4 August, The end of Camp Peter 2010

I'll admit it, I'm sad to see the campers leave.  In fact, I woke at 3 this morning (smoke alarm low battery, don't you just hate them!) and could not get back to sleep.  Yesterday we said goodbye to Liv and Ruby.

Sara, Isaac, Ruby, Grandpa Peter, and Liv

  The house got much quieter but there was still lots going on.  We had many loads of laundry to do, sheets to change, trips to the bank, suitcases to pack, and all those details that crop up prior to a trip.  Isaac and I did manly things in the garden while Sara ran errands.   We had a pleasant dinner at a restaurant (Gosport Tavern) and Isaac was a delight.  We came home to watch a movie but quit half way through because we were all too sleepy to finish.  Today we finish packing so Sara and Isaac can fly out to Colorado this afternoon.  They will get home in time for dinner....but the house will be empty because Wilma had the baby this morning at 10:50!!!!  I'll follow later in August, date still up in the air.

Future World Cup Hero

In order to get Isaac to sleep before the plane trip I took him to the park to kick the soccer ball.  After 45 minutes of that you'd think he would fall into bed, exhausted.  Not so.


Some observations:  With the girls gone Isaac is suddenly tugging at us for lots of attention.  I'm not sure if it's because he misses their attention or just the constant flow of energy from those two has infected him.   He knows that he is going home to Mom and Daddy but I'm sure he has no comprehension of what it means to have a baby in the house.  Heck, most adults don't either until they have one.  I expect to have some sad moments in the next month, prompted by finding kid stuff scattered around the house.  Chris told me that he and Wendy expect to hear Liv and Ruby asking about 2011 in Portsmouth...starting about Thanksgiving. 

Martha Ann's house now six feet up in the air

Martha Ann's house is now six feet up in the air.  They are building a new foundation and will lower the house onto the new brickwork.  The house will end up four feet higher than when they started.

8 August, Ruby and Liv depart

Wendy getting an activity update from Liv

We are seeing the beginning of the end for Camp Peter.  Chris arrived on Sunday, Wendy on Monday, and the Casey family departs today (Tuesday).

In the past day the campers have been busy playing cards with Chris, making chalk drawings on the sidewalk, playing with toy paratroopers, going to the park, enjoying Movie Night, and generally having fun.

Red Lions at Red Lion Square

Peter's scooter

This part of the fence is dedicated to Peter and Sara Youngblood

Chris bought treats from the Ice Cream Man

Movie Night...before Wendy and Peter fell asleep

What a group!

Tomorrow it will be deathly quiet around this house!

1 Aug, David leaves and Chris arrives

On Saturday we seemed to be in high gear all day long.  We helped the Spirit of Independence dock and than we toured the boat.  Brother David (my brother, not a camper brother!) arrived from Roanoke so we all went to Yorktown to see the Ducati dealer.  David has been having a problem with his motorcycle and Dave Lillard agreed to take a look at the part in order to figure out what was going wrong.  Liv and Ruby had entirely too much fun messing about in the shop while Dave worked on the bike part.  We had a really late lunch and then took David over to see the house that is being raised.  Next was a late dinner and bed time.  All of this was complicated by the fact that our air conditioning units stopped working.  We had to get the AC folks over to see about the problem, which turned out to actually be an electrical problem.  After a few hours of crawling around Sara and I discovered that four of our 220 volt breakers were totally fried!  Thus we had no AC when we went to bad last night.  Luckily it was a cooler night and even rained overnight. 

This morning we fixed a huge breakfast and then took David for a ride on the Sara C.  He had never been on the boat.  Too bad we had to make that a quick trip because next we had to go to Hampton to pick up Chris at the train station.  David left for Roanoke and I took the campers to Hampton. 

The train was early and when we pulled in we thought we were 20 minutes early but Chris had just stepped off the train.  What luck.

Once home Chris taught Isaac how to play Old Maid and then they worked on playing catch.  By the time we had lunch everyone was ready for quiet time.  By that time Sara and I had installed new breakers and the AC was once again working.  Life is good.

By the way, our friend's house is now about two feet up inn the air.

30 July, Carrot Harvest

We have not spent as much time in the garden this year as past years, I guess we simply had too much to to this time.  At any rate, it was time to harvest the carrot crop and Friday was the day.  Please understand that we have been growing carrots for about three years but have never gotten what could be called a great crop.  With that said, what we pulled out of the ground this time was better than in the past.  You can see that the campers liked the crop even though it would never make it in the market. 

Sara took Ruby to the mall to have her nails done.  Everyone was pretty happy with the end result.

Sister Ann came to visit, along with niece Jan and her son Justin.  We all went over to John's pool for a swim. 

 

John's pool is a salt water pool so we have to rinse all the salt off after a swim.  The campers think this is pretty neat.

We had a huge dinner at Roger Brown's and by 8PM everyone was in bed.  Whew!

29 July, The Fire

Ah, the start of a normal day.  Coffee, newspaper, breakfast, everyone happy.  This is Elizabeth's last morning with us so we decided to have a swim in John Joyce's pool.  John lives next door.

His pool is a salt water pool and has powerful water jets for exercise.  After 45 minutes the campers were nice and tired.

After swimming and a snack we walked over to a neighbor's house.  She has been flooded five times in ten years so she, and her insurance company, decided it was time for a change.  The change is to raise the entire house 8 feet!  They are supposed to start the raising today.  When we saw the house it had huge steel beams in place and the city was disconnecting the water and gas lines.  

Elizabeth's Dad (Frank) picked her up and they headed home.  We will miss Elizabeth.

As quiet time was winding down we started to hear fire trucks...and they sounded really close...like right by our house.  That's because they were parking on all sides of our house.  In fact, there were ten trucks responding to what turned out to be a mattress fire.

Looks like lots of smoke damage but no structural damage.  The firemen were working in 95F heat. 

Isaac remembered seeing two of these trucks at the library earlier this summer.

28 July, Boating today

Even though the campers got to bed late they were still up by 0700, which caused me to be out of bed earlier that I really wanted.  Liv and Ruby were able to Skype with their Mom (causing some backlash when Elizabeth and Isaac realized that they did not have the same opportunity).  It seems that everything has to be done four times....all at the same time....if one has a glass of water ALL have a glass of water, etc. 

Today we decided to take the Sara C. out for a tour of the harbor.  We walked over to the marina.  Note that part of the street has been closed off...we do not normally walk in the middle of the street but it felt neat to be able to break convention safely.

Sara C. on the Sara C.

Elizabeth drove the tug.

We docked at High Street Landing where the campers got to see a large collection of jellyfish.

It was hot enough to rest in the shade of the lighthouse museum.

Then we rode the ferry to Norfolk.

On our return we once again boarded the Sara C. and headed back to our marina.  It was pretty hot and all the campers were 'starving' so lunch was the next item.  

This time we had Nutella, watermelon, and cantaloupe.  The campers were overdue for some quiet time but we had to put then in separate rooms in order to actually have quiet.  They need lots of rest to get ready for swimming lessons.

27 July, more movies

Here's a hoot.  It's 10:30.  Isaac is reading to Sara....she thinks that he is going to sleep, he thinks that she is enthralled with the story he is reading.   The girls are all on the third floor saying that they are going to sleep.  Liv and Elizabeth are on their cots, Ruby is wrapped up in a sleeping bag on the floor.  Ruby wants to be with the older girls so bad that she does not care that she is not even in a bed.  The big girls are so happy to be camping out that they don't care that they have a 5 year old between them.  What a hoot!

We just watched 'The Point' on DVD.

The kids were enthralled with the whole movie.  It was like watching four zombies.  Sara and I loved it!

Earlier we had swimming lessons.  Ruby and Isaac had a ball doing their normal stuff.  Liv perfected her back stroke.  Elizabeth worked on her underwater summer-salt.  Everyone had fun.

We started out with pancakes (from scratch) and things went out of control from there. 

We had story hour at the library which included making plastic bottle sea scapes.

The campers then had stickers to attach to their plastic bottles.  You had to be there to appreciate this.  Afterwords we sat on the library steps and put more stickers on the bottles...very cool. 

The younger campers had a quiet time while Elizabeth and I went to Yorktown to fetch my motorcycle.  Elizabeth took the time to nap in the car....both ways....but did not see any need for quiet time or a nap.

Just in case you missed it, this has been a time of personal accomplishment for Isaac and Ruby.  He has been rewarded for pooping in the toilet, she for dry pullups.  This is a big deal.  We reward each with M&Ms.  Now, for all you adults, don't expect the same reward!

Now, at 11:00 I hear subtle noises from the attic.  Giggles and such.  Sara is the bad cop putting the campers back into bed.  Tomorrow is another adventure.

26 July, The Zoo with Elizabeth

This morning we gained a camper, Elizabeth Phillips.  Elizabeth is my niece and she lives in Richmond.  We thought that her first day at Camp Peter would be a good time to go to the Zoo so that was our morning adventure. 

The spider's web was a huge hit.

And we just had to watch the geese walk around and poop!

The train is a huge hit and was the favorite exhibit for Isaac.

After we got home from the zoo we checked the mail and found a letter from Chris Casey to Liv and Ruby.

 

After quiet time (which was not very quiet) we headed over the the YMCA for swimming lessons.  Elizabeth chose to do free swimming while the other campers were in their classes.  Elizabeth already swims like an otter so she really had no need for lessons.  Liv worked on her breast stroke and back stroke.  Here you see Liv begging for mercy from Miss Nicloe.  No Way!!!

 

Now at after 10PM the campers are watching "The Music Man" with Sara.  This was an experiment: a classic movie to compete with the high tempo animated modern fare.  I'm not sure it's a success.  We will see if we have campers singing 76 Trombones or such tomorrow.

Update from Sara....while I was typing the blog the campers decided that they would rather go to sleep than watch the rest of the movie.  In other words, the soft shoe musical got a huge thumbs down.