supertent

Tonight we are spending the night in our pop-up camper for the first time. We had intended to wait another week or two but ended up needing to make a trip near a campground, so here we are in Decatur. Kristin's grandfather passed away at the ripe old age of 100. He lived a long and wonderful life, and we were lucky to be able to spend some time getting to know him when we were here in February to celebrate his 100th birthday. It saddens me that we are back for his funeral just a few months later even knowing that he is right now celebrating in Heaven. It was an honor to know him and our lives are the richer for meeting him.

Dennis very much enjoyed seeing his cousins from Washington tonight. He seemed to remember them, especially Mirella, who he called by name many times. He kept trying to engage her in conversation at dinner at Cracker Barrel tonight, and she was certainly fascinated by his antics (waving, nodding, calling her name, pointing at her across the table, etc.). Speaking of Cracker Barrel... We kept Dennis out WAY past his bedtime tonight, and he was crying in the car after we left the funeral home. The crying had escalated when I asked him if he wanted to go to Cracker Barrel. The crying immediately stopped, and a little voice from the backseat said "Cwacker Bearrerr." And then he was all smiles.

Now we are snug in our camper, glorying in all the nice air conditioned air coming from the ceiling. We're still kind of in a tent--we can hear campground sounds (albeit somewhat muffled by the sound of the A/C) and we are surrounded by other campers. Honey the dog is even enjoying the camper. She lounged around here while we were at the viewing and dinner. Dennis was so tired when we got back that he slept through his diaper change, and when I went to put his pajamas on, he mechanically raised his arms over his head and then lowered them. He rolled over, saw his Pea Pod setup on one of the camper beds, crawled into it, grabbed his Froggy, rolled over, and went immediately to sleep. We're hoping he'll sleep through the night (as I'm sure the rest of the campground is also hoping though they are unaware of it). He watched an Elmo video while we were arranging and setting up, and we thought it was fabulous until Baby Elmo began dancing with his dad on the video and Dennis felt compelled to climb onto the dinette table and dance along with them. I'm thinking we never should have bought that Happy Feet movie! I'm fine with his dancing--it's cute, actually--but the high surfaces bother me. Going to have to teach him to keep the dancing down a little lower without dampening his enthusiasm for it. Parenting isn't easy!