Months ago we booked two camping sites for this past weekend. As the time got closer, I found out my holiday party for work was scheduled for Friday night. I really wanted to go to the work party because it was a holiday lights tour, and I love Christmas lights. Andrew and I decided that he would take the kids to the campsite and enjoy some time with Pops and Grann since they were camping on Friday night too. I would go to my work party and then meet up with everyone later that night.
Ryder woke up on Friday morning super congested and just feeling blah. Same thing that Harper had a couple of weeks ago. Since Andrew had taken the day off work to get our camping stuff together, we let Ryder stay home with him to take it easy and rest. They headed to the camp site mid-afternoon, so after work and school I dropped Harper off to join everyone and I headed to my holiday party. About twenty minutes into the trolley ride, I received a text from Andrew that Ryder had thrown up and really wasn't feeling well. :( I felt so sorry for my little man, but I was riding on a trolley and couldn't get to them until the tour was over. When I showed up at the campsite, Ryder was just lying in the camper van waiting for me--he said he wanted to go home and sleep in his own bed. I didn't blame him at all! So I took him and Garcia home, leaving everyone else there for the night.
Ryder woke up Saturday morning feeling much better, although he still didn't have much of an appetite, so we headed back to the campground. The kids played on the playground, the grown-ups visited, and we finally made breakfast around 10:30 or so. Steve, Ali & Maisie came shortly after, and we spent the day playing outside! Ali even brought some nature scavenger hunts that she had created to use with some of her students last year, so we modified them a bit for our little people. :) All three kids had a great time looking for insects, pine cones, leaves, and "evidence of humans" just to name a few. Before Pops and Grann left for the day, we gave Andrew his birthday presents. Maisie was disappointed that there was no cake, because "you have to have cake at a party." We told her we would have plenty of sweets and desserts next week for Christmas.
Garcia discovered that his tie-down would reach into the van and onto the bed. Ha!
We wanted to block the sun to keep it from blinding us at the table, so luckily Ali had brought this tapestry that Andrew made for her several years ago.
a cabin ornament for our tree
Ryder, reading by headlight.
Saturday evening we walked over to the "campfire circle" area of the campground where one of the rangers was giving a presentation on vultures. It was actually pretty interesting as she told us some interesting facts about the ugly birds--Ryder leaned over to me at one point and whispered, "I really like this!" He even raised his hand and asked a question during the Q&A part at the end. That's my boy! After our vulture lesson we made s'mores and eventually got everyone tucked in for the night.
I woke up in the middle of the night to Harper whining for me. I figured she was just disoriented, so when she said she wanted to snuggle with me, I brought her into bed with Andrew and me. Now remember, the mattress in the pop-top might be a double, so it was a tight squeeze. For a while we lay facing each other, and I remember thinking how restless she seemed--it took her a long time to just lay still and fall asleep. I rolled over with my nose against the wall of the van and fell asleep until I heard the unmistakable noise of someone about to throw up. I shot up and turned to see Harper throwing up all over my pillow. I moved her to the floor of the van, and as I tried to get the door open she threw up some more all over the floor. I was beyond grossed out, but my goal was to get her outside so I could turn on a light and survey the damage. Andrew is a heavy sleeper, but he hates vomit so much that when I woke him and told him what happened, he quickly moved off the bed so I could grab everything and stuff it into a trash bag. Once I had collected everything that had been "contaminated", I loaded Harper and Garcia into my truck and headed home. It was 3:30am, and I had never seen so little traffic on the road! We got home in no time, and I put everything into the washing machine on heavy duty extra rinse, gave Harper a quick bath, and went to bed. We slept in until about 9:30 since we had been up for a while in the wee hours of the morning, and Andrew and Ryder got home after cleaning the camp site and packing everything up themselves. It was definitely nice to have a lazy Sunday at home after a weekend like that...whew!
