General Conference Campout

This weekend was busy and a lot of fun. The girls had their last class of gymnastics Saturday morning Mommy got to stay home and do some deep cleaning and Daddy was working very hard on the girls' Easter present. Eli played all around the house with Fiona.

A conference tradition that we started last year was putting up a tent in the living room like the Nephites did to come and listen to King Benjamin. The girls LOVE it! They get so excited about General Conference. They also love the activity booklets and playing conference bingo. Last time we tried a breakfast casserole. They were all so excited but none of them liked it, so we didn't repeat. Instead on Saturday afternoon we had cracker hors d'oeuvres. Daniel just cut up a bunch of cheese, meat, pickles, and avocados then we let the girls make their own stack. I made a little tuna salad to give some variety. It think this might be a better tradition for us.

After getting a lot of work and Saturday jobs done, Daniel headed to priesthood session and I was left with the kids and an oven I was in the middle of cleaning. Shortly thereafter they got their jammies on and declared that they were all STARVING! I thought all the crackers and cheese at 4:30 would have been enough so I wasn't really planning on making dinner. Hamburger Helper to the rescue! It has been many, many months since I have used a box of that stuff but I was sure glad to have it on hand.

We extended the tradition this year and I let the girls sleep in the tent in their sleeping bags.

They had a lot of fun, but I was so exhausted from cleaning that I needed them to go to sleep quickly. They were pretty good and I didn't have to get after them too many times. I made the mistake of laying Eli down in a sleeping bag and reading books to him like he was going to get to sleep there too. I tried to lie him down twice and then I took him up to his crib. He cried and cried "seeping bag" "seeping bag". Finally I went and rocked him to sleep.

I am not really sure how early the girls got up Sunday morning but they watched a Veggie Tales show and then started playing. Daniel made Danish pancakes for breakfast. We showered the kids and headed to the Riverview chapel to watch the morning session. (After an untimely accident of leaving Eli running naked for too long after the bath! We were a few minutes late and the girls had to do their own hair.)

This afternoon they enjoyed hanging out in the tent and even listened to the last session fairly well. I didn't really expect them too, I figure having them listen to one session a day is pretty good. The squares on the wall is a matching game where they match the apostles name and picture when they speak. As you can see it was quite the disaster area after two days of fun. They were pretty good about cleaning up, although Kyla really didn't want to take the tent down. If frustrates me how if I try to get REAL stuff done (something that I don't have to repeat next week) then the rest of the house falls apart. I can keep it up and maintain it but it is pretty much a full time job!

I am happy that we have been able to find a way to make Conference exciting for them. I really enjoyed conference too, although there wasn't one specific talk that really stuck out to me. I thought it was funny how they kept on talking about the guys getting married. I think the Saturday morning session was my favorite but I need to go back and relisten to some of those talks too.