Carlton Family: Camping at Turkey Run State Park!!!

Wow, it's been a LONG time since I updated this thing! So sorry! We've stayed fairly busy this summer, lots of play groups and playing out back in Milo's pool.

This last weekend we went camping with our favorite camping buddies, the Tibbs, at Turkey Run State Park here in Indiana. It felt like we were doing something 80% of the time, which is great when you have 5 kids under the age of 10.

Here's how the weekend went, pictures will be after:

We drove down (about a 3.5 hour drive) on Thursday afternoon, set up, had dinner, and of course had a campfire before hitting the sheets. Milo's not big on roasted marshmallows, but LOVES eating them straight from the bag (which we've known for a long time now). We have also found out that if Milo is BEYOND tired, he sleepwalks. Jesse caught him standing next to his bed three times during the night and one time Milo looked at us and said, "Milo all done [sleeping]" and Jesse told him to lay back down, and he did!

Friday we had an action-packed day. We got up and hit the trails. This is the first park I've been to that I can remember where the majority of the park is trails, not roads that run through it. It's just as beautiful as I'd heard, so it did not disappoint. We (Jesse, Milo, and I) walked for a total of almost two hours, the Tibbs stayed out longer. Milo was still tired from not getting a good nights sleep, so he actually fell asleep in Jesse's arms for the last half hour of the hike. Poor Jesse did a great job of carrying him and going up and down stairs, over rocks, etc. Once we got back to the van, Milo stayed asleep and we drove to the nearest town to get lunch (we forgot to get the camper keys from Jeremy, where all of the food was...). He slept for about a total of an hour, which is better than no nap at all.

After the Tibbs came back and ate lunch we went to the pool in the park. It's a newer pool, extremely clean, and the water was SO warm! Everyone had a great time and got cooled off. Boy were the little ones upset when it was break time! The pool had a very shallow part that worked its way to a deep end. Milo and Kassidy could stand in the shallow end, and as long as Milo can touch, he's pretty fearless, which is good and bad for me and Jesse.

Friday night after dinner we hit the putt putt course that was pretty much across the street from the campground. I have not had a chance to write and tell you how much my child LOVES mini golf! Jesse took him one night while I was out and he did nothing but talk about it for the next 4 days, seriously. Needless to say, Milo was ecstatic about going. This was about the cheesiest course ever, but the kids loved it and Jesse and I tied for low scores. Milo woke up Saturday morning asking to go play mini golf again...

Saturday we got up and had chocolate chip pancakes and then got ready to go tubing down Sugar Creek. There is this awesome place (only because of the tubes, not the way it was run) called Sugar Valley Canoes that offers canoe trips along with tubing. For the 3 mile tubing trip, it's $5 a tube, and they say it should take you an hour to an hour and a half to do this trip. Um, yeah, it took us 3 hours!!! None of us had our camera because they weren't waterproof, but it was a great time! You start at one covered bridge, when you hit the suspension bridge you're half way through, and end at the next covered bridge, and the whole thing goes through Turkey Run. We did not get tubes for Milo, Kassidy, and Kamden. Milo rode with Jesse (he wouldn't exactly fit on my belly), and Kassidy and Kamden rode with their parents.

Even though Milo slept really well Friday night he managed to fall asleep while on Jesse's lap in the tube! He slept for about an hour, which once again is saying something because it's not like Jesse was just sitting there, he would need to readjust and paddle with his arms to keep moving. A ton of people made comments about the kids sleeping while tubing, I thought it was hilarious. All three of the young ones napped at some point in time on the creek.

We were so pooped after tubing that we came back, ate lunch (at almost 3:00), and just relaxed the rest of the day. Erin and I were going to do a candlelight tour of the Lusk home (built around 1840) that night, but were very upset to learn, AFTER we arrived, that they only let 35 people on the tour at a time, and we were "supposedly" numbers 36 and 37. I can count, and there were not 35 people in line...Also, they only do one tour a night.

Sunday we got up, ate breakfast and the packed up to come home. The Tibbs are still there, but we needed to get back so Jesse had time to relax before getting ready to go back to work on Monday.

Like I said, we had a great time and I would definitely go back! Yes, Jesse, Milo, and I slept in our tent, we were not in the camper. Some friends think I'm crazy for going to 7.5 months pregnant, but it was fine!

Here are the pictures to enjoy:

The Tibbs brought some cars and an airplane, so Milo was in heaven playing with their toys. What you can't see is that he's sitting in front of the steps leading into their camper. This is where the young ones decided was the best place to play-all weekend...We were constantly having to ask them to move so they wouldn't get stepped on.

Milo putt-putting. Doesn't he look like he's a pro already???

Milo passed out on the trails in Jesse's arms. This picture was taken as we were getting to the end of the trail (finally!).

Milo when he first fell asleep. Notice the slight smile on Jesse's face, this was gone in about 10 minutes!

Just a nice picture of one place we hiked through. You can see the Tibbs family and Jesse and Milo.

Jesse and Milo climbed up a rock and this is them on top. I should've taken one from further away so you could see how high up they were.

This is the rock next to where Jesse and Milo were standing. I loved watching the little ones (Kamden (almost 2) in yellow, Kassidy (almost 3) in green, and Milo (almost 3) in blue shorts) try and climb to places where Keegan (9) and Kennedy (7) were.

This is a stop on one of the trails called the "Ice Box". Where all of them are standing is a slight drip of cool water, and they loved it!

Climbing down into the "Ice Box". It was a bit scary climbing down into it, but it was worth it!!!

Kassidy and Milo standing together. They're only 6 days apart. I think that she's standing on slightly high ground than Milo, because he's a bit taller than her!

Right after we came down from the suspension bridge there was a DNR officer with a snake that the kids could pet. I was very impressed that they did touch it!

Erin on the suspension bridge. This is a very cool bridge, I was expecting something out of Indiana Jones and was slightly disappointed when I saw how secure it was...