Happy Camping Guide: Sleeping

In a few weeks, I'll be accompanying my Cub scouts on a weekend camping trip. I sat down this morning to jot down a few tips for the families in our group who may not be experienced campers, and decided it was a Noteworthy topic. So over the next few posts, I'll be sharing tips on how to camp without roughing it.

Tents

Tents have come a long way from when I was a little girl, camped out in our musty-smelling Coleman model, made of heavy canvas stretched over a metal frame. It must have weighed a ton. It wasn't waterproof, either, which was a problem if you lived on the east coast. I can still hear my father barking, "NOBODY TOUCHES THE WALLS" as we huddled together in the middle and watched raindrops beading on the exterior, threatening to penetrate.

I'm a fair-weather camper today, and I keep a close eye on the weather before loading the van. We've had our spirits dampened occasionally, but have always managed to sleep dry and mildew-free. Both tents we've had in our ten-year family camping career have been Coleman's, which is somewhere in the middle of the quality/price spectrum between Eureka and the Target/Wal-mart store brands, Greatland and Ozark Trail. You can almost always find a deal on a new tent online. Remember that the capacity estimate is based on a can of sardines. If you want to move around your tent in comfort, you'll need to pad it by a couple of bodies. Personally, I like to be able to stand up in my tent. Ours is an 8-person, three-room tent, no longer in production, but along the lines of the one pictured below. You'll want at least one good lantern, but the magnetic clamp-on night light is handy to have, and extra stakes, a mallet and a whisk broom are essential. I am a lunatic about dirt in the tent, barking at the kids in the same tone as my father with the rain, "NOBODY WEARS SHOES IN THE TENT!"



Any tent can be upgraded with a five dollar bottle of seam sealant. A new tent should come with a rainfly and ground cloth (footprint), but I recommend buying an extra tarp to fold up and tuck (completely) under the floor. Every layer of insulation you can put between your body and the cold, hard ground is going to keep you that much warmer and drier at night.

Bedding

Someday I'm going to get into backpacking and go tripping down the Appalachian Trail with gear so ultralight and high-tech, it will have to be weighted down at night just to stay earthbound. In the meantime, I am a car camper, the kind who backs the van up to the site, rolls out an eight-person tent, and looks for a place to plug in the Christmas lights. Because no one has to carry their bedding more than a few feet, we are able to bring many of the comforts of home. Or more precisely, the comforters of home. We have two inflatable air mattresses. The one Patrick and I sleep on is an Aerobed, and it is as comfortable as our bed at home. The only problem is, it has to be plugged in to inflate, unlike the kids' bed, which has a battery-powered pump. It's not a problem at state parks with hookups, but for elsewhere, I need to pick up a power adapter. Also, "NOBODY BOUNCES ON THE AIRBEDS!"



Remember what I said about insulation between you and the cold, hard ground? Air counts as insulation. So the elevation of the air mattresses really ups the comfort level. Placing an old blanket or sleeping bag under the mattress will improve it even more. Also, never wear your day clothes to bed, especially your socks. Even a little lingering perspiration will make you cold and clammy at night. I make everyone change into synthetic long underwear and fresh socks. More on clothing to come, but in general, COTTON=BAD.

If you have sleeping bags, great. But if you're starting from scratch, and are on a budget, I'd say spend the money on air mattresses, and just bring your duvets, comforters and pillows from home. Just give it all a good shake when you get back, and of course NOBODY WEARS SHOES IN THE TENT, so the dirt should be minimal. Of course, if you plan to camp in less than fair weather, you'll want to look into sleeping bags with the appropriate temperature ratings. My eldest son has one for Boy Scouts that cost a fortune and is rated for nights on Pluto. But Patrick and I stay pretty toasty under our feather duvet. It's getting out in the early morning that's the cold part. Which brings me to

Gear For Sissies (Like Me)

There are now portable heaters that are safe for use in enclosed spaces, though I would certainly not leave it on unattended, or while sleeping. But I'd really like to get one for preheating the tent before bed, or getting warm in the morning.

The table, pictured above, is a really cheap contraption of aluminum and plastic that folds flat into its own carrier. But it's nice to have somewhere to sit and play cards or eat cereal inside the tent, and if it lasts four trips, it'll will have been worth the 30 bucks or so I paid for it (with a coupon). When it finally gives out, I'd like to replace it with the sturdier one pictured below.

Finally, you want a place to corral dirty clothes, because clothes get unspeakably filthy in the great outdoors, and spiders love to hide under yesterday's socks. A pop-up hamper contains the laundry, and makes unpacking a little easier when you get home.



Up next: Eating

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With My Little Eye

Today's Noteworthy library find: Spot It! Find the Hidden Creaturesby Delphine Chedru (affiliate link). Early readers (or listeners) are invited to search for creatures hidden among repeating patterns that are geometric, but whimsical. Beautiful design, accompanied by simple, poetic text. It reminds me how much I loved to study the groovy flower-power wallpaper in the spare room of my grandparents' house when I was tucked in bed there.

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Dragon Birthday Cakewreck

I swear, no alcohol was consumed in the making of this dragon birthday cake. Fortunately, in the eyes of child judges, candy and buttercream covers a multitude of sins. Bonnie Stewart of Crib Chronicles turned me onto the Instructables for it. My advice to you if you attempt it is to not wait until two hours before party start time to make it (unless your house is already clean, and the decorations are already up, in which case, two hours should be plenty). Also, use a wide, flat-tip icing point to apply the icing, so the cake doesn't crumble to moist particles of chocolate dragon flesh where ever you touch it with the spatula.

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Birthday Morning Breakfast "Cake"

With apologies to all of my kids' teachers this morning, I give you a recipe for Birthday Morning Breakfast Cake: multigrain waffles layered with peanut butter, Nutella, marshmallow fluff, and, of course, sprinkles.

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Vintage Sewing Cards

I went to a couple of estate sales this morning. Mostly, it was a phone-camera photo safari, but I had to pick up these vintage sewing cards for two bucks. Don't you think they'll be adorable framed and hung in a group on the wall of a five-year-old's room, or a friend's baby nursery?

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The Five-Minute, Eleventh-Hour, Hundred-Day Project

I was picking up my youngest from a friend yesterday evening, who happens to be a teacher in our school district.

"Got your Hundred Day Project done?" she asked, brightly.

I said something not appropriate for a family-oriented review blog.

Hundred Day is one of those made-up holidays that sneaks up on me every time, because it's not rooted in any personal childhood memory. That sounds good, doesn't it? Actually, my own children's birthdays sneak up on me, too. That's how I roll.

Fortunately, if there's one thing I'm good at, (as I keep reassuring my agent and editor, patiently waiting on late manuscript revisions) it's pulling it together at the fifty-ninth minute of the eleventh hour.

I came home and found boxes of crayons hoarded from back-to-school sales, dumped a 5-lb bag of rice in a shoebox, and told my kindergartner to get busy planting.

Inch by inch, row by row.

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Pokemon Themed Birthday Party

My freshly-minted nine-year-old had a birthday party this week, with a Pokemon theme. I've been living with thousands of Pokemon for the better part of a decade, and I'm still not sure whether they are animal, vegetable or mineral, so I went to the internet for ideas. I stumbled across one birthday party website where parents submit details of their own party planning. I was exhausted just reading a couple of these. Some of these moms are raising the bar too high, too early.

For the benefit of underachieving moms like me, here's what we did:

Guests: No more guests than the birthday child's age. Half this number for a sleepover.

Venue: My kids love hosting their birthday parties at home. After outsourcing several in the early years, I much prefer it too. The focus is more on socializing, less on the activity.

Decor: Pokemon tablecloth, paper plates, cups, napkins and helium balloon arrangement. Store bought from the local party supply depot.

Activities: The table was set with blank shrinky-dink sheets from the craft store and a bucket of multi-colored permanent markers. I was surprised how many kids needed an explanation of what shrinky-dinks are. I told them to use the markers to draw their own Pokemon card or character, and we would bake them in the oven for a keepsake. We had about a fifty percent fail rate in the baking, as some of the cards curled up on themselves or warped, but the kids were really into it, so it warrants some more research. Maybe the sheets (trimmed to 5X7) were too large?

We played stick the tail on the Pikachu with a large cut-out sketched by our resident graphic designer and colored by the birthday boy. Kids love this one. I always spin the contestant around a few times before sending them toward their target. The other players think it's a hoot to watch their pal stumble off blindly in the wrong direction.

I had a bunch of balloons for pumping up and twisting together into shapes, thinking the guests could make their own balloon Pokemon to take home, but we never got to it. My kids really liked the test run of this the night before though, so it's worth passing along.

Two ideas I borrowed from the party website were Guess how many Caterpies (gummy worms in a ziploc bag, which the winner got to keep), and Which Pokemon Am I, a kind of 20 questions game, which didn't really work out, because there are just too many Pokemon a person could be, as it turns out.

Prizes and favors were Pokemon trading cards.

Cake: my son requested a cake "shaped like a Pokeball," and I told him I'd do my best. I found a ball-shaped mold at the craft store, and covered it in marshmallow fondant, a vile concoction if ever there was one. But if you don't mind sacrificing taste to style, it was easy (if messy) to make, and can assume the shape of anything.

Behold:



If this child of mine ever even so much as whispers a complaint of middle child deprivation, I plan to whip out this photo. Enough said.

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Let it Snow

The kids are out of school, and in the absence of snowy drifts to toss them into whilst I work, scissors and a stack of fresh white paper was the next best diversion this morning. We used Martha Stewart's method for cutting snowflakes. Bonus benefit: I need a blizzard of them for a holiday party tomorrow night. Hooray for child labor! I'm sure Martha would approve.

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