Plane throwing, bubble blowing, sand shoveling fun!

Just a day at the park....

Budding Artist

For Christmas Tobey got some new paints and paper. We have been doing alot of painting since then. Last week he got to go to his friend Ava's birthday party and it was at a Art House. All the kids got to paint a picture and keep it. It was very cute. Tobey had to put his painting up in his room so he could look at it.

He is an abstract artist

This is a face of sudden inspiration

I asked him to paint a tree

And he did!

Then he did another one

Or is it...

He ended up with this. Still quite lovely in his mother's eyes.

Tobey's First Camping Trip

We left on a Friday afternoon. Our car was loaded to the brim. On the way we stopped by Walmart for food and a miniature fishing pole for the boy. Rodney had to unpack the back of the car to make room for the groceries. I have never seen our car so loaded down. It looked like we were leaving for a month. Rodney commented as we got on the highway and headed west about our city slicker ways. He was a little embarrassed I could tell. I tried to make him feel better by reminding him that Scooter's travel crate took up quite a bit of space. I silently prayed for safe travel. Tobey would have been buried by camping supplies in the back seat if we had a wreck. We drove on. Even though we had tried to leave early enough to avoid traffic we managed to get stuck right in the middle of it. The stop and go quickly turned my stomach upside down and I made Rodney pull over so I could drive. I wonder why drivers never get carsick. Rodney and I had a discussion on this subject and decided that it is a control thing. If you are driving you are in control and can anticipate the movement of the car. Plus you are distracted and focused on driving. I don't know but it works every time. Within 10 minutes the car sickness was gone. The trip to Walmart had set us back a bit on time and it was getting dark when we arrived at the campgrounds. The ranger's station was already closed for the day but they had posted our campsite location. We drove around and found that is was not the area we had expected. It was only about 30-40 feet from the lake and there was only one tree to shield us from the wind. This area looked like it was more suitable for RV campers. So we drove around and found the more primitive campgrounds (we still had water and electricity so it wasn't that primitive). The gate was locked into that area but the first campground was very accessible so we parked and set up camp there. There was no one else around. I wrote a note and left it at the rangers station hoping they wouldn't be upset that we had changed spots. This new spot was much better. We were totally enclosed by trees and the bathroom/shower facility was only 30 ft away. Rodney quickly got busy unloading the car and setting up our tents and lanterns. Of course Tobey had to help.



I let Scooter out and walked him around and then tied him to a tree. You could tell our poor dog had not been on a trip for a while. He was shaking and whining. I think he was terrified that we were just going to leave him there. The rope was long enough that he could reach almost anywhere on our site but he he just followed us around. He did not enjoy the trip one bit I think. Shortly after we got our tent up a couple showed up and stopped by our campsite. They had a group of college kids from their church following behind them but they hadn't made reservations so they were just going to walk in a little ways and find a campsite (since the gate was closed and locked). I was secretly overjoyed that 1.) We were not lone campers anymore and 2.) They were breaking the rules too so we wouldn't be the only ones kicked out of the state park the next morning.

For our first night we planned to have hot dogs, chips, baked beans, and of course smores. Rodney got a fire going in the fire pit and we roasted our hot dogs. I spent most of dinner time yelling at Tobey to stop running so close to the fire. I was a nervous wreck. I could just see him tripping and falling into the fire. Tobey's favorite part was roasting the marshmallows. He is a marshmallow freak and I do not use that term lightly. He wants them for breakfast, for snack, for lunch-it drives me crazy. By the end of the day he usually wears me down and I will give him one and say sternly "do not ask me for marshmallows the rest of the day". At my sister-in-law's shower that we had at our house a couple of weeks ago we had a chocolate fountain. We set out marshmallows among other things that could be dipped in the chocolate. The house was full of people and kids. I was very frazzled and every time I would see Tobey he had a handful of marshmallows in his hand taking them back to his room to share with his friends. I finally had to move that bowl to higher ground. Here is a picture of Tobey doing a little campfire jig inspired by his first marshmallow roasting experience.





By the time we finished dinner it was already 9pm. We took Scooter for a walk down to the lake and back. Then we headed to the bathrooms to get ready for holing up in the tent. We knew a cold front was blowing in that night and we weren't sure how bad it would be. The bathrooms were nice and warm though so we figured if it got too bad we would just camp out in there. I wasn't too worried because we had brought our space heater from home to place inside the tent with us. As we were walking back to our tent we looked up at the stars and were amazed. To me that is one of the best things about getting away from the city. You forget how numerous they are and how breathtaking the night sky can be. Tobey was amazed too. We have been discussing night and day with him lately. There was not a moon that night and he was very perplexed by that. He also wanted to know where the sun went. He is a very inquisitive little boy and I love it. Back at the campsite we all crawled into our tent. We each had our own sleeping bag even Scooter. We played a game of Go fish and then turned the lights out. Tobey was out within minutes. Before long Rodney was breathing heavy too. I was very restless and couldn't fall asleep. I was warm and cozy inside my bag but I just wasn't sleepy so I read for a little bit trying to make myself sleepy. I guess it was around midnight when the wind started blowing in and never stopped the rest of the night. It was loud and hit my side of the tent the hardest. The tent kept pushing down on my head and at times the whole tent would shake and quiver. And it got colder and colder. I think the temperature dropped about 25 degrees that night. I finally fell asleep around 2am but it was not a restful sleep at all. Tobey never stirred and barely moved. I was afraid he was cold so I kept waking up to touch his face but his skin was always warm. I stayed mostly warm although by morning my feet had gotten cold. I checked my phone which said that it was 29 degrees outside. Brrrrr.... It was torture getting out of that sleeping bag. We gathered our things and ran to the bathrooms to thaw out. The sun was out and it warmed up to the 40's rather quickly but the wind was so strong that it felt much colder. Back at the campsite I found a note on our car from one of the rangers. They weren't kicking us out but they needed us to come down and register our vehicle. So I I set Tobey up with his breakfast in the tent while Rodney cooked our breakfast and then I drove over to the ranger station. They were very nice about us switching spots. I found out that the area we were staying in was actually closed for the winter which is why the gates had been locked. That area opened up the following weekend. We decided to cut our trip short and not stay another night. It was just too cold. We hung around for a couple of hours. Tobey was not interested in leaving the tent. We brought his portable DVD player and he was content watching his cartoons in the warmth of the tent with Scooter. I took a walk by myself down by the lake. We had planned on renting a boat and taking Tobey fishing. Looking out at the choppy waters I knew I didn't want to be floating on that surface. The wind crashed against me and whipped my hair around and took my breath away. I did get a good look at some of the other camp sites and picked out the one I would like to come back too (when it is much warmer). It backs up to this beach...

By noon we had loaded everything back into the car and we were on our way. It was alot of work for such a short trip but I am glad we did it. 

West Texas Cacti

Tobey climbed all over this rock while we loaded up the car

Recap

So I have really fallen behind in blogging. Two months behind. It is shameful. And I do not even have a good excuse besides just life in general. We have all been sick in our household at some point the last two months. Tobey has been sick twice with high fevers lasting 4 or 5 days. He ended up with an ear infection one of those times. I have had several things to blog about but just haven't seemed able to get to it. We took Tobey on his first camping trip a couple of weeks ago. We drove out to Possum Kingdom which is west of Fort Worth. We were going to stay two nights but a cold front came in the first night. We stayed warm in our sleeping bags but woke up to some very frigid weather outside our tent. The wind was so strong that it was miserable hanging outside. Tobey ate his breakfast inside the tent. Rodney and I were brave and ate at the picnic table. We quickly decided to cut our trip short. We were packed and ready to leave by noon. It was still a fun trip and I can't wait to do it again when it is warmer. We really want to rent a boat and take Tobey out on the water and Rodney wants to take him fishing. 

Rodney's sister and her husband flew in last weekend and we had a baby shower at our house for her. She looked so cute. Her little belly was round and perfect. We can't wait to meet our new niece. Tobey talks about his baby constantly. Lately he has been asking "is my baby out yet?".  He is so much fun these days. His favorite things to do right now are painting, playing with play dough, blowing bubbles outside, and racing. So he is always asking us if we want to race or if we want to play with him. And he says some of the funniest things lately. And he says them deliberately to make you laugh. Sometimes this is not a good thing because he likes to try to make us laugh when we are disciplining him.  He has also started justifying his wrong behavior. The other night he would not sit still and finish his dinner and when I got on to him he innocently responded, "Mooom, I'm just playing".  Of course I responded back, "Well we do not play at the dinner table, we eat".  It feels weird having these developed conversations with my baby. But then I remember that my baby is 3 and a half years old. His new obsession is his superman pajamas that Mimi bought for him. As soon as he got home from school today he had to put them on and race around the house with his red cape flying in the breeze. I have lots of pictures to post and more to say about our camping experience which I will try to get to this week but for now I will sign out with a picture of my little superboy.