Memorial Day Weekend

We spent the Memorial Day weekend in Abilene. Originally, we wanted to camp at the State Park, but we are quickly learning that if we want to stay at a State Park during peak seasons, like Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Thanksgiving etc...we should book several months in advance. The Abilene State Park didn't have any openings, so we stayed at Trey's parents place.


While we were in town, we celebrated Andy's graduation.

Queen Wilhelmina State Park

Here are some pictures from our Spring Break Vacation. This was our second leg of the trip, when we camped at Queen Wilhelmina, located in Arkansas on Rich Mountain.




Lodges at State Parks are a common thing in Arkansas. Pretty cool! We spent a few hours playing games inside.

Airstreaming Close to Home

Once the ice melted in Abilene, we drove back to DFW. Trey had to work (his business has been doing well in the winter months). The girls and I were still in vacation and airstream mode and we were not ready to go home. Trey worked the rest of the week and the girls and I spent time at a park, close to home. There were a few nights, Trey stayed with us, but for the most part the girls and I were camping solo. We had a wedding that week and we also went to the Cotton Bowl, so staying close to home worked out for us!

It was cold at night, but sunny during the day.

We wanted to hike the trails, but most of the trails are still flooded, so we walked near the lake and campsites.  The picture below is an area that was flooded.

Lake Mineral Wells State Park

This past weekend we camped at Lake Mineral Wells State Park.

We've heard from multiple friends it's one of the best State Parks in the area. A few years ago, I ran the LMW Trailway, but I didn't get a chance to explore the area, other than the main trail.

Even though our site didn't have a lake view, most of the sites we saw didn't, but we were surrounded by trees and nestled away from other campers.

I feel like we are getting faster at packing, setting-up camp and breaking down. One word: TOTES! Many many TOTES! Which reminds me, I should buy more.


Friday night, we grilled burgers and made a campfire. We stayed out there visiting by the fire, until a raccoon scared us. The crazy animal jumped on our picnic table. After the raccoon scare, we decided to go inside and call it a night.

Saturday morning, I went for a run on the trail. This particular trail overlooked the lake. The view was incredible. Most of the longer trails, including the main LMW Trailway was closed due to flooding, so I kept circling the shorter ones.


Shortly after my run, we all went on a hike.


Sunday morning, I woke up and made breakfast for everyone and then I went for a shorter run.

After my short run, we drove to the trail entrance of Penitentiary Hollow. It was quite the distance from out campsite, but once we got there, we hiked. This was the best part of our camping trip and something we enjoyed doing together.

It was exciting exploring the area.


Trey winterized the Airstream, so I'm not sure if we will be going on another camping trip this month or even for the rest of the winter season. We've had the airstream for 6 weeks and we've camped four times. I'm hoping we have an unusally warm winter. That would be AWESOME for camping! 

Camping Before the Torrential Downpour

I hope you and your family had a wonderful Thanksgiving. We spent the majority of our break camping near the lake. Wednesday the weather was nice and cool. That was the only day we had good weather. The rest of the time it rained. We actually cut our stay one day short because the lake was overflowing onto our campsite.

Trey was on call the week of Thanksgiving, so we didn't camp too far from home. For a moment, we considered doing Thanksgiving in the airstream (the entire meal) and we also considered going to a resturant (the keg), but Jessica and Jeff invited us to their house and that sounded like fun. Cheyenne and Dakota were thrilled because that meant they could play with Sophia. We took food to share --- a ham that we bought from Honey Bee Ham (Grandbury) and a few sides.

This was our third time camping and we loved it. It's a ton of work to prep for. I found this one site that has been a huge help. Before each trip, I print these .pdfs and use them.  If you camp often, you have to check this out, they've been a lifesaver!!