camping gadgets

Check out the latest S'More maker!

My daughter-in-law Nicole bought us this cool gadget for the camping trip.

And it was a smash hit :)

Think about ~ the grahams, marshmallows and candy bars are all roasted over a fire.

And I'm telling you, so much better than just a roasted marshmallow
between a boring graham cracker & chocolate bar.

We made our S'Mores with peanut butter cups,

but you can also use chocolate bars or cookies 'n creme bars.

Ok, I gotta come clean here, camping is not for the faint of heart. You gotta be ok with communing with nature when nature calls. You gotta be ok with no running water... and waking up to bad hair. Thus the cap. I have noticed over the years that campers wear caps. Well duh, it's to hide bad hair. It covers a multitude of faux pas. So I dug around my closet and found this cap. And I wore it the 2nd day... on bad hair day. I am not a hat person, nor a cap person. Heck, headbands hurt my head. So it took some getting use to. But I think I'm sold.

Ok, onto the 2nd gadget Nicole gifted us with... the cast iron old-fashioned waffle maker. Oh my gosh, love, LOVE! Thank God we took the time to season it before we left ~ we coated the entire cast iron in solid shortening and baked for one hour in a 350 oven. It took us a couple tries over the Coleman stove before we got the process down pat... 2 minutes and then flip the iron over for another 2 minutes. Perfecto.

Ok, so here's the story... while packing for the camping trip ~ which btw, we have down to a science ~ I asked Randy... ok, I badgered Randy about always bringing his tools and jumper cables. Always. He's been packing them every single time we travel anywhere for 32 years. But this time I had the audacity to point out that we've never needed to use said jumper cables. Like ever. So why bring em.

Well, fast forward Sunday afternoon. We break camp ~ which we also have down to a science ~ and we're ready to hitch up the cozy cottage to the van and head down the mountain. But... we have a problem. The battery is dead. We neglected to keep the tailgate closed most of the time and drained the battery.
Did my husband point out how I had railed on him for always packing jumper cables everywhere we go? No. He's a humble man and thanks the Lord he brought jumper cables. (in spite of my nagging) I, on the other hand proceed to gush about how he's the best husband ever for always bringing jumper cables! And thankfully we use a 12 volt battery on our cozy cottage, which get us jumped and on our way. Whew!

And for those of you that didn't get enough of our camping trip ~ more pics found HERE on facebook.