Weekend Recap

What a beautiful weekend!  Eric, B-Man and I packed up early on Saturday morning to head up to New Hampshire.  We were meeting some of Eric's friends from high school to do some hiking and some camping!  We were planning to camp in the White Mountains, but the original site we wanted to go to was closed (oh hi & thanks, Government shut down).  Luckily everyone else was up there before us and we found out just as we were crossing the border.  They were able to find a camp site that was a little further south and so we headed there.  We got there a little before everyone else, and a while before that I had realized that I forgot wipes for B (mother of the year?).  We found a nearby Hannaford, got some wipes and some snacks (ran over Eric's Achilles on the way to checkout....) and headed to the campsite.  We met up with Eric's friends, got to our campsite and started setting up the tent.  Side note: one of our wedding gifts was an 8 person tent (which we had registered for) from Eric's parents.  It is MUCH easier to set up when you have two people who can actually help one another set it up, rather than one hubby and a mama holding baby.  But, we did it!  We also had brought our air mattress, but didn't have the pump.  Luckily, our friends are innovative and found a way to blow up our air mattress through their full one...without using a pump for ours.  It was great!  Once we were set up, B-Man decided it was time to hang out in Uncle Aaron & Aunty Chris' tent.

We hung out for a bit and had a quick lunch...

We knew we were going to be going hiking, but what we didn't know was that we were really going to be hiking.  The couple of times Eric and I have previously gone camping, we've always gone hiking.  Err...."hiking."  We hike on trails near the campsite which are usually beautiful and we see some pretty trees, foliage, lakes, mountains...something of the sort.  Well, it turns out everyone we were with had a different definition of..."hiking."  They actually meant driving about 45 minutes north and trying to climb a mountain.  

When we started out I was worried.  I'm still not in great shape...but I was hurting after 5 minutes.  Luckily, after 5 minutes...everyone stopped because there were no trail markers and we weren't sure that we were going the right way. Long story short, we went back down and headed to the left to actually start the real hike. 

We lasted about 20 minutes.  And by "we" I really mean me and B.  Eric easily could have kept going (even carrying B!)...but B-Man entered melt down mode.  Don't believe me?  Take a look.  Beginning of the hike: 

Aaaaannndddd....20 minutes into the hike:

And me you ask?  Well I was just about dying...there is no way I could have kept up that pace with everyone.  Everyone stopped with us for a bit, but there was no calming B down so we told them to venture on without us but to be sure to come back down that same trail and catch us on the way down.  When we finally got the little man to calm down, he had a bottle and we took our time heading back down the trail.  Did I mention we got a new camera?  It's amazing!  More on that decision later, but taking our time heading down let us have some time to play with the camera, and Eric got some really good shots (during and after Brady's bottle)!

After we were done hiking it had gotten pretty windy.  Eric, B and I headed back to the car, thinking everyone would be down just after us.  I think it took them another hour to get down, but once they did, we headed off into town to grab a dinner.  It was a long wait in a loud bar, with dinner in a loud restaurant, a longer wait for food, and the food ended up being just alright.  Let me guess what you're thinking.  Our little man must have had an epic meltdown, right?  Wrong!  I'm not sure how, but B-Man was actually really good.  He was definitely getting a little fussy at the end, I mean that's a lot for such a little man to take in! We ended up outside for the last 5 minutes or so, just me and the B sitting on a bench while everyone finished up their dinner and settling the check.  Of course, we got in the car and about 20 seconds after a bottle was in his mouth, B fell asleep.  Once we got back to the campsite we let him sleep for a bit while we got a fire going.  Chris also had these great speakers and we listened to some country music around the camp fire.  B woke up after a bit and I had a headache setting in, so I ended up staying in the tent until morning.  We also bought B a snowman suit to keep him warm at night (we were, after all in the mountains of NH...in October) because we were worried he'd be cold.  Well he woke up shrieking at about 3:30 in the morning for exactly the opposite reason!  Poor little man was sweating up a storm.  We cooled him down, rocked him, Eric somehow made him a bottle in the middle of the night, and it was smooth sailing until 7 AM!  We packed up, had a morning fire to burn the last of the wood, and then headed out to a little diner to grab breakfast before calling it a trip.  Everyone else was going to go hiking, but after the first hiking attempt, we figured it was best if we just headed home.  Unfortunately (for Eric...) I slept most of the way home while he drove.  He was in pretty rough shape by the time we got home (he's been battling a nasty cold/cough all week) so once we got home we took the day to relax and recover....lots of lazing and snoozing!  All in all, it definitely went much better than I thought it would.  And makes me so excited for when B can actually walk around the tent and camp site, and sitting down and actually enjoying a S'more!  Next summer should be great!