Last Monday we got all packed up and headed to one of my favorite campgrounds, Clubhouse. It is just outside of Marcell, Minnesota; so only about 40 minutes away. It is a pretty rustic campground; outhouses, hand pumped water, no electricity… But it is one of the most beautiful places on this earth in my humble opinion!!! Doesn’t hurt that I was there was a bunch of people that I love!!!
This first one was taken when Wyatte and I were out in the canoe. It was so calm the only waves were the ones I was making with the paddle and the ones coming from the back of the canoe. 
The view from the boat landing.
Another view from the boat landing.
Wyatte in the boat, waiting for Daddy to start it and head to the campsite.
And their off!
Xander taking Wyatte for a walk! Wyatte had to run full speed to keep up with Xander!!! I think just a few minutes after this Wyatte ended up taking a digger and John or I took the leash.
Must have been me, because John go the stroller with the girls!
Enjoying her ride! Isn’t she adorable?!?!?
John pushing the stroller up the “hugest” hill ever!
Wyatte pretty much ran the whole time!
John finally at the top and able to move a little faster!
Yes that is another dog, no you aren’t losing your mind! This is my brother’s dog, Rusty. These couple of pictures are of our camp site. We did end up setting up another tent right behind where Rusty is sitting for Paul and his friends that came up. The tarp is over the firepit (over which we cooked all the meals.) and the picnic table.
John and I and the kids were in the camper that used to be my mom and dad’s but is now just my dad’s. My mom and youngest brother slept in the tent.
Nevaeh was playing peek-a-boo with Krislyn, Paul’s girlfriend, when they came up. Krislyn is one of the kids’ favorite people in the world. They absolutely love her! She is great with them too! Wish we could see her more. This isn’t the best picture of her, but I didn’t get any better ones. Sorry Krislyn…
Nevaeh was messing around at the table and all of a sudden she was on the ground! Still not totally sure what happened, but she looked too cute to not take a picture. 
Here are some more shots from when Wyatte and I were in the canoe. There are three loons in the pictures, if you look close you can see them. I am pretty sure it was a mom and two partially grown up babies.
I just happened to look up at the sun and this is what I saw. At this time in the trip there were no clouds in the sky, no precipitation at all. I have never seen anything like this before in my life. My mom or Krislyn hadn’t either, so… I don’t know if it was a fluke or if it happens more and I just don’t see it. Anyways, it was beautiful. No, I didn’t edit the picture at all either, this is what it looked like in the sky… 
Krislyn with all the kids! Getting ready to make smores. We tried something old and something new with our smores this year. We started using chocolate frosting instead of chocolate bars because the bars would end up melted, or get full of water in the cooler. So we used chocolate frosting on one side, and then going off a tip from the Wright’s (who also go to our church) we put peanut butter on the other side. Everyone seemed to love them, and decided that it was a keeper idea! Thanks Nathan and Heidi! Too bad for me that I don’t like peanut butter!!! But I enjoyed them with just the normal chocolate. If anyone else has a smore idea that they would like to share, let me know. 
All tuckered out after a full day!
Krislyn and Paul, Kirk, Mom and I, and John played Scrabble after the kids went to bed. I don’t remember who won (I think Paul and Krislyn beat me and mom by a couple of points, but I could be wrong, that might have been our rummy score….) but the crazy thing, something that doesn’t happen to us very often is that everyone got rid of all their tiles. CRAZY!!!
Paul and Kirk like to play disc golf or frisbee golf and since they had their discs we went down to a semi open spot and threw them around a little. 
Took us a while to figure out with this purple thing is, but we are pretty sure we know now. If after I describe this someone else has other info let me know and I will fix it! Based on a paper that we couldn’t really see we think it is sticky and catches bugs so the forest rangers and other guys can see what kind of bugs are around, so they can see if there are any that are potentially dangerous to the trees in the area. There were a couple of them that we saw around the campground area.
We then took a walk down some of the trails in the woods. They are all over and lead to tons of different things. This one goes out to a point, partially down the trail is an opening that I always wanted to set up a tent in and sleep out there, but wasn’t ever quite brave enough to actually do it!
Aubrie loves this uncle! Well all of them actually, but!!!
Some of the natural beauty that we saw.
Paul helping Aubrie walk down a hill, or trying to get her to let him help. She was pretty convinced she could do it alone!
Pumping water to get a drink after the trail walk.
This time up the hill we let Wyatte hold Xander’s leash and he pulled the stroller up the hill!!!
Wyatte took a very long nap, something that doesn’t happen much any more.
It got pretty cold there on Tuesday, and stayed cold the rest of the time up there. The kids all had on three shirts, and still seemed cool.
This is what happens when you are at a campground when it pours rain!
John and Kirk had fun making trails in the campsite to let the water run down the hill to keep it from flooding the tents. 
I didn’t want the kids to get too wet and cold so I made them stay under the tarp for most of the down pour. 
John’s legs and part of the “trail” that he made to try to keep us dry!
John got pretty wet! This pictures are pretty horrible quality, but apparently taking a picture during the pouring rain, under a tarp, in the dark, and through the smoke are too many somethings for my point and shoot camera to handle! 
Kirk put on his swimming shorts to keep his pants dry(er)!!!
I did end up letting the kids run around in the water. They had fun, and it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be! We were camping after all.
Even with a rain jacket he still got pretty wet!
Aubrie enjoying her thumb and some mommy cuddle time while it was raining.
Got pretty windy, had to prop the tent stakes up to keep them from snapping… Almost decided to come home at this point.
Filled this “tub” up with warm water (from the kettle over the fire) and the hand pump, and gave the kids a bath after playing in the rain. I don’t ever remember getting a bath when we were camping when I was going up, but THEY WERE FILTHY!!!
Grandma trying to chop up a birch log that we found for extra fire wood.
John finishing up the job.
Wyatte got his turn in the tub too!!!
Wyatte, Uncle Kirk and John getting ready to go fishing. Aren’t the clouds beautiful in the back ground!?!?!?
This is another of our favorite spots at this campground. I am pretty sure is it an old train car, but I could be wrong. It is at the end of a small crick, that when the water is high enough, flows pretty fast, and we used to float down in on inner tubes. My dad put up a rope in the culvert so that we could float through there and the pull ourselves back though. I guess he might have put the rope up in there so that he could pull the canoe back through when he used it to travel from one lake to the other, but we used it for floating too!
This was on the walk back from the culvert, I wasn’t brave enough to get in the water much this time! TOO STINKING COLD!!!
This is called the Twisted Trees, and is a white pine and a red pine that have grown together. They have looked like this since I can remember. I am pretty sure they got struck by lightning one year when we were there, but we couldn’t find the scar this time…. Still a beautiful thing to look at.
Aubrie was sleeping in there!
Waiting for Daddy and Wyatte to get back from fishing.
Showing off what he caught. A large mouth bass, a blue gill and a sunny.
Headed to the pier to fish. 
Nevaeh caught one! No, you aren’t going blind, it is a little speck of a thing under John’s hand! The really funny thing is this was the biggest one that we caught off the pier!!!
I was kinda surprised that Nevaeh held it, but she didn’t seem to mind it at all. I know she looks kinda grossed out in this picture, but she really wasn’t! Aubrie on the other hand!!!!
Wyatte was getting shown the art of Bocce Ball!!!
Hope that was enough for you to see! My fingers hurt from typing, and my eyes hurt from reading!!! Don’t stress out too bad if you have to come back a couple time to finish!!!
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