Ben's favorite memories of childhood are always "beach camping at San Onofre". Ben turned 31 on May 13th. For every birthday for the past 7 years that we've been married he's been asking for a camping trip to San Onofre. Every time I'd look into it, it would be booked till sometime in November. This year it just happened to be open and I was so excited. But than I realized that we had the baby and camping with a little baby would not be such a great idea. I looked into renting a motor home but it was too expensive. I ended up finding this travel trailer for rent on Craigslist for a lot less. The guy would even deliver it to your campsite. So I booked everything and surprised Ben for his birthday. He didn't know about the trailer till we started setting up camp and the guy delivered it to our campsite. I thought he would be excited but when he realized the trailer was for us, he looked kind of disappointed. 1-Ben was wanting to re-live his childhood memories of "tent" camping, 2-Ben felt that we didn't really have the funds and 3-Ben felt that if we did this, we'd never want to go tent camping again. After getting a tour of the inside of the trailer and realizing that this was a better option for Leah he was very pleased. The man who we rented from, gave us a quick review of the trailer. The last thing he showed us was the awning. He showed Ben how to put it out and gave a warning to make sure to put the awning back in whenever we went down to the beach or if it got windy because the awning was very delicate and very expensive. As soon as he left Ben wanted to put the awning back in because we didn't need it. That's when he realized he didn't get a tutorial of how to put it back in. We tried calling the guy to get instructions but he didn't answer his phone but Ben felt that he could figure it out on his own. WRONG!!!...
In the process of "figuring it out", the left side of the awning fell, ripping the canvas about 12 inches. Ben was so upset but I told him not to worry because it would ruin his trip and that it probably would be an easy fix with a repair kit.
So the rest of the trip we forgot about the awning and had a really fun time. Ben's brothers, Jon and Isaiah showed up and they all spent one whole day down at the beach with him. I had a lot of fun playing with Leah and preparing meals for the boys. The best time we had was actually roasting marshmallows one night. We ended up roasting the entire bag but not for eating just for experimenting. It was amazing how much entertainment we all got from a bag of marshmallows.
Then when our trip was through the guy came to pick up the trailer. We told him what had happened and he wasn't very happy but was really cool about it. He said that he'd take it in and see how much it would be to repair and he'd let us know.
Well.... we found out that because of the location of the tear, it could not be repaired but needed to be replaced! The guy found and "after market" canvas and let us know that it was going to be $582.00!!!! I cried when I found out how much it cost. I tried talking to the guy and asking him to only charge us a portion since the awning was already old and falling apart. He wouldn't give in. Ben talked to him and finally he agreed to go down to $400.00.
So our total camping trip turned out to be about $800.00 (trailer rental, camping reservations, food and awning replacement)! I realized that we could have stayed in a 5 star hotel on the beach for that and I cried even more! Then I realized we could have done it all for about $100 if only I would have done tent camping!!!
Daddy dressed Leah
This was the 2nd time he dressed her
and mistakenly put her outfit on backwards.
Leah did so good camping!
Leah did so good camping!
I bet she would have been just fine in just a tent.
She had fun down at the beach.
She fit perfectly in the sink for bath time.
As you can see, she even slept well in between Ben and I.
Isaiah and Jon admiring our marshmallow shrine the next morning!
The Gang
The trailer was really nice. It was even fully stocked with clean linens
and necessary odds and ends.
I don't think this should be considered camping.
The $400.00 headache!!!
Since the day she was born, poor Baby Leah has had a "Bad Hair Day". She was born with this funny sideways 
I'd always try combing it down after she'd have a bath but as soon as it dried, it would just pop right up!
Then the poor little thing started getting her bald spot! Not only was her bald spot HUGE but the hair broke off in a perfectly straight line! I could see people starring at it and some would even ask why I shaved it like that! I started getting really self conscience of it and would put hats and huge flowers on her head to divert the attention. I started getting self conscience of it and I could tell Ben was too. (so sad and funny, I know). Well then the other night I realized that my baby had a 
