the weekend

While we were camping last week, Toddley was in Ohio, for work.  He returned home to us Thursday afternoon, and we were glad to see him!  We had lunch with my dad that day, too, because he went out of town on Friday.

A while back, some couple friends of ours from church invited us to spend a night with them at her parent's camper that sits on a lake.  We did that this weekend, and had a great time.  Between us we have nine kids, and our houses are never quiet, so it was a nice little getaway.  It was only about an hour from home, at a beautiful campground.

Beechwood Family Campground.  I love the leaves right now!  This is my favorite time of year, so I am loving the pretty colors, the fallen leaves and the crisp weather we wake up to each morning.

Their camper sits on a campsite overlooking the water.

We got settled in with all our stuff, then we just sat and talked for a long time.  We ate a delicious dinner (grilled chicken, steaks, baked potatoes, green beans and rolls), then played cards for the rest of the night.  We played Phase 10 and a new game we learned, called Tripoly.  We loved Tripoly so much that we bought it on Amazon.  It comes in today.  :)  It's three games packed into one and it's complicated, but I was pretty decent at it and was winning our second game when we finally had to start packing up on Saturday.  

We got home around 5:30 on Saturday and our neighborhood block party was going on, but I didn't go outside.  I was so sleepy and fell asleep in my chair at seven something, only to wake up and go to bed early.

Yesterday was church as usual with community groups that night, but I went with our juniors to the corn maze.

I named them Children of the Corn.

It was a great weekend, and I was glad about the fact that the boys survived being on their own for one whole night, for their first time.  I wasn't sure how that would turn out, but it was good.  They all slept in our room with the dogs and the cats.  That makes me laugh ridiculously hard.  On today's agenda is light school work for them, cleaning and laundering for me and planning out my time from now until Wednesday night.  We are leaving for our annual (giant) multiple family camping trip to Petit Jean on Thursday morning and won't return until Sunday afternoon.  I am excited, but I have got a lot of work to do until then!  I will start making all of the lists and such today.  (Please pray that the weekend forecast changes there!  There looks to be rain on Friday and Saturday and after last week's trip with the heavy rain, I am not excited about another night or two spent outdoors in heavy rain.)

Thanks for reading!  Love to all.