some fancy new (slightly used) hiking boots.  We found Babboo some new (slightly used) hiking shoes.  And then we found me some new (slightly used) hiking boots.  We were now officially “people who hike”.

Since the house is pretty much done, our Saturdays have become more open.  Lately, we’ve been using our Saturday’s to go on hikes with different friends, my in-laws, and even some with just the 3 of us.  We’ve hiked in other states and other countries.

I’ve even gone hiking on business trips.

While it’s highly unusual for me to be hiking so much, it’s even more highly unusual that I’m enjoying our hikes.  I even commented to The King on a recent hike “I sure do like hiking!”

He about had a heart attack hearing those words come out of my mouth.  And frankly so did I.

After talking to my dad last week about a recent hike we’d taken, he said “I didn’t know you guys were so into hiking.  Next time you’re in Utah for a visit we should go on a hike.”  I had to laugh (on the inside).  The thought of my parents going on a hike IN THE MOUNTAINS was comical.  The only thing they do in the mountains is ride their huge 4-wheelers around.

Yesterday My Best Friend Who Deserted Me And  Moved To Reno (aka: May) sent me an e-mail where she said something to the effect of “don’t be offended, but it’s hard for me to picture you taking a hike.  Do you do it dressed in all black and wearing heels?”

She knows me very well.

But she knows an older version of me.  She knows the person who was ruled by The Tired.  I totally understand what May was saying to me and it made me feel good to know that I had been able to change. And for the better, I hope.

I tried to count the number of hikes we’ve taken since that first hike on Mt. Rainier this summer, and I can’t.  There are too many to remember.

And I like that.

(Oh yeah, The King plans on hiking to the top of Mt. Rainier this summer.  I don’t plan on going with him!)

(Yes, these are just some of the pictures from different hikes we’ve taken. All since last summer.)