Our General Conference "Campout"

A few days ago, I had a stroke of inspiration that I ran past my 11 year old son:
For the Saturday sessions of General Conference, we can have a "campout." We can set up our smaller tent in the living room, facing the tv; and between sessions we can cook hot dogs outside over our propane fire pit, and roast leftover Easter Peeps, then use what's left in our "Spring Mix" bag of chocolates to turn them into s'mores.
He hopped up and down while clapping. There's nothing like Easter Peep flambe  to excite 11-year old boys.

Yep. Inspiration.
While this idea might not directly affect their attention spans during the sessions, I think having the children look forward to General Conference weekend as a special event, not a burden, may help us in the long term.
And even I was looking forward to roasting Peeps over our propane fire pit.

So, fast forward Saturday.
Rain. All morning.
We ran errands to the library to pick-up a hold, the farmer's market for our last CSA pick-up, and the grocery store for milk. There were some serious breaches of umbrella ettiquette.
Arriving home about fifteen minutes before the noon (a.k.a. "morning") session of conference, it was still raining.
The children spread blankets on the living room floor and I took notes on my new iPad (courtesy of my husband, but that's another story).
After the session finished, it was still raining. We decided to make the best of it.
First, my excited young Boy Scout set-up our two-man tent in the living room. Everyone started feeling more cheerful already.

What's the next-best thing to Peep Flambe?
Exploding Peeps in the microwave.
Well, not actually exploding, but they definitely inflated to at least double their size.

8-10 seconds in the microwave

We went through one package of bunny Peeps and agreed to save the second package so we can do the same thing tomorrow.

M gathered coloring books and supplies and set them in the tent. During the session, there were usually one or two people in the tent. It wasn't used by everyone constantly, but that was probably a good thing.
Sunday Update: the weather was clear and dry today, so we roasted hot dogs and Peeps for lunch before the first session. It was awesome.