I recently went winter camping to try out a new heated tent setup of mine and decided to bring the kids along as well 🙂

I have wanted to get them out winter camping for several years now by either borrowing or renting a tent/stove combo, but never got around to it. However, I finally have my own tent and stove, so the in-my-head-excuses were hard to come by!

Since this would be my first trip with this tent, and the fact that I would have young children with, we didn’t go too far into the woods (1/2 mile) before setting up — pro tip: maybe try car camping the first time vs. hauling everything deeper into the woods, especially with a ton of gear and toys for the kids.

We ended up finding a perfect spot sheltered in some pine trees with enough flat ground to pitch our tent! Shortly after discovering this gem of a location we got to work setting up the tent and firing up the wood stove inside.

I must say, the feeling of entering a cozy, wood-heated tent in the middle of the woods when it’s cold outside is rather magical. Combine that with the fact you’re sharing such an experience with your children only adds to the magic. And the fact that it was something new for us (winter camping that is, we do plenty of spring-summer-fall camping as a family) enhanced the fun factor as well.

We spent our time drinking hot chocolate, making heated meals on the stove, wearing comfy slippers, reading books, playing games, and I even downloaded a couple movies on my phone to watch (just in case) since we decided to go camping on the longest and second longest nights of the year! We also had several family members come out and visit us, which was fun to show off our backwoods home for three days.

To sum things up – I’m absolutely hooked on winter camping! The forest is beautiful covered in snow, no bugs, no bears (not that they’re ever too big of a worry around here), solitude, haul everything on sled(s) so you can bring as much stuff as you want (can be a bad thing too if you’re not careful), and warm temps inside of the tent are amazing!

Note: I will be doing a more in-depth tent review article with a video walk-through shortly, stay tuned!