Camping is an unpredictable art, at best.

When my husband approached me with the idea to take our 3 younger boys camping for a few days over Spring Break, I immediately got a warm fuzzy feeling over the idea, as I remembered fondly the experiences I had as a child growing up in a family that spent a few weeks camping every year.  The memories I have are wonderful ones of lazy days spent throwing rocks, exploring nature, fishing, sleeping in a tent after a relaxing evening sitting by the campfire and roasting marshmallows.  Even though I had not been camping in many years, the lovely memories I hold dear and my vision of creating such fond memories with and for my boys seemed like the perfect plan.  I'm an outdoor kind of girl who isn't afraid to catch bugs and snakes, and doesn't mind getting dirty.  Sure honey!.....let's go camping.  The plan was set to camp for 4 days at beautiful Stone Mountain State Park, located only 30 minutes from home, and with it being Easter weekend our trip would end with a high point of going to the top of Stone Mountain on Sunday morning for the sunrise Easter service to celebrate our risen Lord.  With that "vision" in mind and our "perfect plan" in place, we set out to have 4 days worth of outdoor adventure.  Now, let me just say that my husband has got to be the best Boy Scout in the world in that he is always prepared for everything and every situation, and he packs for any trip he goes on accordingly.  I am trying to be tactful when I say that there should never be anything we would ever want or need, because chances are, he has it packed somewhere.   But there is always that moment of truth while packing for a trip with him that I realize, that maybe we have over packed.  For this trip, the moment came when we were packing the second car, full to the top with stuff, and I see that there is a canoe still sitting on our front lawn.  Really?  We need a canoe?  After some "plan review" with him, thankfully he nixed the canoe idea, which meant we could pull out all of the gear associated with the canoe, and might now actually have the room to put our children in the car.  As predictable and prepared as my dear husband is, and as perfect our plan and vision for this trip were, it's the unpredictable stuff that one can never fully prepare for and that tends to cloud the clearity of your vision.  For instance.....one could not have predicted that our campsite would have such an incline.  More precisely, a hill.  Up and down that hill, a million times over the course of 4 days.  Sometimes walking up that hill, and sometimes falling and then rolling down that hill.  All of us fell down that hill a few times, but 3 yr old Carson just couldn't get up or down it without eating dirt to some degree.  And speaking of Carson, who could have predicted how my "less than compliant with poop" potty trainer would respond to the great outdoors?  Ok, maybe I should have predicted this one.....since he insists on pooping his pants at home, why did I think it would be different while camping?  And that kid's undies just don't contain all that they should, and we had a few wardrobe malfunctions during this trip.  One poop landed in the floor of the tent.  Of course I found it as I was crawling on my hands and knees in the tent....and you just use your imagination for the rest of this sentence.  Another poop fell out of his undies, and went.....somewhere.  I could see the evidence that he had pooped and could for sure smell it, but could not find it.  Not until I got a minute to totally change his clothes and wash him, and then found the poop that had fallen thru his pant leg and into his Crocs and he was walking around on the poop tucked in his shoes.  Gross.  Just....gross.  Thankfully, the last poop just rolled right out of his pant leg in little balls onto the road as he walked and we were able to easily kick them into the woods....well, except for the one bit of poop that landed on the bathroom floor.  Obviously he was at least trying to make it to the toilet for that one, but just didn't quite make it.  And who could have predicted that your little pooping machine would throw his jacket into the campground toilet that the occupant before had not flushed?  With all this grossness, I just sincerely thanked God for the campground laundry facilities.  And I appologize to the person who has to use it after us.  And who could ever predict that 9 y/o Everett's enthusiasm for fishing with the worms he dug up, and his wild casting of his fishing rod would result in him catching so many things?   He caught 1 fish, the sleeve of my shirt, a lawn chair, and his 5 y/o brother Harrison's arm.  Yes, he hooked Harrison right thru the arm with the wiggly worm still attached.  I had to unhook a hysterical Harrison from the end of Everett's fishing pole. We decided it was best for Everett to fish alone as his unpredictable casting was too much for anyone to bear.  Ok, I should have seen that one coming too, as Everett is unpredictable with, everything.  And who could have predicted that Harrison would find SO many treasures that he would instantly form a special bond with?  He found about 327 "diamonds"....actually quartz rocks (Stone Mountain is one giant quartz  formation), and a pile of fake poop made from rubber.  Unfortunately, all of those diamonds he found would not fit in his pockets securely and he kept loosing them, causing much emotional distress, and there was just NO fooling him by holding up another quartz rock that looked EXACTLY the same and trying to pass it off as the "mostest specialist diamond I had eva' lived for."   And then of course, he kept loosing the fake poop as he tried to "pull da' bestest eva' in da' wurld pranks" on us all by placing the pile of rubber poop in our direct path.  But it was brown, and blended in well with the dirt, and then he couldn't find it, which is probably how it was left by it's original owner in the first place.  Lucky for him I had developed a keen eye for poop, as there was real poop lurking around and I was always able to find the fake poop while looking for the real poop.  The one highlight of the trip was on the third night when sitting in the chilly tent and after our family prayers, Harrison broke out in worship to God by singing "Hungry", a song about being hungry for God's presence.  We all began to sing and worship, and all 3 of our boys sang their own version and words to the song.  That was a good moment for sure!  Unfortunately, our song of worship was drown out by the rowdy, loud, and boisterous campsite next to us with it's 40 people who misread the sign that said "11 PM begins quiet zone" for "Scream like insane people until 3:30 AM".  These crazy campers even came over to our campsite and were walking around.....appearantly looking for wood.  Several camp sites woke up to missing firewood.  Thankfully, the rowdy campers were asked to leave the camp grounds.  And who can ever predict the weather?  Especially in Georgia, which has had unseasonably hot weather so far this Spring, which my dear husband was prepared for with 2 huge fans.....just in case.  But it didn't stay hot while we were camping.  Nope, in fact, it got downright cold with temps down in the high 30's overnight.  After the first cold night my husband had to run to the Home Depot for a space heater, which he had not packed, but predictably went to get so his family would not stay cold the remainder of the trip.  We may have stayed warm the next 2 nights, but we sure were not comfortable because our air mattress seemed to have a slow leak in it and kept deflating.  Slow leak the first 2 nights, FAST leak the 3rd night, which left us sleeping on about a billion quartz rocks.  Probably the ones Harrison lost.  If I could have predicted a faulty air mattress, I for SURE would have prepared for that!  We did have a fun day at Stone Mountain park along with every other person in the greater metro Atlanta area who had predicted that Friday would be THE day to go to the park because the prediction was that nobody else would be there that day.  (we were ALL wrong on that!)  And after waiting 2 hours in line to do Skyhike, (a multi level maze of ropes, boards, and wires) my boys predictions of me chickening out, were wrong.  I did Skyhike....not very gracefully, but I did it.  And the sunrise Easter service on top of Stone Mountain?  It sounded like a good idea, but the park predicted that a record number of people would attend, so they recommended that we get on the Skylift to the top of the mountain between 4-5 AM.  Normally I would have not been thrilled with getting up at 4 AM to do anything, but after sleeping on rocks all night 4 AM could not have come soon enough.  For 3 sleepy little boys?.....not so much.  We got to the Skylift to take us up the mountain at 4:45 AM just in time to beat the crowd of people that endlessly flowed in after we did.  The slight problem with going on top of a giant quartz mountain at 4:45 AM is that it is much colder and windy up there.  PLUS, you have to wait until sunrise for the Easter service....approx 3 hours later.  Now, I know we were up there to celebrate that Jesus rose from the dead, and this was supposed to be the pivitol moment of our trip, but after the trauma of camping for the previous 3 days, I just could not find it in any fiber of my being to be happy about celebrating it up there on top of that cold windy mountain with about 6,000 other mostly cranky and ill prepared Jesus lovers.  I just kept thinking to myself, "That Skylift only takes about 30 people at a time, and there are only 2 Skylift cars, and there are approx. 6,000 people on top of this cold windy oversized diamond.  How long will it take to get them all down?"  Just saying, it was hard to relax and enjoy with what could potentially be facing us for the next 10 hours.  Fortunately for us, Everett randomly threw up on that big rock about 15 minutes after the Easter service began so we had a great excuse to leave.  We got on the Skylift to go down the mountain right as the service ended with the singing of one of my favorite childhood church hymns, "Up from the grave He arose."  As I surveyed the scene from that descending Skylift car, I couldn't help but think that I should have enjoyed the moment a bit more because the chance of me ever doing that again are slim to none.  But I had to remind myself that I am grateful that my Jesus laid down His life for the redemption of MY sins and rose from the dead on this day so long ago.  But I didn't need to be on top of a mountain to know how much I love Jesus and to be grateful for what He did for me.  In fact, I found my relationship with Jesus not on top of a mountain, but in the bottom of a valley.  Sometimes, life can be more unpredictable than one could ever expect.  Sometimes we try to recreate something in life that we hold fond memory of, only to have it dashed by a pooper in our life.  Sometimes there are unpredictable hills that cause us to trip, fall, and even roll to the bottom of the hill, yet again.  Sometimes, the seasons of life change without warning and we find ourself ill prepared.  But even in the midst of the unpredictables, we must focus on the one thing that is predictable and constant, and that is God's overwhelming love for us.  His need to protect us, guide us, and show us His love in the little things that sometimes we overlook.  With that hymn being sung, and the sight of those 6,000 people heading towards their fate in line for the Skylift, I had to once again be thankful for God's little mercies in my life, and this weekend.  I was thankful for the campsite laundry services, and for the vomit that got us off of the mountain just in time to avoid the crowd, and I was really really thankful that some of the poop from my weekend, actually was fake.