melba... or shall we say death valley

chase has been wanting to take the kids camping all summer. i cant believe how hard it can be to find time to camp! in between our trips and visitors and needing to attend church a few times a month it seemed near impossible. but last weekend we finally went. we have NEVER been before. once without kids and never with kids. but they are older so it seemed perfect. i had such a wonderful picture in my mind. well lets just say that didn't quite turn out. i told chase i would camp as long as there is grass and trees. well that didnt happen. so i called up the bagleys, they humored us and went with us with the notion there would be trees and grass and water. well we changed spots at the last minute, still not entirely sure why that occurred... and lets just say where we ended up was nothing but fine dirt and sage brush. the kids were black in a matter of seconds after arriving. it was about 100 degrees in the desert. duh. no trees to be found. actually i take that back. there was one. yet underneath it is was 115 degrees and looked like 8 million spiders lived in it. nothing but cobwebs. not my thing. so we pitched our tents in the sage brush. on every ant hill known to man. with every palm sized spider living near us. there was the snake river near us, yet no way to really swim in it, no beach like desired just a boat ramp and a dock... it was quite the treat! i am not sure if chase or i, or seth and carly enjoyed life for those hours we were there but it was an experience. 

and the kids loved every second of it. so despite the stress that we had it was fun to see the kids love to explore everything, even if sage brush have nothing but spiders and ticks, seeing them fishing and catching bass (burkes favorite fish) every cast. and having fun with friends.

 

we went for a midnight swim in attempt to clean the kids off. it was still 90 degrees out. they loved swimming in the dark... slightly stressful for the parents in a river, they made it down stream a little quicker then i would of liked in the dark!

 

our tent was actually quite cozy and we didnt even need any blankets. so there was no worry about cold kids! chase and i slept in t-shirt and shorts. yup. it was still that warm. we all slept great for an hour until a million high schoolers decided to come hang out at the docks from 1:30 am - 4:30 am... then the sun rose at 5. awesome. thank you for that you drunk children. i hope you made it home safe seeing as how we listened to your whole conversation about who was least wasted and could drive.

 

we did find this awesome little bridge.

 and after leaving at 10 am, since there was nothing to do, and having already fished for hours on end, seems as if the sun is quite the wake up call, we decided to stop at the Kuna caves. might of not been the best idea. a little insane to get down with the kids and burke hit his head and tripped at least a dozen times. but, yet again the kids thought it was bomb. oh to be a kid again!

so now i feel the need for redemption. i am on a hunt to find somewhere amazing to camp. like in emmett with my original idea! to find an experience that i will LOVE. and to take my kiddies out again. they seriously loved it. every second of it... 

i on the other hand am still trying to wash and catch up on sleep.