Mother-Daughter Backpacking Trip

This needs a post of its own because it was one of my FAVORITE motherhood moments ever.  EVER.  Ty takes the boys on a backpacking trip every year and we were discussing that we wanted Kelly to know that it's not just a boy thing.  Eventually, when all of our kids are old enough, we want to make backpacking a family affair.  But it's kind of fun for it to be a boys' trip while Kelly and I have date time at home.  Soooo, we kind of said Ty would take Kelly out on her own.  Then I piped in, "Why don't I take her?"  Ty was all for it, thought it was awesome.  I've been on two backpacking trips.  So, no big deal, right?  

*ahem*

I had never, previously, lit a fire by myself.  I would need to know how to hang a bear bag (all of the smelly stuff - toothpaste, food, etc - has to be hung in a bag high in a tree, away from your campsite, away from the trunk).  I had gone backpacking with my handsome, capable Eagle Scout of a husband.  But this would mean I was the star of the show and in charge of bringing my little girl back in one piece.  I was nerrrrvous, but resolute.  For FHE one night we borrowed a friend's fire pit to practice building and lighting a fire.  My hubs had me practice tying knots (he was shocked that I didn't know how to tie a square knot and tried to teach me something trickier than that, but he told me the square knot would probably be fine for what I needed, so I didn't really pay attention to the other one) and talked me through hanging a bear bag.  I packed and re-packed my backpack because there are nuances to that as well.

Kelly was SO excited leading up to the day.  We talked about it constantly.  The day finally came and we were off!  

 And then, as we were driving, I started thinking, "What in the world am I doing?!  What if we get killed by a weirdo in the woods?  Or mauled by a bear?"  Aaaack!  But my girl had 100% confidence in me and I knew I had to be confident.  So I was, errrr, pretended to be.  But you'd better believe I was praying my heart out.

We got to the parking area and I could NOT find the trailhead.  We walked all around the parking lot and I knew it had to be close, but I couldn't find it.  And I had a huge pack on my back.  Finally, I decided to walk down the road a bit and across a bridge...sweet relief!  There it was.

Then the most joyful motherhood experience EVER really began!  Kelly wanted to hold my hand the entire hike in.  We talked nonstop.  We stopped to look at interesting things.  The weather was perfect.  We didn't see another person.  It was, of course, gorgeous (there is NOTHING like Western Washington vegetation). 

We found our (amazing) campsite, right next to the river, put up our tent, gathered tons of branches and sticks (Ty's voice was in my head: "Gather WAY more than you think you're going to need").  Then we hung our water filter and filled up our water bottles, plus a little more for cooking.  We had a little while to explore before it got dark, so we climbed and wandered a bit.  Then we started a roaring fire (I felt SO awesome when those flames started licking the bigger sticks in the fire pit, and Kelly was super proud of me) and had a yummy dinner.  Afterward we picked some perfect marshmallow roasting sticks and I used my trusty knife to take the bark off and make the ends pointy...I felt so hard core doing something handy with a pocket knife.  (You're probably laughing at me, but I totally did.)

Then we hung the bear bag!  I broke a few tree branches, missed getting the rope over several times, muttered a prayer or two, and then it finally worked.  It wasn't in the very best spot, but it was as good as it was going to get!

We left the rain fly off of our tent so that we could look at the stars before we fell asleep.  We talked and talked.  It was magical.  My little lady finally fell asleep and I watched her for awhile with a heart filled to the brim...and then I was left with my thoughts.  NOT GOOD.  I got up and grabbed the pocket knife, opened it, and put it under my sleeping mat.  You know, just in case. :)  

But we survived the night!  Hooray!  That morning we had breakfast (plus a few roasted marshmallows), hung out a bit, then packed everything up so that we could just explore the river and the trail.  

Kelly was the PERFECT little camping partner.  She wanted to help with everything and when something looked like it was tough and I offered to help, she would say, "No, it's okay, I've got it!"  I got tears in my eyes several times because the whole thing was so perfect and fun and I was so proud of this little girl I get to claim as my own.

Oh my GOSH, it was so fun!  Kelly was absolutely in heaven.  So was I.  We took much longer than we'd planned and then finally went back for our packs, talking about how we want to stay for two nights next time.  We hiked the mile out to our car and started home.

On the drive home, we hit a little spot with cell reception and the phone was ringing - it was Ty who had tried to call several times that morning.  He never expressed a single doubt in me, but I'm sure there was some fear in his heart for his girls making it out alive. :) 

Ohhhh, this was fun to write about and re-live in my head.  We are DEFINITELY doing this again.  Total success!