For the long weekend we decided to go camping with Anna (my sister) and Derik (her husband). Andy found a camp spot that he could reserve online at Alturus Lake, the lake where Anna and I grew up camping. After an exciting morning of the first round of stamped concrete in the backyard, Andy headed up to the lake to claim our spot before 2pm. I worked until 1:30 and then picked up Belén at Grandma Care. Then we went over to Anna and Derik’s to ride up with them.

Belén did really well in the car and more or less slept the entire ride up. Anna, Derik and I played Trivial Pursuit on the iPhone almost the whole way. It made me miss road trips with games and conversations. This was only the first of many thoughts of childhood since we were going back to our old camping stomping grounds at Alturus.

When we arrived at the campsite, Andy had everything set up and had made Mexican tacos for dinner. We devoured them, put Belén down for bed and then sat around the campfire for awhile before going to bed ourselves.

It was much colder at night than our previous camping trips with Belén so we layered her up good. She had on two pairs of jammies and two swaddles of varying sizes and two hats. By morning when she woke up for a second feeding, it was pretty cold so I was glad we had brought the extra clothes. I am convinced someone needs to invent a baby down sleeping bag. It is so much easier to stay warm with one layer of down than four layers of fleece.

Belén continued to be a champ sleeper at night and slept through the night both nights camping. Now that I am getting some core muscles back, it was much easier breastfeeding her sitting on the ground in the tent than previous camping trips. That is always the thing I dread the most about camping with a baby…the feeding is hard and uncomfortable. This time was better though and it was nice being around family because I wasn’t as concerned about exposing myself to feed her.

Saturday went by quickly. We took the dogs down to the dog beach and played rounds of fetch. We hung out at the beach for a short while before the weather acted a bit blistery, then we headed back to our campsite for the remainder of the day. We all took naps at different times, except for Belén who was content to chatter with whomever was awake taking care of her. While I slept, I understand that Derik and Andy got an earful. She is quite the chatterbox these days when she is in the mood.

That night, Derik made an elaborate Dutch Oven pork dish which he said was simple. It was quite a feast that we followed with a Dutch Oven chocolate cake courtesy of yours truly and s’mores. We packed up fairly early the following morning to get back and have some time getting ready for the coming week. I wish every weekend was three days!

When we got back into cell phone range, I called my mom to see if her and my dad wanted to come over for dinner since we had not seen them for nearly two weeks as they had both been out of town (my mom went to North Dakota to see family and my dad was fishing in Alaska.) A minute into the conversation, I got a load of bad news. My grandma was dying and my cousin’s wife, Heidi had a brain aneurysm. Jeez!

The Labor Day holiday, Andy and I each went for a run independently and then we ran a couple of errands before going to see my grandma. She was in the dementia ward of a nursing care facility and I am sorry to say that it is the first time I had visited since she was moved there shortly after Belén was born. The way that she looked when we walked into the room was the very reason that I didn’t really want to visit her. She was very frail and failed looking and looked less than human, like death would soon be upon her. I didn’t feel comfortable kissing her because it didn’t even seem like her.

Unfortunately, this was Belén’s only chance to meet any of her great-grandparents as my grandma was the last one remaining for both Andy and I. I had so many of intentions of taking Belén to see her earlier but it just never happened as I rationalized that she wouldn’t recognize me anyway with the dementia. All of the sadness and guilt was swept away when we brought Belén close to my grandma’s bed and said, “Belén, this is your great-grandma Dorothy.” Belén replied something like, “argbugha goulab aahhhaaaa.” Incredible how a baby can lighten the mood and make a sad time happy.

We went home and waged war on the pantry moths which have reemerged in our kitchen in the form of little worms in EVERYTHING in our pantry. We threw away 90% of what was in there and wiped everything down with bleach water. We had to completely remove the shelves as they had laid eggs under the shelves and those little bastards were EVERYWHERE. Not at all how I had hoped to spend my Labor Day, but the good news is that Heidi is out of surgery and seems to be recovering well.

My grandma passed away this morning at 6:10am. While I am sad, I am also happy as it was her time to go. As Andy and I were nuking the pantry moths, we discussed if we would want to live past the time where you lose your marbles mentally and we both hope that we don’t have to.

I find myself wondering what my grandma was like at my age and how she had to deal with her grandma passing away and what she thought about that. Losing the last in a generation makes one sad for the loss and it also brings with it fear that you are one step closer to being the older generation.

Today I was happy. I think I have been wallowing a bit in self pity for various reasons and the shake-ups of the weekend helped me to realize that I have been ridiculous and am so fortunate and have SO much to be thankful for. I realized this before, but am focusing on it now.

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