This year's gotcha day was celebrated at Pike Lake State Park. Buffy did some searching for a place with a lake that was affordable and found it down in southern Ohio. So on July 30, we packed up enough stuff, including provisions and dogs and headed south. It was about a 4 hour drive, but everyone did pretty well and we didn't even hear an "Are we there yet?" out of the back seat. As you might expect, there isn't too much going on down there and there was no cell phone coverage, but we enjoyed getting away for a couple of days. The pine trees smelled great and there was a really pretty butterfly garden (with many bees as well) that we enjoyed passing on our way to and from our cabin. The cabin was Buffy's kind of camping: 2 bedrooms, A/C, cable TV, DVD, screened in porch with swing, deck, kitchen, bathroom and running water. Unfortunately the toiletries were left at home, so Brent made a trip to the local grocery store, if you can call 30 minutes away "local" and got what we needed. Whilst Buffy was making dinner and Cam was playing, we came to realize that the Air Force does maneuvers down that way. Buffy was convinced that they were going to break the sound barrier at one point and nearly hit the deck. This of course, scared the bejeebers out of Cameron who then insisted on having Buffy carry him throughout the rest of the meal prep - no easy feat with a 31 lb. weight on your hip! The highlight of the day for Cameron was the campfire and roasting marshmallows and making s'mores. He had a great time helping Brent find kindling to get the fire going.
The next day, Gotcha Day, we got up and drove over to the Serpentine mound with the dogs and we all walked around it. Buffy remembers learning about it back in her Ohio history class (7th grade), but neither of us realized that it isn't any taller than 3 feet from the ground. Cameron had fun running around (while staying off the mound, walking on it is a no-no) and the dogs enjoyed the walk and new scents. 
We headed back to camp, had lunch and went to the lake at Pike Lake. There was only one other family there so we had the place to ourselves. The only real problems were bees and goose poop, but in spite of that Cameron liked digging in the sand, creating buildings and then knocking them over (King Kong Cameron from last summer still lives!). Later on, we had dinner and then walked down to the park gift shop for ice cream. Overall, a good day was had by everyone. 
Even Jake and Maizey got a long walk in the woods.
We headed home on Friday and stopped to see Grandma and Grandpa DeWitt on the way north. Two years later, we still feel like the luckiest parents in the world and are so glad and thankful every day that Cameron is part of our lives.
No comments:
Post a Comment