Sunday with Ashtabula Family

 Sunday morning and we had to pack up the car and head north to Ashtabula.  We were all sad to be done with camping for now, but I know I was looking forward to a long hot shower. 

Once we got to my mother's house, we had a bit of time to relax and socialize before an afternoon party for Jude.  IT was good to catch up with mom and Dale on all the going-ons in the exciting town of Astabula.  Tam enjoyed talking Nana and Papa's ears off with stories of our recent camping days.  I also got a chance to share the ol' iPad with my mom...and convince to get one because of its uber-usefulness and uber-lightness (in weight).

Relatives came over 'round three o'clock, strategically timed to be after Jude and Tam's afternoon nap.  Jude got lots of love and hugs from everyone.  He was such a a happy camper being passed from one lap to another.  He really squealed with laughter when Papa Dale tickled his feet. Here the birthday boy is with his Great Aunt Clarice Ann, Papa Dale, Aunt Carol, and Aunt Rosilyn. 

It was a bit chaotic to have great aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, kids, and grand-kids all in two rooms, but it was a good chaos.

 We let Jude attempt to open his gifts.  He was quite a bit more interested in the gift wrap and packing newspaper than the actual presents.  I loved all the really cute clothes he received.

Tam was a very helpful big brother and aided Jude in unwrapping some of his gifts. 

 He would also "help" Jude with trying to play with some of the toys as well.

In the end, I think Jude's favorite gift was a plastic hanger from the clothes.  

He waved this around, smacked the floor (and his brother), tried to gnaw on it, and giggled with glee.

 After gifts comes...CAKE!
We all sang "Happy Birthday" to Jude...even Tam and Ciearra chimed in with their sweet little voices.  The bakery provided both a sheet cake for all of us to eat and a little 6 inch cake for Jude to "eat" on his own.

We put our little man right in the middle of everyone so that we could all share in his delight over having his own little cake.

 Jude took one look at this and decided it looked Dee-Licious.

Jude started right in with eating this yummy treat...

using both his hands!

 Nana inquires if the cake is good...

Definitely...at least the cake that is making into his mouth and not around it.

 Jude kept eating...

though some of the frosting was getting smeared on the face

Jude realized there was lots of icing not only on the tray but also on his hands...

yummy!

I can just hear Jude thinking..."wait, is the cake all gone?"

or maybe he's asking if he's got anything on hi face :-)

 

Now, I didn't give little Jude the entire cake, but a portion of it for him to eat by himself.  The other parts went to his brother and cousin.  Tamlin did agree that the cake was very awesome.
I'm not exactly sure how Tam got some of the frosting on his knees...

The rest of the evening was rather relaxing and restful, and I was really sad to have to pack up the next day and start our journey back home. 

Huge thanks to my mom and Dale for having us stay with them and 

helping to provide this excellent little party for our Jude!

Saturday Spillway Adventures

Around lunchtime, Shelly and family stopped by and we went over to the Spillway in Linesville, PA to feed the fish.  This is an area of congregated carp where the water spill through from the reservoir.  The carp are in humungously high numbers and love to eat bread thrown by visitors.    I can remember stopping at this roadside attraction when I was small and I was eager to pass on this experience to my boys.  Ah...what red-neck bliss to heave stall hamburger buns at creepy-looking carp just to see them leap out of the water in a feeding frenzy.

Yeah America!

Ciearra had been here before and had a good-bead on how to chuck bread at the fishes.  Tamlin quickly picked up the idea to throw small pieces to make the loaf last longer...but really liked watch the frothy mass of fish fighting over the large chunks, and so he resorted to this toward the end of our visit.

Jude got shuttled around by his Aunt Shelly.  

We gave him a hunk of bread to drop on the fish, but Jude just ate it instead.

:-)

We eventually stood up on the bridge over the spillway in order to heave our bread chunks on the greatest number of congregated carp.

It was both disgusting and fascinating to watch.

Tam stooped to see if his head fit through the arches of the bridge's railing.
It did.

Brian's great eyes spotted a goldfish in the mix, which lead to a healthy debate on wether this was a coy or a gold colored carp.

I'm not entirely sure what Tam thought of the whole experience, but there were lots of grins for everyone.  Then, we all headed home for lunch and naps.  We said goodby to Shelly, Rick, and Ciearra, but we would see them again on Sunday.

After naps, Brian's mom and step-dad arrived with the great-grandmothers.  It was great to see several generations sitting around enjoying the outdoors.  Here is Jude with his Great-grandma Hixenbaugh.  Tamlin is sitting between his Great-grandma Hixenbaugh and his Great-grandma Harrington.

On the way to dinner, we again headed out over the reservoir to the spillway.  Tam was an expert now and showed everyone how to drop the bread on the fish's heads.  This time, Nana Margie got to tote Jude around.  We had just as much fun at this second visit :-)

We then all headed to the Spillway Inn for dinner and visiting.  Tamlin enjoyed talking everyone's ear off about anything that popped into his head.  I think many of us just had fun relaxing and watching Baby Jude try to talk to everyone (and trying to stay happy despite his aching tooth).  One thing that was silly was that Tamlin decided to call John, Papa Johnny-Bonnie.  ?  Silly kid.  After dinner, we had to share hugs and bid all of the family goodbye.  I know that we'll certainly miss them!

With the fall evening,  I realized that this was our last night camping. Sigh.

After Jude was put to bed, the three of us had fun around our final campfire.  Tamlin played horseshoes and then played with the ipad.  Brian relaxed.  I was a bit of the bad parent, because I let Tam stay  up way late, because it was our last night...but he was having such a good time with us and enjoying being out in the near-darkness.  (No bears).  We had enough wood left for a roaring fire for the night and to toast a few last yummy marshmallows.

 

After Tam was put to bed, I had some time to watch the nearly full moon rise and reflect on our first family camping experience.  Overall, both boys were so good here and were so tickled with camping and everything that it entails.  After 6 days and 5 nights camping in a yurt with my family, what have I learned?

1. I still really enjoy camping.
2. The men of the family enjoy camping too, especially Tamlin.
3. I want to buy a tent, a good tent, so that we can go camping some more.
4. I didn't miss the internet too much.
5. The night sky is still awesome to see...especially away from light pollution.
6. It was great to be in one place and have family come and visit us = way less car travel and the misery involved with the boys.
7. We have too much stuff in our house.  Too many dishes, too many clothes, too many toys.  We didn't miss many of these things while we were camping.  I was a bit disgusted to walk back into our house with all of its stuff...so many things to take care of and put away!  I'm ready for a yard sale!

And at the end, what was our animal-sighting tally?

1. Chipmunks around the yurt
2. Red-wing blackbirds, crows, bluejays all flying around the campground
3. Walleye, caught be others
4. Crayfish, though we didn't catch any
5. Snake, along the beach and poking his head above the water surface
6. Skunk, walked really close to our campfire and into the woods
7. Two foxes, beside the road that runs around the park
8. A bald eagle, flew right over our heads while outside our yurt and it was close enough you could see the white feathers on his head.
9. No bears...and very few mosquitos :-)

Saturday camping fun

The last day of our camping excursion began chilly...so chilly that we actually ran the heater in our yurt the previous night to keep us all warm.  I know that at some point in the early hours of the morning I was shivering so that I grabbed Jude to cuddle between him and Brian for warmth.  However, thankfully, the day got warmer and we only had a few rain showers.

After a sluggish start, we eventually got to the outdoors.  Brian and Tam were a bit quicker at getting going in the chilly air, so they went walking along the beach.  Jude and I eventually caught up with them, and saw this sight:

Yep, that's Brian leading a pack of boys.   I told him it looked like a page from "Lord of the Flies"...or maybe Peter Pan and the Lost Boys.  Apparently, he and Tam attracted a few of the neighbor boys during their exploration of the beach.  He jokingly said that he was cool for to them because he kept pointing out dead things (crayfish and fish), skipped rocks, and helped them try to catch crayfish.  Tamlin loved playing with the slightly older boys and his way cool dad.

With a few feathers and some long grass, I got Jude into the spirit of things too.
Then I showed Tam how to do duck calls with grass, which made me sort-of cool too....not as cool as someone trying to catch crayfish though.

During Jude's first nap, Tamlin and I decided to search for another playground in one of the parks on the Pennsylvania side of the border.  We stopped at one of the beaches and found one...an  older model wooden playground.   The bonus was that there was a tractor out on the beach scrapping it flat and catching all the branches. (maybe from yesterday's storms?)  A playground and a construction vehicle?  Tamlin was in heaven.

The playground provided entertainment in the early sunshine.  It brought back memories of my childhood playgrounds...especially the wooded swinging-plank bridge.  I had lots of fun rocking the bridge while Tam tried to cross it;  he was leery at first but was giggling after a moment.  I then "popped" him up on the bridge by having him stand on one end while I jumped on the other end. 
Yep, that's my monkey-boy hanging from the bar over the slide.  This trick he learned from older kids on the playground hear our home.  What fun.

 

Of course we had to check out the beach...and those huge mounds of sands.  Tamlin and I played king of the hill on top of them.  We even found sticks to declare our sandy reigns.

Tam loved checking out the tracks left by the tractor too.

Though it was hard to leave, we did head out to explore the rest of the park.  We eventually ended up at the Pymatuning dam.  It certainly looked as if the dam had been here for a long time...judging by the grass covered lawn on the outside :-)  There were people fishing on both sides, and we even watch someone catch a big ol' walleye.  Tam insisted running up and down the stairs a couple of times before he would get back into the car.

After a brief romp through the clover, Tam and I headed back to Ohio and our yurt to check in on how the rest of the family was surviving the morning. 

And on the fourth day it rained...

Prior to heading off to bed, we felt the first few rain drops. We dragged the wood into the gazebo and pick up any arrant objects to prepare for the coming rainstorm.

And then it rained...

And rained...

And rained...

All day.

Wonderfully, the yurt held up to this soaking downpour.  We eventually had two slight leaks along the baseboards, but towels sopped them up readily.  I think Jude enjoyed being the only child for the morning.  He was happy to explore the yurt all by himself.  He did discover my coffee mug while I was drinking some tea.  He tried chewing on it, and we could hear his new little tooth clinking on the ceramic edge.

We had lunch at Shelly and Rick's home over in PA.  We heard that the kids eventually went to sleep after the excitement of having a sleep over wore off.  Tam slept on the floor because using his sleeping bag trumped over sleeping in the bed with Ciearra.

Because of the rain, we decided to go to Chuck E. Cheese to let the kids play before naps.  We had a cup full of tokens to spend on the games and rides there.  Overall, the kids cared  most for the plastic tunnel/slide system than any of the games.  Jude had fun riding a little rocking train with  (gag) Barney. He was all smiles during the day; I hoped this was because he was done teething for awhile. Sis and I played some skee-ball; I won :-)   It was nice to have four adults to mind the three kids in this chaotic atmosphere.  I do admit that the place wasn't too crowded, or had too many older crazy kids, or seemed to be too filthy.  (All complaints I often hear from fellow parents).   I would consider stopping at the one near us again on a raining school day.

We headed home for naps at the yurt.  Jude was so tired that he turned his music box on, grabbed his monster, and tried to crawl into his crib all by himself!

The rain let up by early evening, which allowed for some outdoor time before bed.  Tam and I went on a walk around the rest of the campground.  I hadn't realized how big the place really was, because we were just situated on one of the three camp loops.  After seeing how the other campers and tenters were fairing in this wet weather, especially at sites closer to the lake, I was very thankful our yurt was on the high ground and up on a deck.  Lots of puddles (for jumping into) and mud.

At some point in the past two days, Tam discovered the "peeing standing up potty" (the urinal) in the boy's bathroom.  This meant that he now insisted on using this device for the rest of the trip. He's growing up so fast.  I don't know what I'm going to do if he starts insisting on using the men's room by himself...I'm not ready for this yet!

In the end, we were bummed about the rain all day. It totally spoiled my plan to visit Conneaut Lake Park, but we still had fun as a family and stayed mostly dry.

Third day in the yurt

  Thursday, again, our little Jude woke up early... around 6am. He and I checked out the sunrise over the lake, while Tam and Brian caught a few more moments of sleep.  It was a chilly morning, but it quickly warmed into warm sunny day.

 

We let the kids run around the Yurt in the morning.   Tamlin found the basketball and decided to take it for rides at break-neck speeds.  We had to keep reminding him to watch out for his little brother, but he was having such fun.  Jude was feeling adventurous and took off crawling down the ramp of the deck.  After every couple of movements, he would sit up, look back at dad (as if to make sure it was ok), and then continue on.  he did make it to the grass and had a huge grin across his face.

 During Jude's first nap, Tamlin and I again went out for an adventure.  This time we found the park's main office and picked up some maps and the weather report (calling for rain for the weekend).  The two of us then hit one of the little trails for some hiking through the woods.   We saw birds, trees, butterflies, and lots of poison ivy.  I showed Tam some Gallium plants which have curved hairs that allow it to stick to clothing.  He thought this was pretty cool.  We also heard crows calling to each other...which Tam informed me was them playing hide-and-seek with each other.  They play like Tam does, calling out his hiding location to the person who is it :-)  It was a mile trek, and Tamlin survived about .4 of it before wanting to turn back; he exclaimed that it was getting a little scary and that he missed daddy.  He did succeed  in finding a great poking stick and dragged it back to the car (and yurt).  We headed out and back to the yurt, picking up some firewood from a local seller along the roadside.

 My dad and his girlfriend arrived with pizza for lunch.  They were both impressed with how spacious our yurt was.  Jude enjoyed sitting in his Papa Ralph's lap, checking out his beard, and diving backward (we warned grandpa first). Tamlin told them how much fun he having camping and that he hasn't seen any bears yet (in or out of the yurt).

 We all walked down to the water so that Brian could try fishing.  Tamlin brought his little rod and proceeded to tell Papa Ralph all about how to fish.  This was great because, as far as I know, my dad is NOT a fisherman.  Tamlin doesn't do too bad at casting; he gets the line out about four feet when he's lucky.  Brian fooled Tam a bit by throwing a rock into to the water, just out of his view.  Then he hollered over to him asking if he just "seen that big fish jump out of the water?"  Tam readily agreed that it must have been a fish and then kept watching the water to see another.  Brian obliged, always just behind his back.  Silly daddy.

Doesn't Tamlin look like a little rascal in this picture? Or maybe Huck Finn?

  While Brian kept on fishing, the rest of us moseyed over to the beach for some impromptu swimming session. 

The boys loved playing in the sun, sand, and water.  The grandparents enjoyed seeing them having such fun.

Tamlin kept talking our ears off about everything that he was doing...splashing, kicking, building sand castles, throwing rocks.

After this jaunt, the boys were quite ready for naps and we had a nice visit with dad and Madeline.  They headed home in the early afternoon, which left a little time for Brian and I to nap a bit too.

All this fresh air made us all sleepy.

 
My sister and her family came in the early evening to play with us all.  

 Tamlin and Ciearra had fun running around in the sunshine while Jude enjoyed plying his free fall antics with his Aunt Shelly.

We get the kids suited up and all head down to the beach for an afternoon swim to cool off in the water.  Shelly is skeptical that Ciearra will want to go into the water at all, or even want to get dirty in the sand.  However, she plunges right in, and even attempts floating around nearly fully submerged.

Tam's favorite part is getting buckets of water, hauling them up onto the shore, and pouring them on the sand around Jude.

Jude tried eating the rocks...But we all yelled loudly, "Jude, That's Not Food" and stopped him mid-motion to his mouth.  He is certainly getting better at responding to this phrase!   He then settled down to have fun squishing sand between his fingers.

 We serve up a campfire dinner of steaks, corn, potatoes, and watermelon.  However, the corn and potatoes got a bit crispy while we were all down enjoying the water, but what was edible was great.  

Our yurt's "backyard" is a simple amphitheater with a concrete stage.  The kiddos had fun playing on this structure and performing tricks for each other on the stage.  This was a hoot to watch :-)

After Jude goes to bed for the evening, we broke out the marshmallows and s'more fixings.  These were enjoyed by everyone, though Tamlin sat down with his and immediately took it apart to eat.  What a mess!

With full bellies, we kissed Tam goodnight and sent him home to sleep over with his cousin Ciearra.  Brian and I had a quiet evenings pseudo to ourselves (with just Jude sleeping nearby).

I love that my boys are having such a great time here.  I love that they don't seem to care a bit about the dirt, the sand, the grime, the snakes, the fish, the goose poop, the anything icky...They just see the fun and wonder in everything around them...and that make me smile!

And I love marshmallow s'mores!