Camping with a Large Family

We finally got brave enough to try camping with seven children. This is our first time going camping since our three youngest joined us three years ago. It was a grand success -- of you don't count the fact that four of the seven came down with colds that had them napping daily. We weren't even staying up late or getting up early. It didn't seem to deter the hiking or swimming though.

We went north to camp because the north country is breathtaking. Sure there are bears and rattlesnakes (first time seeing a rattlesnake as it crossed the trail while we were hiking), but if you accommodate them and think wisely, it's really no big deal. We're rustic campers. We love our tent. It holds the nine of us plus luggage beautifully! This year all our meals were made over the fire pit. We only had one panic moment and it was actually on the way up when we realised that we hadn't checked what the conditions were for fire cautions. We were fine. It's been a cool decently wet summer, so food over the grill it was.

If you're trying to figure out if all seven belong to us, well, no, the uber blonde ones belong to friends of ours. The two oldest were at home working and we wanted to try the seven kid experiment, so we "borrowed" two children. Really, they fit in so beautifully, you would have thought they were ours. People were more inclined to ask about our three ebony headed children before they asked about the four multiple shades of blondes. :o)

Seeing as this was an experiment to see if we could handle camping with seven children -- three of them still have boundary issues, we only went for five days. It was a largely positive week! Next year, perhaps we'll go for longer and even further north! ;o)

How about you? Do you camp, or do you glamp? (Fancy camping.) Any tips I should know for rustic camping with a family of nine?