Camping with Cranky Pants

(written by Meggan)

  Any of you who is bothering to follow this blog must know Rachel, so you already know a bit about her personality.  She's not an impulsive, crazy, always-sprinting-around-and-screaming 2 year old.  She's a smart, snuggly, thoughtful toddler who usually asks for permission before doing uncertain things.  She is a mamma's gal, and ALWAYS wants to be held by her mom.  When other toddlers are running away at the playground, Rachel is tugging at me to pick her up.  My neck, shoulders, elbows, arms and hands are really sore lately because I just cannot figure out how to reduce the amount of time that I hold her.  I still often make dinner with her in the carrier, and she's almost 2!

 So this past week or so, she has wanted her 'Mamma!  Mamma! Mamma!' a LOT.  It seems to be getting worse and worse.  Unfortunately, she wants less and less of Daddy these days and has been pushing him away.  Poor Jason is hurt because, although he is a really involved and great Dad, she wants very little of him these days.  It's always been like this some... but lately if Rachel is in the same vicinity as me, she's throwing a tantrum if I'm not hugging her.

We have several theories on this recent extra snuggle and hug neediness.  We've had a lot of transitions recently with moving house, Jason returning to teaching full time, and a new classroom at school with new teachers and older peers.  Rachel is teething.  She keeps biting her own tongue and has a canker sore on her tongue.  She has had an on-again-off-again diaper rash since July.  Also, I work quite a bit from Monday late morning until Thurs night and don't see Rachel much for these 4 days.  She has some long days at daycare.

Saturday morning it was my turn to sleep in, so Jason went to Rachel when she started crying.  Crying quickly turned to full-on-freak-out-screaming, and she refused to be consoled.  Both parents tried snuggling, making her laugh, offering her items, standing on their head, etc. and finally after a diaper change and water and snuggles she calmed down.  So much for a sleep in.

We went for a family stroller run on Saturday, in our newly repaired Chariot.  Did we mention in the Boston blog that it was damaged while flying home?  Disappointing.  Airlines are not liable for extra baby luggage like car seats and strollers, and we took our chances.  Anyway, Jason took it to the engineering lab at school and repaired it so we were able to run.  Too bad we got 2 flat tires while running because our neighborhood is full of strange little prickles that like to poke our tires.  We've had a LOT of flat tires this year.

Saturday after the run we packed up all our gear, drove to Silverthorne, and hit the outlet malls.  Rachel slept on and off all day, and wanted to snuggle and sleep.  I was worried she was sick with a possible fever, and wondered whether camping was the best idea.  But in between sleeps and snuggles she was giggling and playing normally, so we went with it.

After a major day of shopping, we drove from Breckenridge up and over Boreas Pass Road and down toward a little forest service campsite called Selkirk.  The fall colors in the mountains were awesome - aspen trees displaying various stages of green, yellow, and orange.  We set up the tent, had dinner, and then Rachel asked to go to bed (a rarity).  It took a long time to get her down, and finally I left her in the tent screaming to go enjoy the campfire with Jason.  She put herself to sleep after just a couple of minutes.  I was able to put her into her sleeping bag when we came into the tent.

12:38am Rachel woke up for the first time and said 'No sleeping bag!'  Did we mention it was cold?  I was not comfortable with Rachel sleeping only in her sleeper and one fleece sheet on top.  But that was the only way she would have it, so I snuck her back inside her sleeping bag after she dozed off.  A little while later, she woke up and wanted some variety of snuggle, water, or no sleeping bag.  Our night continued like this, until at 4am I was able to bring her into my sleeping bag since it felt quite cold outside.  She slept with me until after 7am, which was a really nice sleep in.

Jason holds ice at the creek in the morning

It was 36 degrees when we got out of the tent, and there was some frost and ice around.  It was pretty, but it also marked the end of our camping season.

We packed up, played by the creek, threw rocks at the ice, and drove home.  Rachel was miserable and screamed for the last 40 minutes for the 2.5 hour drive home.  Jason went for a run while we played at the park, and then we came home.  Jason played with Rachel for 30 minutes without me successfully, but then Rachel was attached to me for the rest of the day.

Wearing new snow boots

Anyway, we had a great camping season and we're cleaning up all our gear and putting it to bed...
...until hut trips start, that is!