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My family went camping a few weekends ago. And after spending the entire morning packing up our car I’m thinking, “is this really worth it?” My kids are shrieking and laughing and whining while we’re trying to shove all our camping gear into our station wagon – two tents, four sleeping bags, two folding chairs, a stove, a tarp, the cooler, the food, the lantern, the diapers, the toys and enough clothing for 48 hours and four seasons. And I’m watching all of this unfold thinking, wouldn’t it be easier to just stay home and break out the blow-up pool? We haven’t even left the house and I’m already exhausted!
It’s only after the fact when I spend some time looking at our pictures that I realize camping with these kids is bigger than the sum of our camping gear. We’re creating memories for these little people and collecting the stories that will shape their childhood experience. My family will always know that this was the trip when my daughter first learned to walk. And no one will forget the grin on my son’s face when he crawled out of the tent wearing his cowboy boots and fleece pjs. Twenty years from now we won’t remember the chaos of packing up the whole house for two days of car camping. We’ll flip through our photo book and remember a time when a tent zipper was enough to entertain our kids for hours. And how everything was simple. And how it passed by in a flash.
LarissaP1 put together Camping 2007 to chronicle her son’s first camping trip and it really captures that whole big-eyed discovery thing that two-year-olds do so well. The book is a thoughtful mix of beautiful scenery and those candid moments of her son experiencing it all for the first time.
What camping trip images do you like to capture? Let us know by commenting on this blog. And if you have a camping book you’d like to share, be sure to post it to Shutterfly Gallery.
July 8th, 2008 at 5:31 pm
I love all the wonderful trip and adventures of our shutterfly gallery members. I can remember camping when I was in the girl scouts. It was so much fun making smores, singing around the camp fire and its where I learned how to make a plant hanger. Its been so long I almost forgot how fun and how wonderful it can be to spend time as a family without T.V., phones ,and modern conveniences. Some of the photo’s of nature and the scenery are absolutely breath taking. Thank you for bringing back those wonderful childhood memories. I agree when going on a trip I was so frustrated recently planning and packing and making sure I had everything for our recent Disney Trip that now when I turn the pages of my vacation book I don’t remember those moments of craziness I just see smiling faces, that special moment when we had Mickey Mouse completely to ourselves, or when my 5 year old feel asleep during the LOUD Lion King performance. One of my favorite parts of our vacations is returning home and taking all my photos and preserving all those memories in a Shutterfly Book. Thank you for bringing back those wonderful childhood memories and reminding me that these memories that we create together as a family will truly last a lifetime.
CynthiaY2
Shutterfly Gallery Guru
July 10th, 2008 at 8:08 pm
Wow, Cynthia,
You hit the nail on the head. I too understand all of the work that goes into an overnight at the camp ground. It’s exhausting packing, loading and unloading all of the gear. But, just as you say, it is worth it. Our kids loved the experiece and I too took a lot of photos that I need to make into a camping book. I will check out your recomended book in the gallery. Thanks!
AmyS2310
Shutterfly Gallery Guru
August 22nd, 2008 at 9:19 am
Camping with kids….It is so much work a week before and a week after the trip. But it is really worth it no mattet how long you are gone. The pictures really speak so much of the kids just running, jumping, digging and getting dirty without getting in trouble for it. Seeing your son so happy because he caught a fish or your daughter making a pine cone pile of the most perfect cones around. That is what camping is all about!
Ann Abbott
Shutterfly Gallery Guru