By the River

A few weeks ago, our family went camping with nine other families. Surrounded by friends, we spent four days in the sunshine and water. The kiddos scootered, roasted marshmallows and Peeps (who knew!), built debris huts, floated logs down the river and explored to their hearts' content.

Most of the hours were spent along the Verde River. The adults placed camp chairs along the waters' edge, dipping their feet into the cool water. Aine busied herself making structures out of branches and grass. She showed everyone how to whittle and carve branches into useful tools. Eamon spent time trying to configure a fishing pole and trap. He found a crawfish and educated his peers about the merits of catching the creatures with bacon. A more shallow area had been carved out last year along the bank. Benton spent a lot of time in this area building more walls and creating dams. A few determined children can alter the path of a river quite easily with rocks and boulders, however the river reclaims its path, eventually spilling those rocks and walls over.

We celebrated Eamon's 10th birthday while camping. He had a great day surrounded by people he loves. We ate cupcakes and sang around the first campfire. Nightly campfires rotated among campsites and eventually broke into two when the size of the group became a bit too big. Aine learned a new song and became a big fan of one of the dads. We played telephone and a few other games. There was star gazing and a brief talk about Mars and Venus in the night sky.

It was so much fun. Our group had been back only a few days when plans and reservations were made for next time. I cannot wait.