Mice and Dogs and Chickens. Oh, my!

This last weekend, my little family took our Airstream wannabe trailer and went camping. We didn't go far, just to our local church camp. This was our first trip taking the trailer. We have owned the thing for 2 years now but have put it to use as a guest house for mice, mothers and friends. The Inspector General spent hours sucking out the mouse droppings and spraying Lysol on everything. With this being a big camping weekend the Inspector was too antsy to wait for the trailer to be loaded, before taking it to camp. Being afraid all the good spots would be gone by the time I got my bum in gear, the Inspector General decides that we must take the trailer out to camp to secure our spot. So we haul our Airstream wannabe out to the woods, plop it down and head back to the farm to pack up all the STUFF we will NEED for the weekend.


Needless to say, all that is needed to outfit a trailer (that was completely empty) a family of six, coolers packed with enough food for a small army, toys, clothes, chairs, camera, and a dog, don't all fit so well into a 8 passenger Suburban. With the poor 'burb packed to the gills, we still didn't manage to get our clothes or blankets in, but we did get the dog, and that is all that matters, right??? So, about 4 trips later, we are finally confidant that we have all we will need for say, ten years, so we relax and set up camp.

We had a wonderful weekend with friends and family, gathered around the campfire. Our two youngest children learned to ride bikes with out training wheels. We got soaked to the skin in a huge thunder storm. Everyone froze their keesters off. We ate some of the best camp food ever. We even got in trouble with the camp host for bringing our dog (anyone want a dog? you can have him cheap, oh come on....)

I celebrated my birthday with a day of doing nothing, that's right, no dishes or cooking, no cleaning up, just sitting by the fire eating marshmallows, my girlfriends insisted that I (gasp) just enjoy the day. My darling, amazing, sweet, thoughtful, (ok, I know, I am making you sick) hubby had to run to town for "something" and came back with gifts for me and all my girlfriends; I got two pairs of earrings and the girls and I all got the most wonderful chocolate truffles.


We were home by midday Monday. Everyone was glad to be home and not so glad to have to clean all the junk out of the trailer. I decided that the blackberries needed to be hacked back, and the roses need deadheaded and the dogwood needed to be brought up a bit and well you get the picture.......I got busy doing other things. I hacked and chopped through the briar's till my forearms were bleeding. I made a huge mess then decided it was dinner time. (he, he, see how I am) So I proceed to the kitchen to make us up something non hamburger/hot dog/beans. I thought that Burrito Supremo's sounded good. (O' the gastric intestinal delight, since the only thing not in this concoction is hot dogs) As I am rooting around the kitchen for a pot that I might have left behind (they are all in the trailer) I discovered that the mouse had a dog food party in the oven drawer, while we were gone. Nice eh?

Here dogie...... (what? I'm not touchin' that stuff)

After the gastro delight was done and the dishwasher started, I went out to check the status of the chickens. They were all very happy to see me and chased me around the yard clucking and chirping. Then I noticed it. One of them is missing. It's one of my Hamburg chickens, the Inspectors favorite. SHOOT. What shall I do? I am a total mess, I spend the next hour outside calling for the dumb chicken and looking in the bushes, (that big red spot on my arm is either an infected briar scratch or poison oak) hoping that she just went over to the neighbors for a visit. I didn't find the Hamburger but I did find a few eggs.

What a lively weekend!