I'm sure that you were all waiting with bated breath to hear how our weekend travels went. You can all collectively breath a sigh of relief. The weekend was fabulous -- along with being exhausting. The only regret of the weekend was that I didn't whip my camera out at the right times. I have a habit of living in the moments and not remembering to go get the camera and document what is going on. I think that I should just wear my camera everywhere -- the weight would be a constant reminder to start snappin'.
And no, we weren't in Tennessee as the title of this post implies. But we were in the mountains -- the Catskill Mountains. Last weekend, we drove 7.5 hours from Cleveland to the east side of New York state. We drove to a little town nestled among the Catskill mountains called Ellenville. In speaking of the travel, I hoped for the best but expected the worst...
I really tried to be proactive in packing for this trip -- but I usually was too lazy when I got home from work to want to think about the necessities of the trip and pack. I made a list the night before and set out Finn's clothes but I ended up packing the afternoon that we left. We were traveling Friday evening and coming back on Sunday late afternoon/evening. Being that we were only going to be gone for approximately 48 hours, I told myself that I shouldn't go overboard on packing. I laid Finn's clothes out the night before and when I went to pack them into our communal suitcase that afternoon, Daddy had rifled through them and used them to dress her in his Friday "Daddy Dress Down" day. That meant that the cute little outfits that I had laid out were ransacked and bits of which outfit was put on her. Oh, dear...
I was able to get things packed up pretty quickly -- in less than an hour. We were packing extremely light. I had packed jammies, a single pair of jeans, and two shirts along with rain boots in case the heavens decided to open (which they thankfully did not). I packed for me, for Finn, and for the dogs. We all fit into the Pilot very comfortably and I have to say that I packed perfectly.
Finn traveled really well. We stopped about 2.5 hours into our trip to eat dinner and feed & change Finn. Once we got back in the car, she started fussing about 45 minutes into the drive. Daddy jumped in back and played with the iPad and Finn fell asleep for the last 4 hours of the trip. We timed it perfectly in that, it was her bedtime for most of the drive and she slept peacefully. The same went for the ride home.
She loved Leurenkill! We got up there late on Friday night. Finn & I went to sleep while E headed up "the hill" to the casino (aka community center with bar) to see old friends. He got home pretty late that evening. Finn & I woke up early on Saturday and waited for E's parents & sister to arrive. His mother and sister decided to come up on Sunday, but we saw Opa on Saturday as the refrigerator for the cabin was being delivered that day. We went out for dinner with him before he drove back down to the city for the evening.
It was Halloween weekend in Leurenkill, so all the little kids were out in costumes trick-or-treating. Finn LOVED seeing all the different costumes of the children. I would say there were at least 60-70 kids that came through, all in wild costumes. Then there was a kids' dance party in the casino. We headed up there with Finn in the baby carrier and everyone got to meet her. She was a little angel the whole time! She met one of her future boyfriends, Patrick. It got late and I went down to the cabin with Finn. E stayed in the casino and had a wonderful time with friends.
On Sunday, Granny, Opa, & Anita came back up early in the morning. We walked through the trails on the mountain. We had the intent of going to the top of the mountain to see Kelly (our old pup is buried at the top of the mountain), but we couldn't figure the trails and Finn was getting cold. So we are saving that trip for another time. We then all headed down to the cabin to relax and our friends came over with their three kids. We caught up and before we knew it -- it was time to leave (I had to work early on Monday).
The weekend was a great success and the cabin which was renovated was beautiful! We will definitely be making more trips upstate next summer. The cabin is a summer cabin -- there is no water in the winter and no heat. I hope that it will be a wonderful place for E's family to come together for a week out the year and play.
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