ifamily | Camping in -35 Degree Weather

I’ve got spring fever… and maybe even summer fever. It’s starting to get stronger and stronger. Last week, once my kids were napping I went to my master bedroom where the sun was streaming in the windows making it wonderfully bright and warm and I laid out, kicked off my socks and read a book all the while pretending it was summer. It felt a bit like summer, my toes even got hot from the sun but soon reality came crashing in as I looked out that window and realized the drifts of snow (although melting) were still gracing my yard. I’m so done with winter!

I’ve decided that this week we’re going to do a little more pretending it’s summer. Firstly, we’re barbequing hot dogs tonight. I know it’s unhealthy but nothing says summer like BBQ hotdogs! I also think it’d be great to have a little camp out indoors (perhaps the Sunday night before family day).

We have a tent that doesn’t get much use (as we’ve become a bit soft and prefer our parents cabins and campers) but I think we’ll set it up in the living room this weekend. We’ll pile in the air mattresses and blankets along with books and flashlights. It would even be cute to string up some mini lights on the ceiling so it feels like you’re sleeping under the stars. If you don’t have a tent you can create a makeshift fort out of chairs and blankets or skip it all together and just create a big common sleeping area on the floor.

If you have a fireplace you can make smores! I guess we’ll pop in our faux fire DVD (it has a bonfire option!) and attempt smores in the microwave. In the morning we’ll cook a traditional camping breakfast (which when you’re camping is the biggest meal of the day usually) complete with bacon, eggs, hashbrowns and crispy toast. Maybe we’ll even make it all on the BBQ so it tastes like fire.

Maybe while we’re busy pretending, spring will actually show up!

Here is the 6 man tent in our basement rec room! I'm quite impressed that it fit!

Snuggling and watching "Marmaduke".



We tried to spend the whole night in the tent but unfamiliar nighttime lights and sounds of the basement + the actual tent were far to distracting for our little man so we packed it in. There was lots of fun playing in the tent though!