Since Miguel has summers off and I don't, weekends are precious to all of us.  The quandry of whether to stay home, to get out and go, run errands, or to catch up on sleeping is often apparent.  This weekend, we had penciled in a camping trip and possibly raspberry picking on our "to do" calendar.  We have to mentally gear up for a camping trip, and after heavy thought I was still up for it - and I think Miguel would have been happy to stay home, but he said he was game for an adventure.  We planned it all out over breakfast - but the thing about us is that we plan and we take a very long time to 'do'.  We figured we'd wait until after LE's first nap since she's never been keen on "sleeping in the car" when we make that part of our plan.  This time, we were going to be smarter than her.  I got a tip from a neighbor friend that Camano Island was a beautiful place to camp, and only 1.5 hours away.  So that was the destination.  All we needed was a piece of advice and our plans were in motion. 

While LE took her nap, I resourcefully went to the store to pick up the dinner items, snack items, and a few cute clothes that she 'needed', like a swim rashguard to protect against the sun and some plaid pants (of course!).  I managed to get home shortly after she woke up, but we were all hungry, so the lunch we intended on making at the campsite, we made at home.  As Miguel puts it, we were slow before having a kid.   Now, we're glacial.  So, to sum it up, we got out of the house at 2:40pm.  No problem, right?

Wrong.  We arrived at the campground to see a sign, which I should have taken a photo of to further dramatize this entry, that said "Campground FULL".  We kept an ounce of hope and drove around the 1-43, 44-78, 79-105 loops, and every single stinking spot had a car in it - or some sort of pathetic camp chair.  Not to dispair though, we pulled into the day use area and were determined to have a good time.  The beach was full of rocks the size of baseballs and covered in barnacles.  The water was brown and murky and the tide must have been out, because it was a long ways away.  Lucy was rambunxious as all get-out, and chased her frisbee ad nauseam.   We found a small patch of little gravelly type rocks where we put out a blanket and let LE sift the sand through her fingers.  Lucy ran herself ragged - and cut her feet all up on the barnacles, so we had to stop chasing the frisbee.  We didn't have enough food and the car was too far away. This wasn't quite the beach experience we were expecting, and both of us couldn't help but think, "We should have just gone to Larrabee Park in Bellingham - it is way better than this."  You know how sometimes you have to travel far away to realize how beautiful it is right in your own backyard?  We stayed for about an hour and then with little discourse, made the decision to head back home and camp at good ol' Larrabee State Park. On our way out, we saw big groups of college-age folks with their boom boxes, loud yelling and beercans, and thought "Yah, maybe it's better we didn't find a spot".   With a kick in our step, we headed back home to the first place we ever stayed in Bellingham,  the Larrabee campground.  

I won't go on forever, but you must know that we made our way along the twisting, winding Chuckanut Drive and pulled into the park an hour and a half later, to see the dreaded sign "Campground FULL".  Once again, beaten down.  "No, you will NOT go camping".  So, with a screaming, kicking LE (sick of being in her carseat), and a very tired & sore Lucy, we pulled up in front of our house and proceeded to take everything out of the car that we had so carefully placed there a few hours earlier.  Camping Trip Thwarted.

Never fear though, instead of putting a match to some briquettes, we put LE down in her own bed, made up two beautiful steaks on the grill with salad and corn on the cob and a couple glasses of fine wine (all of which we took out of the camping bin) .  We watched a movie, made a batch of Snickerdoodles and a batch of Chocolate Chip Cookies, and went to sleep in a comfy Queen bed.  We felt like morons, but we were comfortable morons.  

Sunday was much more successful as we did some yardwork, met our friends to pick 10 lbs of raspberries (and LE got very down and dirty), and even visited the water park on our way home.  Once again, this weekend was a good reminder as to why the heck we love living here.  We don't have to go anywhere else to have a great time.  Bellingham is seriously the best place on earth.