Staycation Campout

Growing up, my family went camping quite a few times for our summer vacations. We would sleep on the ground in our tent, cook all our meals over the fire, and spend time connecting as a family.

However, when we got married, my husband made it very clear he was not the tent camping type, so we have only stayed in cabins with our kids. Camping in a cabin is still a lot of fun, but definitely a different experience than tent camping.

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During 2020 when the world was uncertain, we did a lot of at-home “staycations.” One of my kids’ favorites was our indoor camping adventure.

Since then, indoor camping has been something we have done multiple times, including during winter when it is too cold to camp outside.

Read to discover how we “camp” at home and bring the wilderness to us.

Lodging

The first thing you need when camping is a tent. For our first “indoor campout,” I bought a two-person tent which was fairly inexpensive. If you don’t want to spend money on a tent, you can use tablecloths or sheets to construct a tent using other household items such as chairs, stools, or a table. (Think making a blanket fort as a kid.)

Setting the Scene

While we could easily set up our tent outside in our backyard, we created our camping site in our living room instead. We set up our tent and then constructed the wilderness using various items.

To mimic being in the woods, we set up our small artificial Christmas trees (we have quite a few due to my slight obsession with decorating our house for Christmas). If you don’t have artificial trees, use construction paper to produce a forest.

Add your favorite stuffed animals around the room for wildlife. You can even draw/make your own animals out of construction paper. Use a blue tablecloth to fashion a lake for fishing, boating, or swimming. Bring in outdoor folding/camping chairs to place along the lake or campsite.

Next, build a campfire. We use empty paper towel rolls, red, orange, and yellow tissue paper, and strands of Christmas lights. Click here for more information on how to construct your “fire.”

The Menu

If the weather is nice, we have an actual fire in our backyard fire pit and cook our meals over the open flame. We typically keep it simple, making hot dogs and pie iron pizzas, chips, fruit kebabs, and raw vegetables, with campfire pies and s’mores for dessert.

If the weather doesn’t cooperate or it is winter, we make hot dogs on the stovetop and s’mores in a bag. We also enjoy assembling trail mixes. We each grab a bag and fill it with our favorite ingredients for our personalized snacks.

Pie Iron Pizzas/Campfire Pies

*To make pie iron pizzas and campfire pies, you will need to buy pie irons. You can buy them at Walmart or on Amazon reasonably inexpensively. 

1. Spray the interior of each side of the pie iron with cooking spray. Butter one side of a piece of bread and place it on one of the interior pie iron spaces. (Think making grilled cheese.)

2. Add the interior ingredients. Add sauce, shredded cheese, and your favorite pizza toppings for the pizzas. If making pies, add your favorite pie filling. 

3. Butter one side of another slice of bread. Place on top of the fillings with the buttered side facing out so it will touch the pie iron surface. 

4. Close the pie iron. Trim off any excess bread with a knife. Hold over the flames, occasionally checking how toasted the bread is.  

5. Remove from flame once the bread has reached your desired toasted level. Enjoy! 


S’mores in a Bag

1. To make s’mores in a bag, get small individual bags of Teddy Grahams. Cut the bag along the side for a larger opening. 

2. Sprinkle some milk chocolate chips inside the bag. 

3. Place a marshmallow on a plate and heat it in the microwave for a few seconds. 

4. Add the warm marshmallow to the bag of Teddy Grahams and chocolate chips. Stir and enjoy while warm.  

Activities

One of our favorite campout activities is going for a nature walk in our neighborhood park. If you don’t have a nearby park, walk around your neighborhood or even just your yard.

During our walk, we use binoculars to look for unique objects. If you don’t have binoculars, you can use empty toilet paper or paper towel rolls to create your own. Staple or tape the two rolls together. Decorate using markers, crayons, or stickers.

While on your walk, complete a nature scavenger hunt. You can either create a list together as a family before you leave for your walk, or feel free to download and print my Nature Scavenger Hunt PDF found at the bottom of this post.

Collect some of your favorite treasures along the way and bring them home with you. Use them to create art projects, which become fun souvenirs. One of my daughter’s favorite things to do is to create artwork using her treasures.

Games

We also like to play games during our campouts. One game I purchased on Amazon is called Toasted or Roasted, which is very fun. However, you don’t have to buy a ready-made game to have fun.

You can make a Tic-Tac-Toe game out of sticks and rocks. Use paper plates and an empty paper roll to make a ring toss game. Play Camping Charades.

Camping-themed Minute to Win It games are also a lot of fun and use inexpensive items or things you may already have lying around your house.

One game is Swat the Fly. Use a fly swatter and balloon. The object is to swat your fly (balloon) for the entire minute without allowing it to touch the ground.

Another Minute to Win It game is Marshmallow Stacking. Stack as many marshmallows as you can in one minute. The person with the tallest tower wins.

A favorite traditional Minute to Win It game is Face the Cookie, in which you place a cookie on your forehead and try to get it into your mouth without using your hands. Give it a campout twist by using the ingredients for s’mores. Start with a graham cracker. Once you get it into your mouth, try a piece of chocolate. Last but not least, attempt a marshmallow. Can you eat an entire s’more in time?

Have a Minute to Win It race in which each player has to use sticks like chopsticks to carry marshmallows from one side of the room to the other and place them in the fire (a bucket can be used for this) without using their hands. The player with the most marshmallows in their fire bucket wins.

Fun in the Dark

The real fun starts once it is dark. Plug in the fire you made earlier and get out your flashlights and battery-powered lanterns.

We love to play Hide-and-Seek in the dark. A twist is to play Flashlight Tag, which is one of my favorite childhood games that fits in perfectly with the campout theme. The person who is it waits the allotted amount of time and then looks for the others that are hiding. When a person is found, the player that is it shines the flashlight on them and calls out the person’s name. This continues until all the players are found.

A Glow-in-the-Dark Dance Party using glow sticks, bracelets, and necklaces is also a must.

Tell stories by the campfire. Think your kids can handle scary stories? Read from Stories to Tell in the Dark by Alvin Schwartz (a classic library book for kids growing up in the 80s).

If the sky is clear, we like to stargaze outside at night. It’s fun to research the constellations that can be found in your night sky and then try to identify them.

Movies with a Camping Theme 

A movie with a camping theme is also fun to share during a campout. Some of our favorites are:

• Troop Beverly Hills
• The Parent Trap
• Daddy Day Camp
• It Takes Two
• Addams Family Values
• Camp Nowhere
• Heavyweights
• Camp Rock
• Scooby-Doo! Camp Scare

Make sure you check to see age recommendations for each movie before watching it.

Indoor campouts are such a fun way to make core memories any time of the year. Start planning your own and connect as a family.

Nature Scavenger Hunt Printable

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