Camping photos

The bad news is that I may have taken a dead battery as our backup battery on our trip – so halfway through our visit our first battery died and we were left with no camera. So, we missed photos of our visit to the pretty town of Manistee and our walk out to the lighthouse in Ludington … oh well, we got some cute pictures in the beginning.

On the road!

Ella’s happy about her ice cream treat.

… and 10 minutes later.

Ella plops down in front of the camp store to eat her candy immediately.

Her BFF – cousin Rylan.

Waiting for a ride on the campground train.

Such a cute train – made from barrels. Except there were no seatbelts and I got nervous Ella would try to get out so I chased the train all over the campground!

Her favorite item last week – a flashlight.

Relaxing on her own little chair in front of the camper, with her own little baby in front of her.

Back at home

We had a really good camping trip. Perfect weather. And we visited with family a lot. Ella and cousin Rylan had a blast together. And she’s now old enough to really enjoy all the fun kid camp things – like the swimming pool and the candy store, and there’s even a barrel train ride for the kids now.

The bad news is I’m back from vacation and reminded of a problem here. Just before we left Steve mentioned to me that Kennith (our very naughty cat) snuck in for a few minutes and peed in two spots in Ella’s room. Ella’s precious, beautiful little girl’s room I spent months obsessing over. (OK, I know I STILL haven’t blogged about that like I promised – I will sometime.) But anyway, now it smells like CAT PEE. I don’t know if you all know about cat pee, but let me tell you this – it’s a terrible smell and it never goes away. We’ve had to lay new flooring in one of our rooms because of Kennith destroying it with his pee.

So, I’m really at my wit’s end with Kennith. We struggled with his floor urination problem ever since we moved into this house four years ago and we never found a cure/solution. So, he lives in the garage. It’s sad to see him spend his live between a couple of bins, not getting the attention he used to. His hair is all matted. I haven’t taken him to get his regular haircuts like I used to. And he’s 14 years old. I’ve tried to find him a new home. Strangely noone jumped at the chance to take in this overweight 14-year-old cat with health problems!

I’m actually sitting in our living room now smelling cat pee here too. I think he went on the new carpet too. Remember the beautiful new carpet I wrote about and posted photos of? It smells terrible. Ugh.

I’ll try to post photos later of camping – just a bit preoccupied by the stench of cat pee right now!

I will miss you Internet

I haven’t felt much like blogging lately – seems like a lot of bloggers I know haven’t. Maybe because it’s summer and there are better things to do!

Anyway, we’re about to go on our first camping trip of the season to my hubby’s hometown and I’m excited. Although I will have a lot to do tonight after work, like washing sheets and packing. I have all those days off earlier in the week, but you really just can’t pack everything up until it’s fairly close. There are a lot of beer and drinks and cold items to pack. And clothes that I’m still busy washing up to take. Plus the more I pack way ahead of time the more a certain little camper will go through and unpack.

Camping is a lot of cool things, but it is also a lot of work. That’s OK. I’m sure it will be nice. And we’re anxious to see Steve’s family and I hear cousin Rylan really is excited to come stay with us in our camper. He loves playing with Ella, so that will be fun for them.

OK, well I just wanted to check in, let my 12 faithful readers know I’m still around. And I’m sure there will be photos up soon from our trip!

Random photos

I uploaded some photos just now and realized I’ve been only sporadically blogging lately – so I’ll try to just hit some highlights lately.

Saturday night my parents kept Ella and we got a night out at the new Fort Wayne baseball stadium to watch the TinCaps play. It was really fun. A bunch of moms from my moms group and husbands went and we had a great time. We couldn’t believe how nice a stadium it is. This is a nice addition for Fort Wayne. I wish I would have taken more photos than this one …

Also nice – that are seats were actually tables. So we did lots of eating and chatting. What baseball game?

The next day I went to my parents’ house and we went out for some ice cream at a cute little local place. My nephew Grant had stayed the night also and he and Ella had a lot of fun together.

Ella loves our camera lately. And she’s actually starting to use it right – when she’s not blocking the lens with her own finger. Although we do usually need to bend down to get in her photos.

After this photo, I heard Ella saying “Smile Nemo!” and saw her rearranging her stuffed Nemo for a photo.

Nemo, doing his best to look good for a picture.

Also tonight, Ella spilled my tea all over. But she was quick to go get towels to clean it up herself.

So proud. And she just used six towels for the cleanup. (Some aren’t pictured.)