S’mores. Campfire. Tent. Stars. Family Sleepover.
My children love to have family campouts! There is a special feeling at night as we settle in together. We talk around the campfire as we enjoy roasting marshmallows. We build laughter and memories. We encourage teamwork as we work together to set up and clean up. We set electronics aside as we enjoy the outdoors together.
We have ventured to beautiful campsites over the years. One of our most memorable campouts was in Harper’s Ferry, West Virginia when I was 38 weeks pregnant expecting our first baby. Or treehouse camping in Maryland with our dog. We took our oldest daughter on a campout in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia for her first birthday. We have enjoyed tent camping, shelter camping, friend camping, and extended family camping.
My children wrote “campout” on their summer bucket list, so in the heat of a Texas summer we booked a recommended small town campsite. We were the only campers there! Which turned out to be an amazing blessing for so many reasons. The site we had reserved had suspiciously thick spider webs all around the picnic table so we were able to easily switch sites. Our 5-year-old son decided he needed to pee literally every 10 minutes so we were glad for the great outdoors and the privacy of being the only campers. Our children were loud as can be fighting and rough housing and nobody could hear us, so we didn’t stress. It was rare perfection.
Currently it is more overwhelming than fun to take all of our six kids to a campground for a campout. So we settle for the next best adventure: the backyard!
I am loving having backyard campouts! They are my absolute favorite. What we miss in scenery we make up for in simplicity. My 5-year-old and my 3-year-old still have access to a nearby clean bathroom in which they cannot fall into. My baby can sleep in his crib if the outdoor sleeping vibe isn’t happening. If it’s colder than we anticipated, we can run in the house for another blanket. If I forgot to bring out the bug spray, we can grab it inside. Clean water is readily available.
All the kids beg to know when our next family campout will be! We love that our kids WANT to be together as a family doing an activity that all ages enjoy. And I love that my husband and I can even sneak an extra hour or so around the campfire late at night to chat just the two of us under the stars.
These are our favorite family outdoor games to play after we have set up the tent and are waiting for the fire to really get going.
Our Favorite Family Outdoor Games
Flashlight Tag
Frisbee Toss or Kan Jam
Ladder Toss Lawn Game
Bean Bag in a Bucket Toss
Foam Football for “Monkey in the Middle” or Tossing Around
Campfire Dinners
Campfire dinners are the absolute best! They are exciting to plan and the whole family gathers around with delight as we enjoy delicious food together al fresco.
Our Favorite Backyard Campfire Dinners are hot dogs or “walking tacos”. For hot dogs, I simply buy kid-friendly sized hot dogs and buns and set out ketchup and mustard. I like to buy some better quality thicker hot dogs for the adults and older kids. Then everyone roasts their own hot dog over the fire. I tend to serve cut up watermelon or pineapple or any fresh fruit to go with it and call it good. Simple and everyone is happy!
For “walking tacos”, I buy prepackaged snack bags of Nacho Cheese Doritos chips. Each person gently crushes up their chip bag before opening it. Then I set out toppings of cooked lean ground turkey, refried beans, lettuce, shredded cheese, olives, salsa, guacamole, and sour cream. Everyone fills their chip bags with their preferred taco toppings and eats right out of the chip bag with a fork as they walk and talk around the campfire. Amazing!
Dessert- S’mores of course!
Next we bring out the s’more fixings. Sometimes we get creative with a variety of chocolates such as white chocolate or peanut butter cups or chocolate graham crackers, but usually all we want to eat are lots of milk chocolate, honey graham crackers, and roasted marshmallows! This is a big part of what makes us all look forward to our next family campout!
Another bonus of camping in the backyard is it’s completely FREE! Once you have the camping basic, you are good to reuse them again and again!
These are our favorite camp gear supplies that have held the test of time and comfort.
Our Favorite Gear
We love the quality and spaciousness of our 9 person tent. It fits our queen air mattress for my husband and myself, five sleeping bags for my oldest kids, and a pack n play for our baby easy peasy. We love this tent!
We love having our own fire pit! It was a splurge gift for my birthday recently simply so we wouldn’t have to borrow one and can enjoy more family campfires year round.
We recently purchased these adorable camp chairs for our littlest kids and they are even more darling in person! My toddler hasn’t fallen out of it either like he did when we tried putting him in the larger chairs and he wanted to get out.
Our kids love the glow in the dark design on this sleeping bag!
These campfire color packets are my husband’s favorite to create a little campfire magic for the kids!
Glow Sticks make a backyard campout even more memorable! Especially when we give one to each child at dusk only for campout days. It’s fun to put a glowstick in any kind of empty clear container such as a recycled milk gallon, juice container, or mason jar with or without water. Set a few glow stick containers out all night to help guide a path to walk to the house for the bathroom in the night.
Time to get tucked in cozy in those sleeping bags, y’all!
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All comments (1)
Laurel Parkinson
What fun and interesting ideas for a fantastic backyard family camp out. Great ideas!! Love the fire pit 🔥
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