mosquito heaven

Another weekend-car-camping get-away! This one was with Rose Marie and Mark and we headed over to Potholes State Park, south of Moses Lake. We had originally wanted to go to Lake Kachess, just past Snoqualmie Pass, but needed to go further east due to the forecasted rain. We weren't sure we would have nice weather as we were driving up towards the campgrounds since there were dark, large clouds and lots of wind, which was making nice little dust storms over the road. It looked quite ominous as we drove in. We quickly put up our tents hoping the rain would come down somewhere else. We weren't entirely lucky, but it only rained for 10 minutes while we were setting up the tents. The rest of the weather for the weekend was lovely, not too hot, either. We even saw some lightening off in the distance that night and since it was far away, it was fun to watch.
After we set up our tents, I had to eat right away because I was STARVING. I noticed some mosquitoes (since it was getting near dusk) and thought about putting on repellent, but I didn't want my food tasting like repellent and I didn't want to have to go wash my hands after I put it on, so I waited to put on the repellent. I did have pants and a sweatshirt on, so my legs and arms were covered, so I thought I'd be ok. I really should have taken a couple of minutes to protect my feet because look at what those mosquitoes did to me....

I have about 15 bites on this one foot and probably another 10 all together. I haven't been eaten like that in forever. The bites luckily don't look this bad anymore, but they still itch. Just so you don't think all bugs are evil in eastern Washington, we saw this pretty, yellow butterfly. It didn't even try to bite me....nice butterfly. I just wish it would have held still for 2 more seconds for me.We spent the day at the lake on Saturday, which is a nice, clean lake. We came prepared with floaties, but it was on the windy-side, so we kept having to paddle back towards the shore. The park surrounding it is very nice and has lots of green grass. You can see in the picture of Mark blowing up the air mattress that we didn't have any grass, just dirt and dust at our campsites, which wasn't the nicest, but there were trees lining each site which gave some privacy. The fancy rv campsites near the park were right on the green grass, so we kind of felt jipped. We did use the nice grass to play a fun game of croquet.

We ate pretty well. I even attempted to recreate my dad's mountain-man breakfast, which is eggs, potatoes, cheese, sausage, bacon....mmmmm. Mark and Rose making their chicken kabobs.

My favorite part of the weekend was making fires and watching them. Fire good. This is the one I started, all by myself. One of our camping neighbors left us a bunch of wood, so we were able to make a really big fire. We brought stuff to make 'smores and I actually ate a whole 'smore, which I haven't done in years. I'll explain. When I was 5 or 6 we went "camping" on our property on the dairy we lived on at the time. I think it was just on the back of one of my dad's big flat bed trucks. I didn't know the difference, we were outside and in sleeping bags, so it was camping to me. Anyway, the sugar-addict that I am, I ate probably 1/2 a bag of marshmellows that night. Now that I think of it, I don't know how I was able to eat so many, mom must have brought a couple of bags because I'm sure my brothers and sisters ate some too, or maybe they were smart enough not to eat 1/2 a bag. So we all go to bed and I wake up in the middle of the night, sick, and throw up all my marshmellow goodness inside my sleeping bag. Since that day, I have never liked eating marshmellows and always would make my 'smore with just chocolate and graham crackers (by warming it up over the fire to melt the chocolate, still good). I decided to try out a whole 'smore this camping trip and I am so happy that I did. It was so yummy! I ate 2 the first night and 3 the second. Who wants to have a bonfire? So we can roast marshmellows, now I want more! (I'll try not to eat a whole bag at a time, I do think I have learned my lesson about quantity.)