and we're back!

Back and still recovering. One thing about camping, although I enjoy it, is that there is a lot of work when you are getting ready and when you get back. And while you're there, come to think about it. Why do I like camping again?

Anyway, it didn't help matters that J and the kids got home a day before I did - they came straight home from New York and I went to my cousin's wedding in Vermont. I tried to leave the house in something resembling some kind of order (this is, of course, all relative with three kids) but in one day it looked like a stampeding herd of wildebeests had come through. How do they do that?

All right, enough whining - the vacation was wonderful. The weather, the kids, the sights, all of it. Here is our lovely little campsite, site number chosen by my thirteen-year-old husband:

For me, nothing highlights the passage of time like this annual trip. Seeing the kids against this familiar backdrop, with a whole year of time in between, you notice the things you miss at home. Big Brother really looks much older with his hair grown out like that, and he's got his headphones on at night like a teenager, alternating between rock music and Artemis Fowl. Little Brother's lost all his baby fat, and he draws racetracks everywhere in the dirt - watch your step! Both are old enough to learn to play cribbage, and to walk to the bathrooms or their grandfather's campsite by themselves. And Baby Sister! Last year she couldn't even sit up, she wasn't eating solid food yet, she was an infant. This year she's running after J when he walks over to the bathroom, calling "Addy! Addy!" She can (mostly) feed herself and she gives you a great big grin if you ask her to show you her teeth. Next year she'll really be talking, she'll be weaned, maybe even toilet trained (hey - stop laughing!). I know it's a cliche, but really - it's so fast.

We never do too much on our trips. We visit the main street in Lake George for pizza and people-watching, we go to the beach, and we usually do one bigger day trip. This year we let the boys pick, and we went to the Natural Stone Bridge and Caves. I wasn't surprised by the pick; both boys have a rock collection, and Big Brother spent over an hour at the beach playing "erosion." The place was beautiful:

I've taught earth science, and I still find the shapes carved by rivers and dripping water to be almost otherworldly.

For all that, I am glad to be back. One misses showering sans ginormous (a real word now!) mosquitos, and eventually one runs out of clean clothes. I suppose I should be getting back to that laundry . . .

See you next year, Eagle Point!