For the masses Googling “camping while pregnant”

For my next crazy pregnant lady adventure, I went camping. At 38 weeks pregnant. Like cook over the fire, sleep in the woods, pee in an outhouse camping.

Micah and I love going camping with friends, but it’s hard to find people to go with because not everyone loves sleeping in a tent, not showering, and smelling like campfire smoke for a weekend. So when our community group mentioned going camping together about a month ago, I quickly said we were IN, even though the trip was scheduled for my 38th week of pregnancy. I only had one stipulation… it had to be a place with some kind of bathroom facility because there was no way my 30+ extra pounds would be squatting in the woods.

On Friday night, we packed up the truck and headed up to the mountains. We had Zianne with us, which was actually the biggest variable. I knew I could handle a night in the woods, but I wasn’t so sure if my toddler could. In true Russum fashion, we slept in the back of the truck on our memory foam pad instead of pitching a tent. {We actually don’t even own a tent because we love sleeping in the bed of the truck, but we probably need to purchase one now that we have multiple offspring}. Zianne slept with us and did really well until approximately 4:15am when she decided it was time to be wide awake. She watched alphabet shows quietly on my phone until about 6:30am when she decided she was actually still exhausted and fell back asleep. She and Micah somehow cuddled and slept under the morning sun until almost 9am. I, however, was {mostly} awake from 4:15am onward and finally jumped out of bed for a campfire quiet time when Zianne went back to sleep. 

We had a lovely day hanging at camp with our friends while the kids went crazy riding bikes and power wheels and digging in the dirt. In the afternoon, we headed to Woods Canyon Lake and rented a boat. Randy and Micah set up a line, but the fish were NOT biting that afternoon so we headed back to camp empty handed after trolling the lake for a few hours.

We made s’mores two nights in a row with the full smorgasbord of options {grahams, Ritz, Hershey’s, Nutella, Reeses, bananas, and lots of marshmallows… I take my s’more buffet VERY seriously}. We ended up not staying the second night because I was scheduled to speak at church the next morning, but we hung around the campfire until 9pm and then headed home. Zianne slept the whole way back with skinned knees, dirty clothes and a sticky face…

For locals: We stayed at the Ponderosa campground and we loved it. The sites were spacious and private {unlike Woods Canyon Lake which is more crowded}. We could barely see the other campers near us because the spaces were so spread out. The bathrooms are only outhouses but they were kept in fairly clean condition. There was also running water for drinking. The campground was only two hours away {just past Payson} and the weather was about 20 degrees cooler than Phoenix. We had never been up by the Mogollon Rim during spring before. It was a lovely 85 degrees by day and in the 50s at night. We got to wear long sleeves in the evening, but I was never cold like I’ve been during fall camping trips. Highly recommend!