How We Successfully Prepared our Son for His First-Ever Camping Trip! 🏕

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Two days before his day off, my Hubby realized that it was actually feasible for he and NT to go on a Father-Son Camp Out together; a super exciting prospect and a dream come true….

But, such short notice also meant that we only had 2 days to prepare NT; who did not even know what a tent was!⛺

Since this would be an entirely new experience, we knew he would need a LOT of prep work; we were both dedicated to doing our best to prepare NT for the new experience in the hopes of helping this trip to be as successful as possible!

We started by first mentioning the existence of a tent to NT; just a brief introduction. While helping NT with his routine bedtime preparations, Hubby asked NT if he knew what a tent was. Hubby then explained that a tent was a special type of house that people can sleep in when they are outside. Once he had NT’s attention, Hubby expounded on the idea of a tent, and how sleeping outside is called camping. Reiterating that People use tents for camping, we talked briefly about how maybe one day soon, NT could go camping with Daddy, and sleep in a tent. We finished our nightly routine with the kids, said goodnight, and left the topic at that.

The following morning, I set out on a quest to find some printable flashcards for NT…..after a challenging search, I was elated when these lovely (FREE!) flashcards from LanternFishESL were found!!!

Even now, I can hardly believe that these cards exist and are free….every time that I visit the LanternfishESL website, I just want to sing, laugh, and cry with relief and thankfulness that such a thing exists and that these resources are provided Free of charge (means we can actually use them as much as is needed!!!)

Cards like these aid in educating and preparing our kiddos to successfully navigate life experiences, and Activities of Daily Living.

We know that NT responds REALLY well to flashcards….the extent of his response is dependent on his mood at a given time, but flashcards are one of the most effect ways to feed information into NT’s brain; so much so, that even he recognizes this fact and will specifically request flashcards for topics of interest that he wants to delve deep into. There are other things that help him, too, and he does request those (made up songs, stories, and books about topics of interest and/or new life experiences/social situations), but each of those supportive elements have a special place and time…just like flashcards do.

For this particular situation (a new camping trip), we had to have flashcards….inwardly, I just knew that NT needed flashcards and a story told along with the introduction of the cards in order to process this trip and all the new elements and life experiences that he would soon encounter on it.

Directly after printing the cards out, I cut them out and sorted them; removing any cards which would not be specifically applicable to NT’s first trip. The cards were carefully arranged in the order of events that they would occur on the camping trips. Excitedly announced to the kids that I had a surprise story for them, I sat down on the bedroom floor, and began telling a story; using the cards as the picture prompts for my story.

“Once Upon a Time, Daddy and NT went on a camping trip….they drove for a long, long time, until they reached a campground…”

I briefly filled in extra details, like potential stops along the trip, etc. ; cycling back on certain cards to keep with the order of events for the Entire trip; including waking up and slipping out of the sleeping bag, climbing out of the tent, eating, taking the tent down, and packing up.

***(For ordering the card deck to a specific cycle of events, I recommend printing doubles of the cards you need; this prevents having search for a specific card while in the middle of describing the story/events. I also recommend adding numbers to the cards so they may be easily arranged in the order in which they should be used and/or the events will occur).

Initially, I told the story with just blank cards. When we reached the card that talked about flashlights, I brought out the lantern and turned out the lights (blackout curtains in bedrooms are amazing!). We kept the lights off, and went through the rest of the cards that represented nighttime activities by the light of the lantern. When we reached a card that represented what we did in the morning time, we turned the lights back on.

Earlier, in the deck, when we reached the Bug Spray card, we talked about bug spray, various applications of bug spray. I discussed the purpose of bug spray, and to help associate the kids with what bug spray smelled like, I brought out a wristband that was scented with citronella.

Afterwards, NT was allowed to handle the cards and further processed the information by talking about each card. He requested that I tell the story again. We brought out a sleeping mat that he would be using; he laid down on it and requested that I turn out the lights so that he could go to sleep on his camping trip! *(Considering that, despite his age, NT has insisted for years on having rails around his bed and could not sleep without them, this was pretty remarkable!)

Later, I added wording to the backs of the cards for future reference and as a helpful aid to give context to family members and friends who may potentially find themselves asked by NT to “tell a camping story to them.” I also laminated the cards; to increase their longevity.

Directly after the initial story telling, NT definitely connected the dots and began requesting that he could go camping with Daddy! We did not give specific time and dates for the trip (just in case it fell through due to unforeseen events), but did tell him that soon he could go on a trip with Daddy.

As a family, All of us did our best to support and prepare for this Father-Son trip….and had , a lot of fun doing it. 🙂 Hubby and I talked with the kids about how NT was now old enough to go on a camping trip with Daddy; that Sister is still too little to go camping with Daddy, but one day soon she would go (and in the meantime, would stay home and spend time with Mommy). She was genuinely excited for NT and the special time she and Mama would have.

The evening prior to the trip, NT figured out that his Daddy was packing the car. On his own, NT packed a little grocery bag with items from his play kitchen and some favorite books; we were pretty surprised and delighted when NT brought the bag to us and announced that he had packed to go camping. 🙂

On the big day, Hubby woke NT up a bit early (something we also told him in advance might happen). NT shared breakfast with Mom and Dad, and just before Dad did a quick, trip-related errand, we woke E-G up to join NT at the breakfast table (he tends to take a long while to eat…).

Right before they left for the trip, E-G and I went outside to wave as they drove off….and, say our goodbyes (i.e. give hugs and kisses). 🙂

NT requested to take the cards with him on the trip….though, it turns out that he did not use them; he was much too busy! The trip ended up being very successful, and he and his Daddy had a wonderful time together…even if they did not get much sleep that night! 😉

• *To see pictures and a quick overview of the successful (and beautiful!)) camping trip, click here!
  • *To see the exact order I used for the camping event cards and what I wrote on the back of them, click here!
    • *For more details on why we love these cards, and what they can used for, see our Instagram post, here!

Thanks for reading my post! I hope that it will inspire some of you to take your young ones camping, and/or give some helpful ideas to make that initial transition to camping with little ones as smooth as possible.

Do you take your young ones camping? If so, how do you do it? We would absolutely LOVE to hear about your experiences, tips, and suggestions! 🙂