Eternal Hippies A Year Homemade and Beyond

Next to living at the campground, reliving it is very calming. Even the rough parts are smoothed over by romanticizing. Thursday-  Campsite 32-Just pulled in and looking where to set up the tent and shelter. Fairly level campsite. Pine tree canopy. Fire ring off to the side, near where we parked the van.    We moved the picnic table to where we wanted it and Joe used it to help set up the shelter. It only takes us about 10 minutes to erect the tent, takes longer to make it homey. Tent with rainfly on and twinkle lights. Joe is so clever! He used clothespins to hang both the lights on the tent and the tarp onto the shelter. After dark, the bra comes off and the campfire burns! Now that's comfort!!!! Later in the evening, Joe makes hot tea and we enjoy s'mores. The graham crackers are organic, but not the marshmallows or the chocolate. Shame! But it was a treat for being good campers! LOL Friday- We start...

We left for the campgrounds on Thursday, April 19 and stayed until Monday, April 23rd. Arrived around 3:00pm and set up at site 32. It's a good site and close to the shower house. I'll post pictures soon.In the meantime, I've already uploaded the videos I took. There would have been more, but I ran into the problem of storage space on my camera. We explored the park and found a trail from our site to where Lake Norton would have been.  In the videos of us driving around the campground, we point out different sites that look inviting. Lake Norton was drained during Hurricane Matthew and will be fixed started next month. That information was not verified, just discussed among fellow campers. We really enjoyed being outdoors and quickly got used to living at the campground. We love, love, love camping!!!

We are in full swing preparing for our next camping trip. We leave in a few days. Our living room is overrun with all of our supplies and this evening Joe is going to fix the portable headboard. I'll be packing our clothes and toiletries. Our bedding is all ready to go as we washed them after our last trip and they are in a large ziplock bag. We will be camping for 4 days, so we will be bringing the tent for sleeping and a shelter for preparing meals. We'll use both a campfire and a Coleman stove to cook. We also have a Coleman oven for baking.  Our tent flooring is still being discussed. Last weekend we bought two large quilted moving blankets at a thrift shop that I think might work, but I don't know how many times they can be washed before they fall apart.  For my part, I’ve made the menus for the trip, sorted and organized the kitchen equipment/supplies, made lists for each meal and made a shopping list based on both the list and items that Joe noted...

Last evening I made creamy potato soup with breakfast sausage. It came together nicely and we had plenty left over for this evening. We served it with toasted sourdough bread. It’s odd, sourdough always tastes and smells to me like PlayDough. Yes, I have tasted PlayDough. In a deep cast iron pan I sautéed crumbled uncured organic breakfast sausage. Then I added 2 tablespoons Irish butter to melt. I removed most of the sausage once it was cooked and added about a cup organic onion to the pot.   I cooked until tender, then added 4 organic potatoes that I peeled and cut up into small pieces (about ½ inch cubes). I stirred them for a few minutes then added 1 cup of homemade chicken stock, a cup filtered water, ¼ teaspoon garlic powder and a bay leaf.  I let them simmer for about 30 minutes, stirring occasionally and keeping an eye on the liquid amount. I had to add about ½ cup water to keep the soup…soupy.   When the pota...