Hey there! It’s me, Penny!

Mom posted that Wordless Wednesday picture of me in her big yellow tent and now I hear that all of you guys want to know if I went camping! Like in a real campground, not just hanging out in the tent in my own back yard.

Mom already knows I’m not real happy being in the tent in the back yard. I’ve only made it through the night once out there. Did you know back yards have lots of noises at night? And believe it or not, when you’re in a tent you’re expected to sleep on the ground!

Anyway, for some crazy reason only mom knows, she decided at the last minute to book three nights at the local campground, in site 16 which apparently is her favorite site. She says that my sister Katie loved to camp there and mom has lots of great memories of them spending time together.

I get that, but I remind mom that Katie was seven when she first went camping. I won’t even be four until December. I don’t know why mom thinks I’m mature enough to sleep through all the crazy night noises that come from all directions.

Plus did I tell you I can’t see outside when I’m in there, all I can do is smell stuff and hear stuff and I can’t see stuff, so I’m very much not a happy camper.

Mom took me over to the campground, which luckily is very close to our house, on two afternoons. The campground was nearly empty, which mom thought would play to her advantage.

Mom is delusional.

It was still noisy and smelly even with hardly anybody there. Why the people in a neighboring site were burning stuff in some sort of pit and I could smell it! Geeze. I barked at their fire. And at just about every other thing I smelled or heard or saw.

I did love going on walks there. I don’t mind smells when I’m on walks, I actually like to sniff stuff while we’re walking. And there was lots of stuff to explore.

We went on lots of walks each day I was there. Mom thought she could make me tired enough to sleep through the night. In a tent. Right.

We walked around lots of loops of mostly empty sites. I picked out a couple that I liked a lot. Mostly because they didn’t have a big yellow tent anywhere in sight on them. I didn’t like hanging out at our site. I didn’t see the point.

I kept asking my mom if we could go home. She even fed me my dinner there hoping that would make me feel happier about being at the campground. I ate all my food and than I asked if we could please go home now.

The first day I was there mom thought maybe if we were in the tent I’d go to sleep. So we went to ‘bed’ at 7 p.m.!

I did sort of curl up in a few spots, but I didn’t go to sleep. Nope, no way.

And I constantly crawled back up on top of mom to ask if we could please go home now.

Eventually that first night she gave up and took me home to daddy at 8:30. Then she went back to camp without me. She said she felt very sad.

The third day she was there we tried again. I went on lots of walks and connected with trails in the woods too, which I just love.

Mom was hoping if we did more walks I’d be happier. I was, as long as I was on a walk and not at our camp site. Certainly not in the big yellow tent!

She could tell I wasn’t happy so she took me back to daddy at 5:00 and went back to camp all by herself. She was sad again.

So….yes I was at a campground. And no, I can’t say I actually camped.

Maybe next year when I’ll be four and lots more mature. Maybe then I’ll agree to spend the whole night in the tent just because I love my mom, even if I don’t really love that big yellow tent.

We’ll see. For now I’m just glad that experiment is over! I give camping a 1 out of 10. And I only gave it a 1 because mom was with me.