Indoor Camping

I absolutely LOVE to camp. I love to be out in the wilderness, explore, and get dirty with my boys. However, we just don't get to go often enough. This summer we thought we would just camp out in the back yard, that way we would be close enough to the house for potty breaks or for anyone who happen to get spooked in the middle of the night. My youngest, whose 2, had never been before.
To bad we had planned our adventure in the midst of all the storms that hit the US. After seeing the boy's disappointment, we decided to have an indoor camping adventure.
We brought the tent inside and with 8 little hands helping, we set it up in the basement. I thought we were going to have to sleep on top of it being that the little ones were having more fun tearing down.

After the tent was set up, we did an indoor scavenger hunt. I pair them into 2 teams of 1 big kid and 1 little kid. They would not get the next clue until the previous item was put in their teams basket. The first team to finish their list won.
Some of our scavenger hunt clues were:

• Something small and round
• Something green
• Something that is the same object, but different sizes
• Something you wear
• Something that comforts you when you sleep.
• A red car
• Something that tells or shows time
• Something that stars with "L"

Once our scavenger hunt was over we made s'mores on our gas stove burner.

Once we made ourselves 'unsticky', I sat down all the boys to watch Scooby Doo Summer Camp. This gave me a few minutes to get the kitchen and dining room cleaned up.

No camping trip is complete without a campfire, right? So, we made one. We laid a floor fan on its back and taped pieces of red, gold, and yellow streamers onto different sections. When the fan is turned on,  the papers blow upward giving the 'fire effect'. Kids had way more fun taking the papers off and letting the wind float them high above our heads.

We sat around our paper flame and read a few books and learned the Kumbaya song.

Then bed time! Everyone grabbed their favorite pillows and blankets and came down to settle in. I was able to find night time noises online. I hit repeat and it played throughout the whole night. It was actually very soothing. My four year old loved listening to the bugs and would say "SHHHHH" and you could just see the concentration in his eyes as he tried to listen.

We had a blast with this indoor camping adventure!! This is a great idea for any time of the year! If you don't have a tent, use furniture and blankets and let the kids make their own.

Do you do indoor camping?  What is your favorite indoor camping activity?