A summer cold

Last week Mr Wonderful came down with a nasty summer cold. I thought I'd escaped it, but apparently I wasn't so lucky...I started feeling it while I was driving home on Sunday, after dropping Rugrat off at summer camp. I just hope that he doesn't come down with it - what a disappointment it would be (not to mention a waste of money) if he had to come home early from camp!

As much as I hate being sick, at least I'm getting this cold thing out of the way while the kids are both gone (Tomboy's at her mom's this week) and before we head down for our vacation in Palm Springs next week. And I'm feeling much better today; yesterday was miserable but I got 10 hours of sleep the last two nights (thank you, NyQuil!) and have been drinking lots of liquids, so I'm feeling a bit better today. We'll see...it does tend to get worse as the day goes on, so I may be prematurely optimistic here, but I'm not as "out of it" today.

I know I've been lagging on posting here. That happens when I feel like I need to do a recap of something, and then I keep putting it off, and thinking that I can't blog about anything else until that is done. I'm talking about the camping trip we went on at the end of June, of course.

It was really very nice, and would have been ideal if it weren't for the damn mosquitoes. Rugrat got bitten so many times on his face that he looked like a boxer who'd just done ten rounds; his eye was swollen almost shut on the ride home. But other than the bugs, it was great. We spent a lot of time at the river nearby; I'd brought a huge inner tube (meant for pulling along behind a boat, so it was very sturdy) and we spent some lovely hours just floating in the water. Niece, of course, was absolutely ecstatic to be in the water - she's always been drawn to water, and would live her entire life in the water if she could. Mr Wonderful took Rugrat fishing for a little while, and I sat on the beach chatting with Sister and Brother-In-Law, knitting my cushy green v-neck sweater. You may think that wool and knitting needles are not appropriate for the beach, but hey, it's my vacation. I get to relax however I want. :)

And the food was glorious. I'd pre-made some Ribollita and some Mexican Chicken Chili before we left, and we also had hot dogs, eggs and bacon, biscuits, tacos, sandwich fixin's and snacks, plus lots of beer and soft drinks and water. Sister brought deviled eggs...mmmm....and they made us chicken-pineapple kabobs one night that were fantastic! Sister & BIL had gotten a really cool new camp stove; one side is a grill, the other is a regular burner, and it was very handy.

The best of the pictures of the camping trip are up on Flickr, if you're interested.

Oh, and let me leave you with this little snippet of conversation, overheard about 10 minutes after Sister & her family showed up:

Cousin: You suck!
Rugrat: No, you suck!
Cousin: We both suck!
Rugrat: Yeah, we both suck!

Short-timing

I'm totally short-timing right now. You know, when something you've been looking forward to is coming up really soon, and you're just counting down the minutes until it happens, and you're totally not in that "work mode" at all? Yeah, that's me right now. I've been looking forward to this family camping trip for months, and next Wednesday morning we're outta here!

My sister & I have been obsessively planning (ok, maybe she's not obsessive about it, but I am) for weeks now. We've got our meals planned & coordinated. We're each cooking a "group dinner" one night, and our Mexican-themed dinners will also be on the same night (tacos for us, burritos for them). Unfortunately, my cousin & her son are not going to be able to join us, but in a way it turns out to be a blessing in disguise, because now we'll get to spread out a bit more. I was a little worried when I saw "small tent sites" on the notes for the campsites, and here we are with TWO tents to set up (one for Mr Wonderful & I, and one for the boys to share). So it might be a good thing that we've got an extra campsite available.

And the weather is going to be fantastic -- I've been checking, and it looks like the highs will be in the mid-80s all week, with lows in the mid- to upper-40s. Nice.

But in the meantime, I've got work to do and my mind is SO not on it. I'm short-timing, y'all.

Growing up

Rugrat's last day of school is today. The end of third grade!

He's been really impressing me lately. First of all, he hasn't lost his housekey yet. He's been working hard on his goals - remembering to bring all his stuff home from school, taking care of his responsibilities at home (homework, cleaning his lizard's cage at Babydaddy's house, etc). He's walked to school several times by himself (Babydaddy followed him the first couple of times just to be sure). And....he finally learned how to ride his bike.

I've tried a few times to teach him to ride his bike, but he was very resistant to even trying. However, I made this a prerequisite to him being able to be a latchkey kid next school year; I'd rather have him be able to ride his bike to/from school than just walk. So a few weeks ago, Mr Wonderful took him out in our court and taught him how to ride. It took him less than 20 minutes before Rugrat was riding his bike completely solo (including starting off and stopping without falling over). I was absolutely flabbergasted. It helps that Mr Wonderful is a lot stronger than I am, and that learning to ride the bike felt more secure and less wobbly while he was holding the back of the seat. But I think Rugrat was finally just ready to learn. Now, of course, he LOVES riding his bike. He couldn't see what the big deal was before, but once he learned how to do it, he couldn't believe how fun it was. And I had nearly given up on him ever learning to ride a bike, so when I saw him take off for the first time, completely on his own, I almost started crying. My little munchkin is growing up!

This is such a golden age of childhood, and it makes me especially excited about our upcoming camping trip. I've taken Rugrat camping before, but only once, for a single night, and it was a few years ago. I think this is going to be one of those vacations that he remembers for the rest of his life. We'll have three adjoining campsites: my sister & her family, my cousin & her son, and Mr Wonderful, Rugrat and I (unfortunately, Tomboy is not able to join us this time). It'll be five days of getting dirty, hiking, swimming in a river, fishing, and playing with his two cousins that are just about the same age as him. I've gotten a separate tent just for the boys to sleep in, and I really think they're going to have a blast. S'mores around the campfire at night, hot cocoa with marshmallows in the mornings, and long summer days playing in the woods and the river with his favorite cousins. What could be better for a nine-year-old boy?

Busy month

Stupid hectic month. I just got an email from a friend wondering if I'd up & died because she hadn't heard from me in a while and I realized that this month has been a complete ball of crazy:

• Mr Wonderful's uncle died and we had to go to Red Bluff for the funeral a few weeks ago; one hour before the actual funeral we found out that his COUSIN just died and Mr Wonderful's mom and sister totally lost their shit - two deaths within a week.
  
  
• I went in for my consult with the surgeon last week; surgery for my skin cancer is scheduled for 2 weeks from now (May 12) and I am going to have a scar but hopefully it will look much better than it does now.
  
  
• Mr Wonderful went on his trip to Pahrump with friends for some gun class for five days and I was stuck here alone with the kids all weekend, which sucked. We painted 3/4 of Tomboy's bedroom that weekend (three walls LIME GREEN - ugh, but she loves it). I got a cold and was not only grumpy but sick as well.
  
  
• I found out my sister's pregnant again. Also, we're going camping up in Humboldt Redwoods State Park at the end of June: Mr Wonderful & I & the kids, plus my sister & her family, plus my cousin & HER son, plus Mr Wonderful's sister & HER family. 7 adults, 8 kids. Gonna be fun!
  
  
• My mom called when she found out about my sister being knocked up and tried to get me to tell her I'm getting married, and I told her she'd be the first to know, he hasn't asked me yet, GOD, Mom! Chillax! Once the ring is paid off, he'll propose, and THEN I will tell you I'm getting married. We all know I'm marrying this guy, it's not going to be a huge surprise or anything. But I'm not making any plans, setting any dates, or officially saying "I'm engaged" until I he actually pops the question, mmkay? Smooches!
  
  
• I had a couple of stupid PMS breakdowns and took off for a while by myself this past weekend. I was going to stay overnight somewhere but instead just ended up driving for 9 hours and making a big loop through the north bay area and then came home. I just needed to get my head back on straight because I felt like I was getting a little nutso, and a road trip was just the ticket. I ended up finding mecca: the Cowgirl Creamery in Pt Reyes, where they actually MAKE the cheese! It was awesome, and totally coincidental. I parked less than half a block from the place; I was just looking to get out of the car, stretch, maybe get some coffee or something & take a piss, and lo & behold -- the home of the best cheese ever!
  

I'm ready for May to be a nice calm relaxing month. Can we do that? Please?

Camping at Lakes Basin

Mr Wonderful and I just had an idyllic weekend camping up in Lakes Basin, north of Lake Tahoe. I took Friday off and drove up to meet him at our campsite, which turned out to be the most awesome campsite ever. It was right on the Yuba River, but far enough removed from Hwy 49 to make it feel pretty secluded. Our particular campsite was the best, with space for two cars, lots of trees around us to make it feel semi-private, and only a matter of seconds to walk down to the river to cool off.

When I arrived (around lunchtime) on Friday, he was sitting there at the picnic table, reading his book. I was SO happy to see him, and he had been anxiously awaiting me...he even put a little welcome message on his car bumper ("Hi Baby!"). So sweet. We unpacked, set up the tent and the air mattress/sleeping bags/etc., and had a little lunch. I changed into my bathing suit and we walked over to the river and got in (slowly...and carefully...it's FREAKING FREEZING water, since it's all melted snow). We went for a hike up into the woods and had sexy time out there in the wilderness, because we couldn't wait for nighttime and the campground was a little too populated for privacy. ;-) Then we drove over to Gold Lake so he could show me that area (where we originally intended to camp) and we both agreed that our campground was much, much nicer.

The next day we woke up bright and early, and after a big breakfast, we went back to bed. Heh. Then we got up a little later, and drove out to Upper Salmon Lake, where we hiked for a few hours. It was a heck of a trek...we hiked up to about 7000 feet, and my lungs were feeling every single one of the fifteen years that I smoked. But the view from the top was fantastic; I got some lovely photos of Upper Salmon Lake (photo left), little Horse Lake, and the tiny Deer Lake, which was rather dried up due to the lack of snowfall this past winter. I also got a couple of shots of the Sierra Buttes (photo below).

We got back to camp, had a little lunch and then hopped into the river for an icy cold bath. Yes, a bath. In the cold river water. Which I took voluntarily. And it was AMAZING. The water was cold, but not painfully so - you couldn't stay submerged for long, definitely, but it was absolutely invigorating. Mr Wonderful found a great spot that was just deep enough to allow a person to float underwater, with your hands on rocks on either side of you to keep you from floating downstream, and we washed off with some castile soap he'd brought. It was such a rush - and for some reason nobody from the campsite ever seemed to come down to that spot in the river, even though it was only a few steps away from the campground. So it was as if we had that spot all to ourselves during our stay, and we spent a lot of time down there, just chilling out and dipping our feet in the water occasionally.

After the river bath, we came back to the campsite and air-dried in the tent. I'd brought a towel, but it was so lovely and warm inside the tent, with the sun shining in...and later on, I went into the tent to read for a little while, but it was so warm and relaxing that I ended up falling asleep. Mr Wonderful snuck up on me and took this picture while I was crashed out. ;-)

That evening, we had the chicken chili I'd prepared & frozen at home, along with some (rather squashed) cornbread muffins. Mr Wonderful had been chatting with the campsite manager and got quite friendly with him, and the guy told Mr Wonderful about a concert that was being held out at an amphitheater in the woods, so we decided to check it out. And...it was like the worst bar band you've ever heard, doing covers of some great songs, but doing them very, very badly. We tried not to giggle too much, and snuck away when the band took their break. We headed back to the campsite and I built an awesome campfire (almost too awesome, it was HUGE and we had to let it die down quite a bit). We had some s'mores and half a bottle of wine, and then snuck off to bed.

On Sunday we stayed in bed a little later, but eventually we had to rise & shine. We went into the little town of Sierra City for breakfast, and then hiked the PCT to Love's Falls, and joined back up with the Wild Plum loop. The Wild Plum loop is the trail we followed on Friday afternoon, so we knew our way around fairly well, and we went off the trail to the river, where there's a lovely little waterfall and a great place to hang out for a bit. Since it was our last hike before packing up and leaving, we weren't too anxious to get back to camp quickly. Even after seeing two rattlesnakes on the trail (I know!!), we still wanted to stay there and hang out for as long as we could. But eventually we had to get back to camp and dismantle everything, pack it away, and head home. Both of us wished we could have stayed longer, and we'll definitely be going back there again.