Saturday, a day of "work" and play

I am teaching at Day Camp National Camp School again this year (as a volunteer), my 4th time.  I love teaching there because I love day camp and I love getting the chance to share my enthusiasm with new day camp leaders.  I also enjoy teaching with top notch teachers who challenge me to do my best.  National Camp School is in April and part of getting ready for camp school is having a meeting where all the staff can meet each other.  Our camp school draws people who are running camps throughout the Pacific Northwest, and sometimes beyond.  So, our staff is from a large area.  We have someone from Spokane, someone from Southern Oregon, one from Walla Walla, two from Portland, two from Tacoma, one from Seattle and me.  Those who could make the trip got together on Saturday.  Those who couldn't drive so far participated through Skype.  We met at the scout office in Tacoma to get to know each other and to develop a common vision for the school.

Tacoma is a 90 minute drive for us.  My meeting was supposed to last from 10-3.  Anastaya and William's grandpa lives in Tacoma so we took advantage of our trip to let them visit with him.  After Dode dropped me off, they went to the assisted living home where their grandpa Bill lives with 6 other seniors and a caretaker.  They stayed at the house visiting for a while and then went out to lunch.  After lunch, they went to a park where they could play at the playground and visit a beach.  Bill ran out of energy at almost the same time they needed to leave the park in order to pick me up on time.  Perfect timing!  Because I wasn't along, there weren't many photos from the day.

Anastaya and her grandpa at the restaurant

Miriam's fancy "boot" is protecting her broken toe.  It doesn't slow her down any!

My meeting got out on time and we had to decide what to do with the rest of the day.  We had a wedding reception to be at in Lynwood at 7:00 and we didn't want to drive all the way home to Arlington just to turn around and head back to Lynwood.  We decided we'd go to the zoo in Tacoma.  We pulled up at 3:30 and found out the zoo closed at 4:00.  There's a beach right next to the zoo so we went there to kill some time.

After playing on the beach, the little people wanted to explore the trails.  Miriam set off in the lead, quickly scaling the hill.  I could hear Anastaya breathing heavy behind me and wondered how long it would be before Miriam ran out of steam.  She made it all the way to the end of the trail where we met up with a road that would take us back to the car.  Her energy went totally to empty when she tripped and knocked her knee into the pavement.  After that, Dode had to carry her for a while while she cried and begged to just go home.

We stayed at the wedding reception just long enough to be polite.  For 90% of the time we were there (1 1/2 hours) Miriam lay her head on the table and asked me every two minutes if it was time to leave yet.  The reception took a while to get going but once they turned the dance music on, Miriam came to life and got out on the dance floor to bust out her moves.  She did not want to leave when we told her it was time but we still had a 45 minute drive home and then showers for children plus sacrament bread to make.

We'd left the house Saturday morning right at 8:00 am and got home a little after 9:00 pm.  It was a long, tiring day!  We got a lot done but I'm glad every day doesn't take quite so much out of us all.  On Sunday we all got home from church and just crashed.  Naps for everyone but Miriam.