Just What we do at Home: Tara on Vacation

The first year we were all together, the “big” girls were four and the “little” girls were so much younger than Anna is now, I can’t even wrap my mind around it. We went camping, as we had before, but never like this. Five little girls, the two of us, a rented van (our old Volvo’s couldn’t hack it). Ten or fifteen towels, soaked on the first day. Thirty or so panties, (a seemingly excessive amount upon packing; comically lacking in reality), several rolls of paper towels too few, way too many garbage bags full. What a disaster. At one point, my Callie looked at me and said “Mommy, you do everything like at home, but with out running water.”

I haven’t been camping since.

Now we rent houses. We still have to bring everything: food, chargers, dvds, markers and oil paints and boogey boards and bongos. Special blankets and extra pillows and more supplies than we ever approach using.

But this is us. We have six girls, and limited funds, but a surplus of energy (them), patience (us, on a good day), wine (on the rest of the days) and love. So we take the show on the road. We do just what we do at home, but now, with running water, too.

And all the energy that we bring, combined with a new place, a new landscape, makes us see each other, and us as a whole, in a new way, and we always-even after some pretty awful trips (there have been a few!)-come out feeling a part of one, strong, unique thing. Our family.

PS, we’re going to try camping again this summer. I’ll let you know