Winter camping and bathtub swimming

Winter Camping

The children have been off-track for the last week and we have one more week to go. The weather has been decent, which has saved me, but somehow the evenings feel eternal. So the other night, I decided to get out our old small tent and put it up in the living room and we went camping! The children brought down their blankets and pillows. We turned off all the lights and used our lantern and then we read stories. The funniest was reading We are going on a Bear Hunt. Odessa and Katherine were completely captivated and the older kids did their best to make it scary at the end. Then we sang some songs around the 'campfire'. Odessa is at the perfect age for action songs, so we sang 10 little monkeys swinging in the tree. At the end of the first verse when the alligator gets the monkey, she jumped. Pretty funny!Since then, the children have gone 'camping' without me a few times, and I can't quite bring myself to take the tent down!

Bathtub Swimming

I was left alone with my two youngest daughters on Saturday evening, and truth be told, I was in a grumpy mood. Odessa was crying and driving me nuts and all I wanted to do was soak in a tub. Knowing my girls, I knew I would have an audience, so I decided to make it an activity for all of us! I got into my swimsuit, and filled my tub with bubbles and toys. We three had a grand time 'swimming'! Then we ate ice cream, painted toe nails and watched Cinderella. (A movie Katherine never gets to watch due to being outvoted by older siblings.) All in all, it turned into a great, yet very girly evening! Now if I could only be so creative every night!!