Ward Campout

Jeff and I have a great ward. Our Activities Committee knows how to put together a fun camp out with great food, fun, and entertainment. The end of August is a beautiful time to get outdoors in Utah. Kelly's Grove is far enough away from home.... but not too far-- and its a gorgeous location just up Hobble Creek Canyon. We got there just in time to put our dutch oven dessert together before a yummy BBQ dinner and then the kids enjoyed running around in the trees and the river with their friends. There were also water rocket launches and a water balloon launch. The "big boys" aka- DADS, got in on that action as well.

Quinton followed me around with the camera and was quite the poser. Here he is standing on the bridge, right in the middle of the water balloon launch.

Q insisted I take his picture next to this sign. I guess he wanted to be sure we knew he was there... at Kelly's Grove Church. Pretty cute little smile though.

Perhaps the highlight of the evening was the dutch oven desserts. Several of us were split up into teams and competed against each other much like Food Networks' Iron Chef. We all had to make a dutch oven dessert with peaches as the main ingredient. My peach cobbler with crumb topping won the award for the tastiest dessert. I was very proud considering my competition and my amateur dutch oven abilities. There are some mean cooks and bakers and dutch oven camp chefs in our ward!

Of course Hobble Creek Canyon is where Jeff's aunt and uncle live (right off hole 16 of the golf course) so Jeff took the boys on a "nature hike" and came back with his uncles 4-wheeler. Corbin and Quinton's friends thought the 4-wheeler was pretty cool and they played on it for quite a while..... which thankfully kept them out of the cold river water!

My 3 boys catching a ride on the 4-wheeler with their good friend Evelyn as their chauffeur.

Even at 10 months it's evident Deagan is ALL BOY. He loved the 4-wheeler and squealed in delight to play on it.

Once it started getting dark we gathered around for some fun games and entertainment. The adults and kids got in on a great "Minute-To-Win-It" game... in which the females dominated. Tasks like picking up sized paper bags off the ground with your teeth and placing them on a table were A LOT harder for the men and boys to do than the women and girls. Interesting.

A lot of the games LOOKED a lot easier than they were. Such as this sucking up an M&M with a straw and placing it on top of a vertical straw. That is tough!

After the games there were Paper Bag skits and songs before camping out. This camp out happened to be the weekend that I hurt my back and thus we didn't end up camping out, much to our boys' dismay and disappointment. Apparently we missed a really great breakfast the next morning, but we didn't mind sleeping in our nice warm beds and getting a full night's sleep.

Especially this little boy. It would have been much too cold camping in a tent next to the creek for Deagan. Maybe next year.