1st camping trip!

We decided to go on our first annual Cooper Campout! We've been wanting to take Ava camping for awhile and ended up going to Butt Lake (yes, it's Butt...I don't know why they named it that because it's a beautiful lake and a great place to camp). We were joined by Mark's parents, and his brother and family. The kids had a blast during the day, but it was a little rough for Ava and Ben during the night. Ava woke up a few times, totally freaked out! She had never been in a tent before and did not know what was going on. She finally fell back asleep and slept in pretty late--thank goodness! We didn't know if we were going to spend one or two nights up there, but after the first night we decided we would call it good. We stayed until after dinner on the second night, but left to sleep in our own bed (and crib!). We'll try it again soon, we just need to ease into it... :)

The whole family- Ron brought his canoe and it was the hit of the trip!

Ava with Macy, practicing in the canoe.

I love this picture. Ava absolutely loves Macy, and Macy takes such good care of Ava.

Mark, getting ready to go out on the water to set his crawdad traps...he had borrowed some of these traps from a co-worker who told him Butt Lake was great for catching crawdads...he put a raw piece of bacon in one, and cat food in another for bait (I guess cat food is a well-known trick for catching crawdads...)

Ava, already enjoying the 'junk food' side of camping...

Yes, that's a snake! Raymond was sitting on this log only moments before...I was grossed out by it, but Ava kept wanting to touch it. Nice...

It was getting chilly...Macy and Ava hanging out by the campfire.

Helga, Raymond, and Ron-relaxing and getting some dinner started...

Almost sunset...

Little Ben, trying to throw that piece of wood in the water...

The water was freezing!! Mark jumped in to wash off anyway...

After all the bacon and catfood, and leaving the traps out overnight...this was the lone crawdad they caught. Mark had big plans for a 'Crawdad Fry', but when they only caught one, he threw it back. Oh well, better luck next time. :)

We went for a drive the second day, and it started pouring rain and hailing! It looked like snow on the road!