Mark Twain Lake

We finally went on our camping trip that we had planned over a month ago. Alyssa had two requests for the summer when it started to warm up: 1) Go camping and 2) Go to a baseball game. So we can cross one of them off the list now. The camping trip was a lot of fun. Here are the kids loaded up in the car. Casey got in that position whenever he was a little bit uneasy.

We had picked a campground close to a lake with the intention of being able to swim. At first we picked Lake of the Ozarks, but changed our plans when people from around here told us that Mark Twain Lake was much more family friendly. About an hour before leaving, Danny informed me that the beach at Mark Twain Lake was closed. The girls were pretty bummed about not being able to go swimming, but they quickly forgot about it when we told them how fun it would be to go hiking instead. Danny even printed out a hiking Scavenger Hunt and Alyssa loved pointing out all of the things on the list. We also tried out our hiking backpack and Ashley loved the ride.

Along our hike, we had a pretty nice view of the Lake. This was the first good picture spot.

We felt fortunate to find a nice view of the lake with a spot to set our camera for this family picture. Ashley wasn't too happy about being held back from climbing on the railing. She has no fear.
After our long hike, we enjoyed relaxing at our shady campsite.

Originally we had planned to stay Thursday night through Saturday morning. There were threats of severe thunderstorms on Friday night which made us hesitant to stay the second night. Our minds were made up to leave early when we started pulling small ticks off of Alyssa. We must have pulled at least 20 off of her body and at least another 10 off of the rest of us. We didn't feel completely free of them until after we gave Casey a bath on Saturday afternoon(we all had baths/showers before that). On top of the ticks, Alyssa also came home with a nice sized spider bite that made her arm swell up. In spite of the bugs, we still had a fun time and the girls loved sleeping together in the tent.