CAMPING!

OK, so I remember there was a post on Facebook from the Dave Ramsey group from someone who was planning an up coming camping trip with her family and in the comments I was giving tips as well as I talked about my totes to go camping. 

My family camps at a campground 3 weekends a month from June thru September, so I have to be organized. 
I remember the first time we went, it was awful. I forgot so many things, we ended up making repeated trips to the nearest store for several items I had at home and had forgotten! Never again, so I looked and learned and this is the way I do it now.

This is our tower of totes that goes camping with us, as well as those items stacked on top. I'll try to make a list and go thru each tote so you get a general idea of everything we pack.
On top are my dish pans, my dish rack, 2 buckets, my box of enameled camping dishes, and my charcoal chimney for my dutch ovens.
The tote on top is for dry/non refrigerated foods, like snacks, canned goods, etc. as well as any bread I pack for burgers, hot dogs, so on and so forth. We learned to lock up EVERYTHING because who knows what animals are lurking around. One time we lost 2 loaves of bread to thieves and had to eat hamburgers for an entire day breakfast, lunch and dinner! So, lock up your food in something, like a tote, or if you have room put it in the cooler.

The second tote holds our lanterns, wind up/solar flash lights, OFF bug spray, my first aid kit (One of the shoe boxes), all of our battery/phone chargers and cables (the other show box), as well as extra batteries, the air pump for our mattresses and pool inflatables, the girl's bug boxes, and the propane line for our grill. I bought a stacking pill holder, so those big pill bottles will be left at home in the future, I just haven't gotten around to doing that yet, but I will eventually LOL. There are other things that go in here, like my weather radio, but we also use them around the house so they are last minute items and not show in the pictures.
I keep neosporin , anti itch cream, multiple sizes of band aids, burn cream, tums, ibuprofen and Tylenol as well as hand sanitizing wipes, tissues, pads, etc. in our first aid kit.
We have young children, so we prefer battery operated lanterns vs. propane or kerosene. It's just safer, and we can take them right into the tent with us without a fear of fire.

The third tote is pretty much a catch all. It holds everything from our shower supplies to our girls coloring books and crayon bag. There are 4 shoe boxes in this tote, one has my clothesline rope and clothespins as well as extra para cord for our tarps and extra carabiner clips. Another box has all of our girls glow in the dark bracelets, rings, bracelets, etc.
Candy for my husband...he uses chew tobacco and I'm always on him about it, so candy LOL.
I also have plenty of sun block, aloe vera gel in case of sun burns and aloe vera lotion, bubble wands for our girls, pull ups and swimmers panties for our youngest daughter, Q tips box that has cotton balls, Q tips, cotton pads in it (Great for first aid), a bottle of peroxide, hand sanitizer, etc etc.
One box has all of our travel bottles and each one is clearly labeled with a sharpie. The pump bottles have little clips that lock them, so they don't spill everywhere when we are traveling to the campground or where ever it is we are going camping!

The last tote has all of our kitchen supplies, and there are 2 shoe boxes as well as 2 half boxes with connected flip lids.
I have my camp peculator and coffee maker, cooking spray, table cloth, all of our campfire forks and skewers, stick lighters, aluminum pans, aluminum foil, dish soap, napkins, paper towels, etc etc. in there.
One half box has all of my coffee stuff, the other has all my clips for the tablecloth, as well as anything else we that we can use to hold something down.

One shoe box has all of our cooking utensils, and the other is random kitchen items like my gloves, a roll of trash bags, throw away cutlery, and plastic salt and pepper shakers. I also have a paid of rubber gloves in there, because soot gets EVERYWHERE when your cleaning! If you do stain your hands with black soot, just scrub with some salt and hand soap, it'll clean right off.

I pack two smaller coolers rather than one big one, it saves space by stacking them on the back of the truck as well as prevents cross contamination of our drinks from our food. The last thing I want is our cold drinks swimming in bloody meat juices... that's a sure fire way to end up hugging porcelain later, so go with 2 smaller coolers! Also, it keeps your food colder, because your not constantly opening the lid and letting in hot air. Just a win win in my book.

Another thing we do is use cheap car visors with cable ties to wrap around our coolers as insulation and to reflect the hot sun. Combined with keeping our coolers in the shade, our ice survives much longer in the hot summer than it would without such measures. We usually camp Friday to Sunday, and I hate having to constantly go to the store to buy ice.
I also save ice at home all week in a clean trash bag in my chest freezer, then I dump it over into our coolers as I'm packing them the day we are leaving to camp. It saves money by not having to buy so many bags of ice, because let me tell you that adds up over the course of the summer! I freeze all the meats I can, which also helps to keep the freezer cold. I use locking gasket style containers from the Dollar tree to help eliminate cross contamination, and if I feel something might leak, or it's something really juicy that I'm worried about, I'll put it in a ziploc bag and make sure it's sealed up tight.
I use an old mayo jar for eggs, with a canning funnel so they drop right in the clean jar. That way, I don't have to be scared of busted eggs and salmonella all over everything...ewww no thank you!
There are extra items that are in stowed in my husband's truck tool box, so I'll take a picture the next time we go camping. I'll also take plenty of pictures of how we set up our campground site, so be sure to come back for the updated post!