E and I are both pretty lucky. Our dads are great, supportive men. I figure P is extraordinarily lucky. In addition to two fantastic grandfathers, he has the most amazing father a boy could wish for. And, as of this year, he was ready to celebrate it. He was pretty bummed our move nixed Mother's Day (he, apparently, had big plans for me;) But he did write me (er, dictated to E) the Absolute Sweetest, Most Awesomest letter a mother could ever wish for, evah. When I come across that box... I'll put it on the blog cuz its just that damn sweet ;)
Soooo, Father's Day was all big excitement for him. After reading a book earlier this year about breakfast in bed, he was bound and determined that we would provide this service for E ;) He started chatting it up weeks ago.
Meanwhile, I was bound and determined to actually do something for E, for a change. We typically skip fanfare and holidays with each other. But the man has been hankering for trips every father's day for years... and it was always just too hard in NYC. This year would be different ;)
So P and I planned a little weekend trip to the Olympic National Forest. I knew this was something E would like because we had planned a hiking trip to this park over a decade ago. A trip that was sidelined by an emergency hospital visit and a limping husband with a huge hole in his leg...
So we vacuumed the car (collector+car to carry collections=HUGE mess), bought E a raincoat (it is a rainforest and all;), packed our picnic cooler and headed north. After a lovely week of sun, it was cloudy and a little rainy, but with plans of clearing...
We took the long, scenic drive on the way there, wanting to relish our new neck of the woods. The scenery was stunning, and the child sat, happily, in his booster seat for multi-hour tour (once again, I was shocked. He chatted, sang songs, pointed out sights, colored a bit, moo-ed at the cows, snacked a bit, asked a zillion questions... but never seemed to get bored.) Nevertheless, wanting this to be non-miserable for a small person, we went a little further out of our way to stop at a beach en route. It wasn't a planned place of beauty, just a sandy spot we could get to, but the child was So Happy to get out and run and collect; it was adorable.
The little hike to the beach was gloriously beautiful, bracketed by bushes of bright yellow blooms. The beach addict was super stoked. I mean, it had been a whole week since he was at a beach ;)
The whole weekend had that "just falls together" feeling. As we reached the beach, the clouds cleared and the weather stayed lovely the rest of our trip.
Unusually good crab collecting:)
The boys raced.
P found a whole crab, picked clean (read:non-smelly and allowed in car;) A major score for a crab collector :)
We did actually make it to the park this time - and it was perfect. More another night... :)
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