August 29 2007

I have had a great time playing with Levi the past two nights. We got him a new toy with a gift card from Grandmother Lille. It is the Fisher Price Little People Garage. I used to have one of these when I was a kid but the little people actually have arms now. Levi likes to stuff the people in the elevator. He also likes to climb up on top of the garage and sit there. We also got him a box with shapes in each side and blocks cut to those shapes and he is starting to get the hang of that but he would rather open the lid and take them all out.

New Stuff

Today I was driving with Levi in the car and I heard him making some noises, so I did a ah-ah-ah-ah by claping my hand over my mouth and he mimicked me. It was like making a little Indian war whoop sound. Since then he has done it two other times without being prompted.

We went to visit Grandma KP and we went for a swim in the pool. Levi had a great time, he was kicking with his back feet and trying to paddle with his arms, it was a lot of fun.

Camping Adventures

Levi had his first camping adventure this past weekend, at Chief Timothy State Park. It was about an hour and a half drive from home. It is near Clarkston on the Lower Granite Lake and Snake River. The park is on a mini-island. I was so excited to go, I always loved camping as a kid and was looking forward to sharing that experience with my own little family.

The trip was organized by Tiffany Michaels from our church, and a number of couples attended. 16 adults total with various ages of kids. Each family was responsible for one meal (to feed everyone) but since I was late coming into the picture all meals had been claimed so we brought drinks and snacks. I took about 3 gallons of water with numerous frozen juice containers to mix, that worked out really well. Also took along bottled water, Hawaiian Punch, and I won a 12 pack of soda from Andys too so I chose Root Beer and took that. For snacks we took Wheat Thins, Sunchips, Granola bars, Rice Crispy treats, CheezIts, Ritz Bits peanut butter bites, etc.

Friday night when we arrived the Darcy's made sloppy joes and it was quite good, you could tell it was a recipe and not just a mix. We got there about 7:30 I think and got Jan's tent set up and it was really big. We also had gotten two single air mattresses and blew those up and got all settled in and ate dinner. Levi liked the dinner too but he ate a little much and had a blowout later.

About dusk I saw a creature scampering about and pointed it out and the others said "oh yes, there are skunks here" and apparently two years ago when this group came here there were just tons of them, people would see six or seven at the same time. The park management has been taking out a number of blackberry bushes along the bank and the numbers of skunks are down now. Well I saw maybe two at the same time, they kept their distance until we went in our tents and then I would see their shadows and hear them as they would run past the tent. Thad and Jenee' went and split a campsite with us and said the skunks were scratching at their tent, trying to get in to the food.

Once it got dark most people just went to bed. It got pretty cold and we discovered our little blanket was hardly enough to keep us warm so Matt ended up inbetween the mattresses and woke up with a stiff neck. I could not find any sleeping bags for the life of me! Brother Lou did you take my bags? Levi was so excited to be in a new place that he crawled all around the tent and played with his toys for at least two hours until he finally got tired and I was able to put him to bed in his little portable travel bed.

Sabbath morning breakfast was about 8 am and the couple in charge made wheat pancakes and had fruit and it was quite good. Then we all sat around and Darcia played the guitar and Rick Drake had a drum and we sang for about an hour. Then we sat around and talked or something, I don't really recall, I know I sat in the rope swing with Levi that Thad and Jenee' had brought and he fell asleep in there. After awhile people got hungry so I brought out the snacks and we all dove in and spoiled our appetites for lunch.

Then everyone decided to get their swimsuits on and go out on the boat. We did not participate in that, the weather was very nice so we decided to take a walk around the "island" to see what we could see. We pushed Levi in the stroller and Thad and Jenee' joined us with Maddaly in a front pack. It was starting to get a little warm by then and when we reached the trail from off the road we almost turned back as there was a sign that said WARNING RATTLESNAKES. I think it may have been Thad who found a different trail and was curious about it and we all followed him up and it put us back on the regular trail. Then we saw Rick and Rachel, I had lent them our child backpack to try it out as they have been thinking about getting one. They came up from the other direction. They said it was a nice walk with blackberries at the end and we should make it back by lunch with no trouble at all. So we continued on. It was a double track trail with gravel. We could see the river to our left and then came across some sort of solar-powered tracking device which Thad said was for Salmon migration studies (he walked up and read the sign).

Soon we came to a fork in the trail, we were tempted to take the shortcut back to camp (by then my armpits were damp) but Thad and Matt said the other way must be the right way and if they were wrong they would buy us ice cream. It sounded like a pretty good deal so we took the other way. At first it looked completely wrong because it took a sharp turn and went down an incline and the road turned from gravel to smooth rocks but I thought if we were really on an island where else could it take us but back to camp? So we pressed on. When we got to the bottom it turned into a single track dust trail but there were some blackberry bushes so we thought we must be going the right way. The blackberries looked kind of shriveled and out of reach so I didn't bother picking any. Shortly afterwards we could see camp and realized we had indeed walked all the way around. It might have been 2 miles.

By the time we got back we were starting to get hungry again so Tiffany (Michaels) started putting out the food, she had brought stuff for hoagies for her meal. It was so good, it was probably my favorite meal the whole time. I ate two hoagies. She had turkey and bologna veggie meats with colby and pepper jack and provalone cheeses. Pickles and lettuce and tomatoes. Also raw veggies and I had some cucumbers but that is all. Levi helped me eat my hoagies, he especially liked the bologna and would try to pull the tomatoes out. He grabbed a cucumber off my plate and took little bites and chewed and swallowed and did better with that than I thought he might.



The weather got very warm by the afternoon, the tent was especially hot as by then it was in the sun. For awhile it felt good since I had been so cold all night but soon took solace in the shade.

Mostly we sat around and talked with Thad and Jenee'. They had arrived first and set up at their/our campsite and then as other people would show up, they would bring all their stuff to our picnic table, so our table became the main spot for socializing. Levi would sit with me on our large recliner camp chair and watch the other kids, or play with his toys, or dig his fingers in the dirt.

The camp did have running water and flush toilets, and a shower that was .25 cents a minute. We didn't think to take quarters so we didn't shower. That is just part of camping right?

Saturday most of the day we had helicopters going over head and coming down to pick up water for fires. That evening Nicole Scruggs made haystacks and that was also very good. That night the park ranger brought us some firewood and a few people had goodies for s'mores so the kids had fun roasting marshmallows. I did not see as many skunks this time, but heard they all quickly ran over when everyone went to bed and checked out our table area. This time Levi went to bed within 30 minutes but once I fell asleep I felt a little hand patting me and he was climbing up on the air matteress. Maybe he got cold. He ended up curled up with me with his little head in my armpit all night.

Sunday morning we had pancakes again for breakfast with muffins and hot chocolate and fruit and it was very good, Levi ate a lot of that. It is fun having him able to eat more real food. Mid-morning it started spitting on us from above so we set up our shade tent and that got moved to over the picnic table. The Darcy's also had a shade tent and everyone set their chairs up under there so between the two canopies we all stayed dry but a number of people went out on the boat again Sunday.

Sunday lunch Rick and Rachel made hot dogs with veganaise only she said four of the bags she had brought of buns had gone moldy so we had a number of left over hamburger buns from Friday's dinner for our hotdogs.


Sunday morning Jenee' and Thad came to let us know they had gone out on the dock and there were beavers so I took our camera. The beavers were directly under our feet living in the dock. You could see their furry backs and flat tails if you looked between the boards.

Jenee was kind enough to take a family portrait of us sitting on the dock. My we are bright for that early in the morning!

Valia was crocheting much of the weekend and offered to make me a dishcloth. She had it done in record time and it was fun to watch her turn yarn into something useful.

We ended up staying until at least our check out time of 2 pm. We will need to set up our shade tent and Jan's tent at home to dry them out once the bad weather passes over. All told we had a good time and are looking forward to camping again on Labor Day weekend for my first endurance ride.

August 15 2007

Levi has pretty much stopped with his animal sounds now, instead thrilled to make vrooming noises as he pushes or rides his motorbike around.

August 13 2007

Over this weekend Levi figured out how to push the power button on the stereo on our headboard. On off on off. He also learned how to push the button on his new fire engine toy from aunt Tina and he loves to hear the sirens. More to come...

August 7 2007

Today Levi had some leftovers for lunch. He ate about half and then tried dumping it off the edge of his highchair and onto the floor. The dogs were thrilled! He was pretty proud of himself for a successful scientific experiment.

He is trying to balance while standing more, it is pretty exciting. He is getting close to standing on his own.

He climbs and sits and stands on his little bench all the time too.

August 6 2007

Tonight I made Eggplant Parmesan. Well it was more like Eggplant Mozzerella. :) It turned out sensational. Levi had his small portion with a side of spaghetti (cut up) and he chowed it down. He really liked it. When he was almost done with his meal he spit out a piece of spaghetti. So now I am thinking maybe he starts spitting out his food when he is full.

Something else worth mentioning that Levi has been doing for about a week now is blowing. He likes to blow in my face but will just blow in general now that he has the hang of it. Too bad he didn't learn it a month ago to blow out his candles, but he'll be ready for next year!

Balancing

Today Matt and I notice for the first time Levi trying to stand on his own with no-hands. He was standing next to the computer desk and we notice him take his hand off and weeble for a minute before quickly putting his hand back on. Then he tried to take a step without holding on between the desk and the footrest. It was pretty exciting.

He is eating whatever we eat now for meals, I make him his own little plate of vegetables and entree' and sit with him and help feed him. Yesterday was the first time he ever spit anything out. He ate about 2/3 of his zuchinni and then he made a horrible face and spit out the last piece. Then he picked it up and put it back in his mouth and again made an awful YUK face and spit it out once more. I tried to get a photo but this was all I could manage. It was pretty amusing.

Tonight I made chicken caccitore' and Levi gobbled that right down.

BAAAAAAAA

Levi is getting to be a pro at the question-answer game. "What sound does a sheep make?" and Levi will reply "baa-aaa-aa" It is darn near the cutest thing EVER. He will answer (without being given the answer first) about 85% of the time.