O’Neill Campout

April 17, 2019 by
Jake and the twins embarked on yet another fun campout with our local Adventure Guides group, with the Rainbow Sky Expedition. The twins are in the Pink Panthers circle and look forward to their daddy daughter camping time! This campout was just a few minute away at O’Neill regional park, so because it was so close, Meredith joined for a day and I picked her up at night.
The dads in this group are pretty impressive creative planners and the theme for camp was “Role Reversal”.  It started off with the girls getting to sit in Jake’s lap as they helped park the car into the campsite.
Their favorite activity was the Bippity Daddy Boutique – where dads had a spa day and then walked the Runway in their beautiful makeup and nail polish. The twins won for best makeover!
Scary.
Another activity was “End of our Rope” – a chance for daughters to lead their blindfolded dads through a crazy rope course, connected by a piece of rope the girls got to make.
There was also “Daughters Save the Dads” – a challenging set of puzzles needed to be solved to keep dads from going in the stream.
The girls also like the scavenger hunt with riddles to solve along the way and the game of Giant Twister. They also always love to sit around and play Uno with the other girls, climb trees, and go exploring.
They were excited about finding a huge toad!
Finding some interesting bugs.
    
This looks like something out of a horror show.
The campfire is always a blast and the girls’ skit was really cute!

Moana sing-along!

 

The girls can’t wait until the next campout!

Lots of love,

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Camp Surf

September 4, 2018 by

With Samantha and Amelia starting kindergarten, a whole new world of activities opened up for them this year. A few different moms from their school and from our neighborhood suggested checking out their Girl Scouts troops, but I was hesitant to make that time commitment considering Meredith was too young to join and I had a baby at home.

Enter Adventure Guides.

Formerly Indian Princess Guides (I personally don’t see anything wrong with this name, but I’m sure it became too un-PC to keep around), the Adventure Guides is a camping and adventure program for dads and daughters. Perfect! It’s only for kinder through 5th grade, so much to her chagrin, Meredith couldn’t join, but we decided to give it a try with the twins.

The Adventure Guides is a popular program in our area, so there are tons of dads and daughters that make up the troops in our town. The twins’ Expedition, made up of several “troops,” is the Rainbow Sky Expedition and the troop the girls joined is the Pink Panthers. It’s the smallest troop out of the expedition, which is perfect for them since they tend to get overwhelmed in large groups. They have a camp-out or activity each month, as well as a planning meeting before the campout where the dads divvy up who is in charge of food/activities, while the girls eat snacks and do crafts. Basically, it’s the twins’ dream activity!

At first, I was a little skeptical of the program, considering dads are in charge of all the planning, but wow, do I stand corrected! These guys are uber-organized with spreadsheets and calendars listing all the activities, campouts, prices, and who is responsible for what a year in advance. My dream! Every troop has their own themed gear and banners and the events themselves have been really organized and fun so far.

At the beginning of September, the twins and Jake went on their first campout to Camp Surf down in Imperial Beach, San Diego, as close to the border of Mexico as you can get.

It’s fun to stay at the… YMCA!

Not sure what this letter is.
Or this one.
Amelia and Samantha thought the concept of a Lost and Found was interesting and kept wanting to take pictures by it. I’m thinking we could turn this concept into a creative Halloween costume one year!
Learning life skills and setting up camp.
I’m pretty sure Jake did all the work.

The leader dad of the Pink Panthers troop is awesome at video editing and takes awesome photos with his drone/creates fun videos! I was so happy the girls had joined his troop because obviously I’m a sucker for proper documentation of events! It’s mostly his two daughters in the video, which is why you see the same dark-haired girls all the time, but there are some fun shots of the twins boogie boarding!

Imperial Beach from the drone.
Shell collecting.
Setting up the fire and relaxing.
Exploring the rocks.
Best buds.
Sammy and Daddy.
Daddy daughter time! The twins were so excited to spend a few days with Jake and were noticeably more tolerant of Meredith when they returned due to the great bonding time.
Go Pink Panthers!
After a tiring first afternoon, the girls were ready for bed early.
Meanwhile back at home, it was scorching, so we played in the pool and did movie night by ourselves.
Eleanor was wondering why there wasn’t as much bickering and fighting going on. It totally changes the dynamic of the entire house when even one person is gone!
Since the campout was at the YMCA facilities, they ate their meals in the cafeteria and from the looks of it, ate like queens!

Grooving to the music and stuffing their faces. 

The twins’ favorite activity at the campout was learning to surf and boogie board! I didn’t think the girls would be brave enough to try it since they don’t even like swimming in the ocean when we go to the beach here. Jake reported back that they were completely fearless!

Surfer Amelia.
All that yoga paid off.
Surfer Sammy.
Cowabunga!

The twins were fascinated by this game called “Ga-Ga.” Still not sure what it is, but apparently all the girls were obsessed with it.

Jake always says this phrase at home because his Grandma Lula said it growing up. Then they saw this print at the camp!
Crafts had to be right up there with surfing as the twins’ preferred activity.
Papier-Mache masks.
Stuffing faces again.

Meanwhile, back at home, our cousins were in town, so they came over to swim with Meredith and hang out with Elle!

Uncle Steve and Auntie Lynn kept Elle entertained.

Hailey mostly hung out on the perimeter. 

Lunch time!
Meredith had some nice bonding time with Cousin Noah.
A special thanks to Zack for being the dedicated adult swimmer/pool monitor!
Later that afternoon, I took Meredith and Eleanor to San Clemente on a walk and to eat dinner, mostly just to pass the time! Meredith kept asking when the girls and Daddy would be home! It was definitely VERY quiet at our house that weekend.

Back at Camp Surf…

Shaved ice!
Boogie boarders.

At night, the dads put on a legit skit night, complete with professional sound and lights. I was very impressed with all the planning that went into the campout– and all by dads!

While waiting for the skits to start, they had a little dance party. 

So exhausted! After all the girls were asleep, the dads had their own “Midnight Meat” where they roasted a bunch of meat for the next day and watched sports or something, but I think Jake was too tired and just went to sleep!
Lost and found again.

Samantha and Amelia loved their first campout experience with Jake and the Adventure Guides and Jake said it was like the summer camps he always wanted to go to as a kid! More than just all the fun activities though, the twins really just enjoyed spending quality time on their own with Jake and came back with their little love buckets full.

Lots of love,

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