I consider myself to be a brave woman. I am willing to try new things and explore new adventures. I have been known to participate in sports and activities that have calculated risks. This past weekend I found that even I have limits when it comes to new adventures and my personal bravery.

Over the Fourth of July holiday we went camping with a total of five boys under the age of 12. Four of whom were not my own and had never, ever set foot in the real wilderness before, slept in a tent or experienced the true joys of really roughing it with only the basics.

I was fortunate enough to be born into a family that has been camping, hunting, hiking and fishing in a wonderful slice of heaven located just North of Winthrop in the Okanogan National Forest for four generations. Members of my family are raised from the time we can toddle, to appreciate the wilderness, taught how to survive in it and most definitely how to enjoy all of its wonders.

Wanting to share my knowledge and love of nature with a few more kids than just my own, I invited my best friend and her four boys to go camping with us. After the six hour drive, I felt certain my ears had either fallen off or burst into flames. I spent a majority of the time answering questions that I had never even connected to camping before and a few I did not even want to know why they were being asked in the first place.

Early that Saturday afternoon we pulled into the camp site and the youngest boy asked where the hotel pool was and when we could get in. Evidently the whole camping explanation had escaped the 5-year-old mind. Later on the 7-year-old asked me to microwave his hotdog bun for him, uh huh. I pointed out that’s a little hard to accomplish with no electricity. The 9-year-old and the 11-year-old had some sort of invisible spring on their behinds that caused them to bounce and jump in and out of chairs around the close proximity to the campfire which made me shudder during a few close calls. Nobody wanted to eat the same thing and everybody always had something to say about it frequently at the exact same time.

I swear a couple of the boys have some real talent. They managed more than once to go from reasonably clean to complete dirt encrusted train wreck in less than six seconds while appearing to be standing still in the middle of camp. Zipping the tent to keep the bugs out, well that is a talent no one seemed able to remember or master with any skill despite their mother reminding them about it every single time. Writing their name in the dirt with the hotdog roasting stick was accomplished by more than one individual if one of your brothers was not close enough to poke with it first. Who could pee the most and the farthest on the designated tree at the edge of camp was also frequently applauded and held in highest esteem.

Despite the adults spending several hours each day alternating between yelling at inappropriate behavior and explaining even more rules that had to be made up on the fly for situations that were not humanly possible to anticipate, a significant amount of fun was had by all. Nobody lost a limb or an eye. Nobody got lost in the woods or managed to get eaten by a bear. I consider that to be a success.

The kids learned a heck of a lot about nature. The adults learned a heck of a lot about the nature of kids and how brave you have to be to take them camping in the first place.