Holiday Weekend Camping at Cran Hill Ranch

After the traditional 4th of July parade we packed up the remainder of our stuff in our trailer and headed up north to Cran Hill Ranch, a Christian camp near Big Rapids. Cory's parents as well as his sister and her family were already camping there so we joined them as did Shawn, Erin and Owen. A little family fun weekend of sorts. We had some great shady, quiet lots, but one lot was separating 3 families from 1 family of our gang. Thankfully those people were very sweet (and oddly enough one of the people staying on that lot was an orchestra teacher who taught part time at the school I taught at). Amazingly the cousins got along smashingly throughout the entire weekend - being older and able to play with one another certainly helps! Nicolas, Joshua and Owen seemed to form a real bond and loved each others company - they made a pretend "boy's fire" one night and another night they had a meeting on the playground planning what they were going to buy for their treat at the camp store (sour Skittles). Besides swimming in the lake and playing on the playgrounds another highlight of the weekend was the little petting zoo. They had calves, a llama, a goat, a donkey, sheep, horses and bunnies. I banned Joshua from touching the horses in the case that I have passed on my extreme allergy to them. The bunnies were definitely the big hit with the kids (okay, and me too)! We were also able to hike some trails to a fresh spring and taste some deliciously refreshing water! The weekend was a success and we returned home rested, relaxed and full of way too much junk food! Oh, and I of course took WAY TOO MANY pictures (like 300 in 3 days - darn digital camera makes it too easy) so enjoy the lengthy video below to see the highlights of our trip.

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