Roughing it at Camp Meeting

Damon and Riley swinging together on the back porch.

Damon and I were lucky enough to celebrate my friend, Kat's, birthday today at Denver's Camp Meeting. This is something completely new to the both of us but we were excited to try a new experience. For those of you that are not familiar, camp meeting is a religious gathering. Two weeks out of the year families who have shacks that were passed down from generations move in and worship which dates back to the 1800's. Now it has become more of a social gathering and a little partying. Kat's family has had their shack passed down to them from their family in the 1800's...obviously improvements have had to be made over the years. They had the nicest shack in the entire place.

As soon as we got there Damon and Riley played outside with all of the other kids. It was very interesting. We had great food and good laughs. Kat, Laurie, and I decided to camp out there that night with the kids...that too was interesting.

The front of the shack


The kitchen and the kitchen table inside the shack


The bathroom with a sink but no shower or tub.


The stairs leading up to the bedrooms upstairs.

The bunk beds before we turned them into beds. There were four on each side of the wall so a total of 8 beds to sleep in.


This was a picture of what the rows of shacks look like. This was taken on the balcony of the second floor.

This is the back of the shack.

Damon and I had a blast. It was surprisingly peaceful and the simplicity was nice for a change. Thank you to the Link family for having us in their shack.

Bike Riding

Damon started riding his bike when he was about 3.5 years old, which is documented in earlier posts. We stopped riding for a while with the cold weather that came around and the fact that in our appartment complex there wasn't many places to ride so we took a few months off.

These past few weeks Damon regained interest in riding his bike and he is doing awesome. Today he figure out how to start off on his bike by himself without me having to hold on to him. He can also slam on the breaks and make skid marks in the driveway.

We took it to the road where it is a little trickier. We would drive up the road, turn around, and come back into the driveway. On Damon's firs turn into the driveway he ran into the mailbox. He was not happy about that but he got up and tried again.

Minutes later the little girls across the street came outside to play and to make sure they saw Damon riding his bike Damon decided to make loud noises such as: "Woo Who!" or "That's awesome" or "Yeah!" and then clapping his hands while the entire time looking at them to make sure they were looking at him. Even when he saw them looking he never said hi. He pretended like he didn't see them and he just jumped on his bike and started riding.

I did tell him that once he got really good I would buy him a new bike...well, he's really good so it looks like this weekend I will take him to pick out a bike and I will probably get one myself. I have always loved riding bikes but didn't want to get one until Damon was able to ride. We will be the biking duo. Yay!!

Busy Saturday!

This morning Damon and I got up, ate breakfast, got dressed and headed out to meet my friend at the pool. Damon did and excellent job swimming. He didn't even need his floaties! He swam under water, jumped in the pool, and floated on his back.

I failed to bring my camera to the pool...didn't really think about it but you better believe I'm bringing it next time.

Damon was complimented by a lady at the pool with how well he swam along with how polite he is. She was watching me teach him how to float and swim and thought he did such a great job taking it all in. She actually asked me if I taught swimming...uh no, I can swim but my technique is poor as anything. I never took lessons or classes so everything I do was self taught hence the splashing when trying to do a forward stroke. :)

It was time to leave the pool go home and pack our close for a sleepover. My cousin was going out with some of her friends so I agreed to watch the boys at her house and have a little sleep over.

It started out really nicely. We ate dinner, played together, got our baths, brushed our teeth and put in a movie. Once the movie was over I put together their camping tent and made a little bed inside for the boys. I read them 5 books and it was time for nighty-night...so I thought.

They couldn't agree on sleeping with the light on or off, they wanted to watch a movie but then wanted to play with toys so needless to say it was going to be hard getting them to sleep. Damon finally decided he was ready for bed but didn't want to sleep in the tent with his cousin. He wanted to sleep in a bed by himself. Aden wanted to sleep wherever Damon was sleeping. Unable to come to an agreement both of the boys jumped in my bed and that is just how we slept. Aden woke up with a bad dream in the middle of the night so we had to play musical pillows and I had to sleep next to Aden.

What a night!!

The next morning we got up, ate breakfast, brushed our teeth and then headed out for a walk around the neighborhood. We played for a little that morning until my cousin came home and then Damon and I bolted back up to my parents house as I had to go visit my brother.

What a good weekend.

Water Fun!

Today I received a call from a friend who asked if Damon and I wanted to go onto his boat after work. I was really unsure about it because Damon has only been on a boat one time so I wasn't sure how he was going to do. I wasn't so much concerned about him being scared but concerned that he would be too brave and maybe fall out of the boat at some point. Damon stated he wanted to go when I asked him so...we went.

We got home, changed into some boat gear, and headed out to my friends house. He lives on the lake in this beautiful house. The boat was even more beautiful. We loaded up and took off. Of course. As soon as we got on the boat to the point where we were not close enough to go back to shore but not far enough to where we were in the main drive of the boats, Damon decided he needed to pee. After getting the approval, Damon and I stood on the very back of the boat as I balanced both of us and let him pee off the back. How embarrassing!

My friend was really careful about driving slow. Damon was all over that boat. Walking from the front to the back, from the passenger seat to the driver seat. He was making me nervous. Finally I got him to sit in my lap so we could go a little faster. He was so excited! Then it was time to go under a bridge. You may know from experience but when you are on a boat and you're approaching a bridge at some point it doesn't look like you are going to fit under it. Damon was a little nervous about it but then he saw we were going to make it. We were on the lake for about two hours and as it was getting dark we headed home. Damon curled up in my lap, I wrapped the towel around him and he started to fall asleep.

We had a blast!

Volleyball Game

Tonight was my first beach volleyball game. I am on a team with one of my doctors and two other guys. My cousin picked Damon up from school for me and brought him to the game. My biggest fan was front and center watching me play. Every once in a while I would hear Damon yell "Go Mommy! You can do it."

During any kind of break Damon would run over and give me a hug and a high-five. I was so happy that he was there to watch me. It is important for him to see that I do know what I am talking about when it comes to sports and that I am actually pretty good at some of them.

Water Balloon Fight

Today Damon and I had a water balloon fight. I bought some small balloons, filled them up with water and started pegging Damon with them. He absolutely loved it so of course I had to make about 10 more and let him throw them all at me.

It wasn't as fun cleaning them up though.

Transformers II

My cousins and their kids came into town this weekend: Jason, Kelly, Trenton, and McKenna. Ihad a 5 hour meeting this morning in Charlotte so I was gone from 7-2. When I got home Damon and Trenton were playing outside. At that moment I was told to get ready because Jason and I were taking the boys to the Transformer II movie but not at just any old regular movie theatre...no...we had to go to the IMAX dome inside the discovery place.

We get there and the boys got to play around in the "museum" part of the discovery place and they absolutely loved it. Damon got to pick up a real four wheeler utilizing this contraption, he got to float in a vacuum inspired chair lift, he worked with a maze wheel to move beans around, and got to play in a blues band.

It was time for the movie to start so we got our snacks and headed in. It was the most intense movie but to have it shown on a dome shaped screen made it very difficult to follow...not to mention the movie is like two and a half hours long. Needless to say we weren't able to stay the entire time. We left about half way through it because the boys were ready to go. Normally they can sit and watch an entire movie but they couldn't handle this one.

On our way home we decided to stop in Birkdale for dinner and to let the boys play in the water. We stayed there for about 2 hours and then headed home. The boys fell asleep in the car.

It was a successful night.

McDonald Disaster

Today Damon asked to go to McDonald's for dinner and since I had made plans to stop by one of my friends homes, I was not opposed. Damon told me what he wanted, so I ordered and we pull up to pay and the first thing Damon yells is: "Mom! That lady is old!!" She looked at me and the only thing I could do was puff out my cheeks and try not to laugh. I know I was beet red but I couldn't say anything. I just handed her my money said thanks and drove off...I forgot my change.

As soon as we left her "old butt" behind I explained to Damon there are just some things he can not say out loud or if he does it needs to not be in front of the person he is talking about. Our conversation went like this:

Me: Damon, you can't say stuff like that.
Damon: Why? She was old mom.
Me: Yes, but that might have hurt her feelings.
Damon: Doesn't she know she's old?
Me: She probably does but some people do not like to be reminded.
Damon: Okay.

I love how they are so honest to the obvious.