Cape Lookout Part II

Hello faithful readers... all seven of you. Okay, there are more, but it's o cool to have 7 "Followers" it makes me giddy inside.

Anyhoo, just acknowledging the fact that I promised you more on the camping trip at Cape Lookout. And I've tried, lord knows I've tried, to write. But, it's been dreadfully hot and I've not been sleeping and all I can come up with is this:

"Look Daddy, my nose is melting" and that's not even a quote from the camping trip. That's just a quote that makes me laugh every time. (Apparently the divine Ms L has learned to cross her eyes)

I could write about the bicycle mafia, as we dubbed the packs of kids ridding their bikes iaround and around, and around, the campgrounds from sun-up to sundown each day we were there. I kid you not. I'm pretty sure they were really spies from the US Forestry Dept trained to keep an ear open for repetitive campfire songs and excessive s'mores consumption. But, I'm too tired...

I suppose I could write about the time N found a moth in the restroom and carefully picked it up to take it back to the campsite to show Daddy. How bummed he was that, 'it got its wings wet and now it can't fly." And how he thought if he just waited long enough the wings would dry and all would be right. He never actually got to see if that was true, as Ms L pulled the wings off in her excitement to see the moth. Ah, little sisters. But again...too tired.

So many more stories to tell. Stay tuned and perhaps I'll perk up and produce soon.

for now, those you in Portland stay cool. And the rest of you well, I'm too tired to even be pithy...

Cape Lookout Part I - the beach

We went to Cape Lookout on the Coast of Oregon. The company was great, the scenery was beautiful and the weather was ideal. I could not have planned these things with greater precision then they fell into place. (And yes, I am well aware that there will come a day when our camping trip will be plagued by rain, bugs and bad neighbors with foul mouths, firecrackers and offensive music blaring from their boom boxes. But this trip, blissfully, was not that trip.)

When we arrived at the coast we quickly set up camp, grabbed pails and shovels and headed to the beach. L sat right down at the water's edge with Uncle Roger and buried her toes in the sand, and then with great joy and much giggling would fling them out of the sand to Roger's, "Ta-da".

N couldn't decide what to do first. Dig in the big hole? Climb the driftwood on the hill? Climb the rocks? Spin around in circles gleefully? I am quite sure he managed to do all these things and more in that first evening on the beach.

This first evening was the only time either one of the kids ventured to put their toes in the water. As much as I tried to get them in on later visits, they were having none of it. (L didn't even like it when I went into the water. She fretted and worried) Perhaps the vast size and the roar of the waves (things that call to me lika Siren) were too much for them this time around. I cannot say whether they will both fall in love with the water like I have, but I do know they have a lifetime to discover what the ocean is to them.

Sand. Did I mention that while my children may not love the water like I do, they love, LOVE, love the sand.

L was content to lie prone in it and rub her her cheeks into its warm embrace. She would pick handfuls up and and then drop it gleefully into my awaiting cupped hands. Slowly I would open my hands, the sand would fall away she'd grin gleefully, and we'd do it all over again. She would fill the octopus molds and sand buckets full of sand, demand that I dump them over to create shapes and castles only to to knock them over with great delight sending sand scattering across the blanket and my lap. It was a game could have gone on without end.

I would say if L had any complaints about the sand it would be vocalized like this, "Mommy, the baby hurt my eye." While she and a little one from a neighboring beach blanket were engaged in a playful game of, 'who's the cutest toddler on the beach', they slowly began to drop sand onto each other's toes. Oh, so cute... and then L got into her favorite position on the beach, her belly, and the 'baby' continued to drop and fling sand (in that oblivious I-am-the-only-creature-on-the-earth way that children have). Oops, this is no longer fun, now it's in L's eye! L quicky tried to remedy the situation by rubbing her eye with her sand covered hands. Whee! Let the crying commence.

Inner Monologue: "Dear God she's going to be blind for life! She'll need an eye transplant! Can we pick our own color?! Whoa that baby has man hands!"

I rinsed L's eye out with water. Got her to put a cover up on and she just sat on my lap for a quiet few minutes. Well, quiet in the sense that she repeatedly said, "the baby hurt my eye" with a random "we missed the elephants at the zoo , mommy" thrown in for good measure. (we went to the zoo over 2 weeks ago kid, give it a rest!) Eventually, the lure of the sand won out and except for the sandy hand on the tongue incident (did she not remember the eye incident!?!) her remaining hours in the sun and sand were blissful.

N also has a love affair with the sand. He happily immersed himself into a group of kids nearby who were digging (and jumping, dancing and rolling) in one of the biggest holes I've ever seen in the beach. Blissful hours were spent in that hole.

But, if the sand on the beach made him happy it was the dunes at Pacific City, that really sent him over the moon. It was all he could do to contain himself when he saw those dunes. Ah hell, there was no containing him. There was a dune to climb! And climb it he did! He tore off up the side like a goat climbing in the Alps, or like a sand-flea leaping from grain to grain. There was no stopping this determined little boy from his destiny. While he did not make it the entire way, he certainly scrambled higher then I imagined he would. And then he did it again. The grins on these faces truly do say it all.

NEXT UP - family, campfires, dead bugs, bicycle mafia and other fine moments from Camp Look Out 2009

Superheros Part I

Do you like your cape SuperMan? Weeellll, I do have a duck on my head....