1st Camping trip as a married woman...

I have been married for almost 3 years now and a mother for all of it. I am embarrassed to say that we went camping for the first time last weekend. We both come from camp-a-holic families but I shied away from the idea because of our son. I was worried that he was too little and that I would be a nervous wreck so we waited until he was 3. Needless to say I was overreacting. Kai did fantastic! No one fell in the water... except the dog (it was hilarious). Both children (bear is our second child) stayed close to the camp site and did a pretty fair job of listening. All in all it was a beautiful weekend.

There were a few snags but nothing too major. We were woken up every morning by a murder of crows cawing like no tomorrow, I didn't have a sleeping bag and froze my butt off the first night so we had to drive into the nearest town (pop. 23) to try to find one... no luck. We had to drive and hour round trip but finally found one. We woke up to beautiful weather... and crows.... on our final morning and were looking forward to fishing. Within minutes of casting out the temperature dropped about 10 degrees. We looked up and saw thick clouds rolling in. The mad dash to pack up began. It started sprinkling but nothing too bad. But the worst problem we ran into were the bugs. Oh Lord the bugs! During the day it was bees, wasps, horse flies, and a myriad of unknown creepy looking things, at night it was moth and mosquito heaven. Brandon got stung by a wasp which was a little scary since he used to swell up like a hot air balloon when he got stung. He didn't seem to have that problem this time thank God. I thought I was doing pretty well. I religiously lathered myself in bug repellent and seemed to get off with only 2 bug bites. I say seemed because when we got home they started popping up EVERYWHERE! Every time I applied the much needed Cortisone cream (which was every 10 minutes or so) I found a new bug bite. 20 in total... yes I said 20! All but three of them are on my legs.

If you have ever wondered what 20 mosquito bites feel like, though I doubt you have unless you are crazy, it is infuriatingly uncomfortable! It doesn't help that I react differently to bites than most people. To say that I am allergic to them sounds funny but I am. Usually the bite swells up to the size of a softball, is burning hot to the touch and makes me physically ill. It doesn't happen every time but more times than not. I didn't have that problem this time but they hurt like no other. As if the itching wasn't enough if I accidentally touch one or bump into something it feels like someone just stabbed me with a steak knife. They itch so bad that falling asleep is practically impossible. So add sleep deprived to my list of ailments at the moment. I am so uncomfortable that the idea of going camping again seems out of the question unless I wrap myself in mosquito netting or buy a bee keepers suit. I have tried every home remedy I could find for bites and none of them seem to help much. Though I must say making a paste of salt and water does take the itch away instantly. But as soon as you wipe it off they itch again.

All complaining aside the camp site was absolutely beautiful. I would do it again in a heart beat as long as I had and industrial sized bottle of bug spray and about 50 Citronella candles scattered around. I may just try the old wives tale of swallowing three whole cloves of garlic before you go camping. Yes you will smell like an Italian restaurant the whole weekend but mosquitoes hate the smell of garlic. Which seems appropriate since they are little evil vampires.