I figure it's close enough to Thursday, and actually our internet is down (Dogs and Cats! How do I cope?! Well, actually my computer is dead, but luckily Eric's laptop is working just fine, so I can still get a fix), so if I'm going to post, I better do it now.
Thirteen Things that I learned from camping this weekend.
1. I don't do well with Chris Puking-First, Chris developed a "24 hour stomach flu" on Tuesday night, but we figured by Thursday (the estimated time of departure) he should be good to go. He was...sort of. He was wimpering, whining, and crying in the Kroger for 30 minutes Thursday morning before finally screaming a total meltdown to the point of puking in the parking lot. At least it wasn't in the car. Kathleen brought an emergency bottle of water, and instead of poring it on Chris's shoes first, I took a drag for myself, so I wouldn't lose it. I thought it was just that his meltdown caused the continuation, because the bug should CLEARLY have been over. But Chris continued to puke Friday morning and Saturday morning. Friday's incident was kind of sweet, because we were sitting fireside, and he told me he wanted to step outside. We laughed because we were outside, until he got whiny, and I got his meaning, I stepped onto a nearby path, and it became known evermore as "Pukey Way." Saturday, he got Daddy on the shoulder 10 minutes after arriving in Holiday World. Good thing we carry a spare adult T-shirt in the diaper bag now. I didn't do well, and Friday, I just did mouth breathing and kept on walking (thank goodness he didn't catch his shoes) and Saturday, I just handed Daddy the diaper bag, and ran for a bottle of water. Both times were within an hour of receiving his pump feeding, so we stopped them on Sunday and Monday and at last, miraculously, he did NOT puke. Neither did I.
2. I do even worse with Eric puking-And when we arrived, near dusk, Eric decided he really needed to puke too, so he did. Fabulous. I did NOT handle this well, as now I had to begin attempting to put up tents in the dark, because I was queasy too, my back hurt, Chris was all over the place, not being helpful, and I had no clue what I was doing, because I've always gone camping with wiser more experienced campers. I was GRUMPY, so it was not a shining moment for us. We got 1 tent up before Mike and Kathleen arrived, threw Chris's pack and play in it, but of course, he did not sleep because he was too excited because Emily was here, and he wanted to play. We finally got tents up Thursday without any more incidents about 10:30 p.m. But Eric felt puny for most of the day Friday. See? 24 hours.
3. A Trip to the Beach will solve most problems-Friday afternoon, after trying unsuccesfully to get the kids to nap, we decided to take them down to the beach. Lake Tipsaw has a nice small lake, the water was the perfect temperature of warmishly cool, and the bluegill were so friendly, they came right up to us as we sat in the sand. I even got goosed a couple times. Sitting in the sand took a great load off of my spine, and after the swim, I felt a million bazillion times better, not to mention feeling cool in temperature. The kids played in the sand, on the playground, even bopped about "swimming" between the 4 of us. We told them they couldn't leave the circle, and they didn't. It was wonderful, plus it started to get cloudy, and was SO much cooler at the camp upon our return. Plus we were cooler too. I forgot how wonderful a trip to the beach can be.
4. You don't need spices if you have good ingredients-We forgot any sort of spices, salt or pepper, and we made kabobs with fresh veggies and steak Friday nigh, using peppers from the garden and vidalia onions. They turned out good. Yum-O. Don't even get me started on our desserts...
5. My husband can cook Brilliantly over a fire-Eric made scrumptious kabobs, hot diggity dogs, and totally tasty brats. He even used a camp cooker to make a really good turkey melt, for himself, mine got burnt, but his was good.
6. Mike is the Fire Master!-Mike broke out all the Boy Scout skills and tricks and built all our fires this weekend. He did all the kindling hunting, and he and Eric maintained the fires all weekend long. Because of these great fires we were able to eat, and eat well.
7. Holiday World is Flipping Awesome!-I had never been to Holiday World, and that's just plain crazy. Let me start by saying, a pregnant woman can't ride much, let alone a pregnant woman with a crappy back, but it didn't matter, there was still plenty to do and see, and even some very toned down rides that we could all do as a family. And it was great! But, in addition to that, it seems the staff really care about people. They were so sweet, at one point, Chris started to lean a bit precariously on his merry-go-round horse, and the staffperson was right there, gently nudging him back on, didn't even have to stop the ride, and he was there before I had to say anything. Their food was really reasonably priced, we split a funnel cake 4 ways for 3$, and that was just perfect. Then they also have Free Drinks: Gatorade, Water, not to mention tons of sodas, even coffee. But my favorite was the Free Sunscreen stations, posted all over the place. They really wanted to make sure you didn't get burned. I only got burned a little bit. But it said to me, they really cared. Kathleen said, "One day, our children will tease us about being corny and stupid...and they'll be right." Yeah, that sums up the whole trip.
8. Chris loved Holiday World- Chris rode more rides than me, and he didn't even meet the 36 inch requirement to enable him to ride bunches more rides. He LOVED it. He wasn't too interested in meeting Santa Clause, content to observe him from a distance, but, he loved most everything else. It's funny, he loved it so much, it totally made me love it. He started to poop out at the Water Park portion, and at one point, he told us: "All done water, want to ride planes." But he fell asleep before we even made it out of the water park section of the park.
9. Pregnant women do not do well in 90 degree heat-Friday and Sunday, it exceeded 90 degrees outside, and we could feel it. (It may have on Saturday too, but we were in Holiday World getting gently misted, or plain wet most of the day.) It didn't feel so bad in the shade, but apparently in the "River Valley", the air does not move, and without a breeze, it was just stifling. It took me until Sunday evening to realize that the heat was increasing my queasies. By Monday, I started to feel the waves creeping on, and was parked in the shade during Tear Down, until Mike offered to turn on the car, and put in a movie (Cars!) for the kids. I spent 2 1/2 cushy hours sitting in the air-conditioned car, not puking, while everybody else broke down and loaded up. Thank goodness for good friends!
10. A trip to the Beach only solves most problems-We learned that although Mommy's back feels better, Chris does not like being in the sun when it is at it's peak. We hit the beach Sunday around lunchtime, thinking we'd cool the kids off prior to naps. In theory it would've worked, and did for a bit, the kids napped, mostly naked for about an hour, but it was too hot for humans, and the beach fix just didn't last. Plus, when the sun is super high, we can get sunburned...very easily. We thought about heading back down Sunday late afternoon, but we didn't want to get more sun, and Chris's mood had not been improved drastically by our Sunday morning swim.
11. Ice cream and Air conditioning will make it all better-Saturday, after Holiday World, we drove into town, Tell City (about 20 miles away) and had supper at this little Mom and Pop drive in place, well it was more of a park-in, they really didn't have wait staff to greet. Anyway, Chris and I split an ice cream cone, and it made him very happy. Sunday, when the napping was failing, and the heat was nauseating, we piled back into the car, and headed into town for an ice cream run at the nicest Dairy Queen I've ever been to in my life. We pumped the kids full of sugar and ice cream and let them run wild around the Dairy Queen and the park, before hauling them to home sweet campsite and throwing them in bed. It was another good fix.
12. I don't do well when non-family members puke-Emily interrupted the great Uno Championship Game at 1 a.m. puking Sunday night/Monday morning. I did ok, teamed up and helped get her bedding rearranged, while her parents bathed her, but then she puked again every half an hour for the next hour, and just hearing that didn't go over as well with my stomach. I ended up putting my earplugs in, just so I didn't have to hear it. Turns out she was done after that, until morning. Yeah. Seems she got the 24 hour stomach flu too.
13. We survived the extreme heat and the puking with our friendship still intact-So much so we were eager to get together and play again. The going plan is to reward Chris (and ourselves) once he gets "fixed" and this feeding tube/silent aspirator business is all done. I'll hope he'll be 36 inches tall too, in order to be able to ride more rides. We figure if we can survive all this, imagine how easy, fabulous, and wonderful a trip to DisneyWorld will be. That's the next big plan.