camping with kids

{Part of this article I originally posted on Or So She Says}

Now that it’s warming up in Utah (well, winter never really happened here this year but don’t get me started on that disappointment) I’m starting to think about our adventures for the summer and warmer weather. One of the reasons why I’m so excited to be camping in the sun this year is that I recently came across many of the best portable solar panels for camping which I’m desperate to see in action!

We’re a pretty active family and one of our goals is to expose our kids to as many different experiences as we can while they’re young. We LOVE to travel anywhere and everywhere we can WITH our kids. I know, people think we’re crazy to travel with them like we do, but traveling and new experiences is one of the parenting tools we use to teach them all sorts of things. And we (usually) think it’s fun.

One of the things we particularly enjoy is camping. Now I’ll admit, camping with kids is WAY harder than camping without them, but there’s something about being in the mountains as a family that is important to us. And can be SO much fun. My husband and I camped quite a bit growing up in our separate families. And we continued camping after we met each other and were married. Once we started having kids, we just brought them along with us. We’ve camped with babies, toddlers, and now kids who are a little older so we’ve experienced all stages of kids when it comes to camping. Along the way we’ve learned a few things about camping with kids I thought I’d share.

I’m still not brave enough to bring my dSLR camping. It’s dirty. So so dirty out there. And I still have really little kids so I spend most of my time trying to keep them alive. So all my pictures camping thus far are with my phone. But I think we’re almost to the point I can bring my better camera and keep it safe while keeping kids alive.

When I talk about camping for us, I’m talking in a tent, no running water, no toilets, out in the wilderness kind of camping. We go all out. From looking into sites such as outdoorshabit, to watching videos online of other people’s camping experiences, we are always more than prepared for the outdoors. I’m not a big fan of campgrounds. People are too close. It’s too loud. People are too close. You know. We like our space when camping. And peace. And generally we don’t get cell service up there so we don’t get distracted by real life (always a plus in my book). So we make an effort to do full-on camping. Takes quite a bit more prep work, but we think it’s worth it for the experience.

We bring a LOT of baby wipes, water, and hand soap. And just resolve the kids are going to get really dirty. We always bring more clothes than we ever think we need. And usually with the younger kids, we go through just about everything we bring. Definitely over-pack on clothes. And we make sure we bring lots of layers. It can get pretty warm during the day up in the mountains and really cold at night. So we bring enough clothes we can layer when we need to. Before each meal we wash their hands and face as best we can, then before bed we give them a baby-wipe “bath”.

We also usually bring a Frisbee, football or soccer ball, books, a board game or two, crayons and coloring books, squirt guns, toy cars, and glow sticks (my kids will play for hours throwing their glow sticks around after the sun goes down).

But we also like to go on little walks/hikes and let them explore and play as much as possible. So I don’t often pack a lot of extra things for them to do. Kids get pretty creative in the mountains and can find hours of simple entertainment. Give a boy a little stick (or giant stick), some dirt and some rocks and they’re good for hours. And our girls always dream up some inventive game of house using pine cones as their kids. Kids are so awesome.

When choosing food, we keep it AS SIMPLE AS POSSIBLE. Prepping and cooking food in the mountains isn’t exactly easy. And it’s even harder to wash stuff when you don’t have running water. So we keep it simple. We prep as much food as we can ahead of time. If we do tinfoil dinners, I get them cooked at home, then just reheat them on the fire (meat takes a LONG time to cook over a fire). Or if it’s a meal I can fully prep and cook ahead of time, I’ll freeze it and then just thaw it out on the day we’re going to eat it (spaghetti works great for that–you can even cook and freeze the noodles). We also take a small stove with us and cook food on that instead of over the fire.

We generally save the fire for lots and lots and lots of s’mores.

A few s’more hacks. You can get the Kellogg’s fudge strip cookies and just stick a melted marshmallow in between two of those. Or bring rolos and press one of those inside a melted marshmallow. Oreos are great as well. We got the peanut butter oreos and pulled them apart, then stuck the melted marshmallow in there (yum). And for traditional s’mores, find a warm rock close to the fire, put the chocolate on a graham cracker and set it there while roasting your marshmallow so the chocolate melts a little. Gooey goodness. We also love to roast starbursts.

A few other things that have helped us while camping:

**If you go somewhere without toilets, buy a cheap camping toilet or make one. This can be one of the more challenging parts about camping where there aren’t toilets. I’ve seen some great ideas on Pinterest making camping toilets. Most places have rules about toilet use. The places we go, you have to pack it out (no digging holes). If that’s the case, we double bag everything and tie it to the top or back of the car until we get to a dumpster.

**Make sure you bring enough water. And bring refillable water bottles to cut down on trash of disposable water bottles. Less you have to pack-out.

**Keep ALL food in your car at night. No exceptions. There are bears in the areas we camp and all sorts of other wild animals. We never take food into our tent and before we go to bed (or leave camp during the day) we put ALL food in the cars). One of our girls got marshmallow stuck in her hair one year and I didn’t notice until we were in bed. I was stressed all night a bear was going to come bite her head. True story.

**Headlamps are really helpful once the sun goes down. Flashlights from Survival Cooking work like a treat, but headlamps are nice to have so your hands are free. It’s also nice to have a good lantern you can set on a table as people are walking around camp at night.

**We bring a sound machine to block out all the night sounds. We have a few nervous kids so we drown out “what was that?” noises with the sound machine. You can get battery powered sound machines that last for a few weeks. Or use a white-noise app on your phone.

**Bring lots of ziploc bags. Seems like you need them for all varieties of things (extra food, dirty clothes, diapers, nature collections, etc.)

**If there’s room in the tent, use air mattresses and cots to sleep on. We love cots because you can store all your bags underneath them without taking up more space in the tent.

**Bring enough camping chairs for everyone coming. You can get little chairs for kids that usually work until they’re about 6 or 7. Then bigger chairs for the older kids. This saves a lot of whining and fighting over places to sit.

**If you plan to go camping more than once in a year, assemble a camping bin (just a big tupperware bin) with all the paper goods and general kitchen supplies in one place. This will save you SO much time next time you go camping because it’s already assembled and will help you not forget things.

**Be sure to have a GOOD packing list and double check to make sure you have everything. Once you’re out there, you’re out there and some things you can live without, but some things are pretty necessary to everyone’s comfort level when camping with kids (like diapers, or coats, or sleeping bags, or diet coke).

**My BEST tip: Bring a separate “play” tent for the kids. We don’t let our kids get in our sleeping tent unless they need to change or it’s time for bed. Otherwise everything gets dirty and chaotic. We set up a smaller extra tent they can play in. Last time we took our 2 year old camping, we got the tent all set up, the air mattress’s and cots put in place, and sleeping bags laid out in their places. I took my eyes off him for 2 minutes and the next thing I knew he was throwing handfuls of dirt alllll over the inside of the tent. It was not awesome. Once the sleeping tent gets set up, we zipper it shut and the kids play in the play tent during the day.

**And don’t forget to take a LOT of the RIGHT pictures to tell the story of your camping adventures!

You can find more resources, packing lists, craft ideas, and food ideas on my Camping Pinterest Board or you can follow ALL my Pinterest boards for lots of other great ideas!

Happy Camping!