How I spent my summer vacation

I’ve gotten a bit distracted by the stuff going on around here. We’ve gone blueberry picking, I’ve made three pies, we had people over for dinner last night, the house needed to be cleaned, the Sam needed attention, we went to see dragon boats , etc. It really decreases my blogging time. Hurmph.

Our vacation was excellent but I’m not going to list every little thing we did but let’s just say we had a family reunion, the cousins entertained themselves nicely with only minimal fighting although I did capture a kid fight on the video camera where Abbie pushed Sam to the floor and snatched away a toy. He seemed minimally upset by this.

I must say that central air and a swimming pool saved the day since we were there in the midst of the Midwest heat wave. Sam was in the pool every day and by the end of our trip, he was happily dog-paddling away without a life preserver. It would have worked much better had he been able to keep his head above water but I like that he was determined to make it work no matter what.

The first night we were there, I opened a can of worms by asking my mom if she had any kids books around that I could read to Sam before bed. This innocent request led to a major effort. It seems that the books were somewhere in the attic. Remember the weather? Just had to point that out.

Stage one was dad standing on the stairs handing us boxes of books. Stage two was me crawling into the insulation-laden attic handing down every last thing in there. Except the ancient TV antenna – that thing is staying with the house forever. What did we find? A large collection of old National Geographic magazines, lots of books and a bunch of miscellaneous stuff from our childhood; most of it belonged to Lisa and me.

You’d think I’d be rather sentimental about this stuff but really I’m not. There were old knick-knacks from our bedroom, costume jewelry, some purses and a pair of high heel shoes that must have been mine because Lisa always had too much sense for such stuff. My high school yearbooks were there and some pictures I took with my Kodak camera and flashbulbs, remember those? I might scan some of those pictures, particularly the one of Lisa surrounded by all her Shawn Cassidy posters because yes, I am that mean.

We went through the books and games and found some old favorites. Have you ever heard of “Fish-a-Ma-Jigger”? It’s a Mattel game featuring Dr. Seuss characters and we’re wondering if it was done legally given that Dr. Seuss didn’t license his characters in the 70’s. We played that game so much when we were kids we wore the tails off the fish and made new ones. The big question…will that game be saved or will it be sent to the big trash bin in the sky?

And the books! There was one book in particular we remember reading to Woogie called “Litterbugs Come in Every Size” and yes! We found that one and it’s meant to go home with Woogie so he can carry on the tradition with his son John. After reading it, Lisa pronounced it “preachy” and it’s hard to argue with that but still, it’s not without its charm. Sam liked it.

He also liked one I don’t remember at all. It’s called “The Jolly Barnyard” and it contains the classic line: “Gobble” said the turkey. I will decorate his Thanksgiving table as best as I am able. That about describes the entire book – rotten rhymes and lame ideas but Sam wanted me to read it over and over and over. I didn’t bring that one home with me because I didn’t want to inflict further self-torture.

The only kids book I brought home with “The Big Happy 1-2-3” because I like the silliness and pictures.

Dad stashed the ancient National Geographics and we hauled more than 200 lbs of stuff to the dump. I took a few things home, so few they actually fit into my suitcases along with 10 packages of hot sticks and three packages of “Award Winning Bratwurst” from Maplewood Meats. That place needs a mail order business. http://www.maplewoodmeats.com/ Good thing Ben didn’t come with me or we’d have bought a whole lot more than that.

Other than our trip through memory lane, we also took a trip to Bay Beach. When we were kids the tickets were 10 cents each and now they’re all the way up to 25 cents! Hurmph! Sam rode a pony named Willie and made me go down the big slide twice. The big drops made me scream every single time and the friction gave me hot butt. I don’t understand why my parents didn’t volunteer to take him down a few times.

The high point of the vacation was the convergence of siblings…we were all together for the first time in ages. We came from Vermont, Arkansas, Montana, Illinois, and Wisconsin and it made me wish we all lived a lot closer together. The transitory nature of our family at this point is somewhat depressing. We really don’t know each other very well any longer and have very different interests and lives. On the plus side, it also probably assures that we all get along pretty well since we don’t have time for petty annoyances.

We also hit the zoo where we watched the monkeys for awhile and Sam asked the question “Does the monkey have a penis?” He’s pretty fascinated by penises right now for some reason.

We also went to Kroll's hamburgers for classic buttered "hangaburs" as Sam says and watched a Packer practice session. How very Green Bay of us but we just had to do it because I'm trying to make sure that Sam is a Packer fan instead of a Steelers fan. His cousin Lukas' hand-me-downs have ensured that he's been exposed to the logo since birth.

Oh, and if you ever see the video footage of Sam and Johnny playing Mom’s grand piano, don’t tell her about the goldfish crackers in Sam’s hand….I’m trying to figure out how to upload videos to YouTube so maybe you’ll see it.

All in all it was a very satisfying and lazy vacation, one that won’t be repeated any time in the near future. And when Sam and I were in WI, where was Ben? He was motorcycling around VA, NC, etc. And after 2400 miles his bike died 1.5 miles from home. Glad we weren’t there!