Part of our full time camper living is extended stays at our kids houses ;). This past Christmas was spent at my daughter Samantha's house. She and her husband David are gracious hosts. We appreciate so much them lending their house to our family. It is her family too. The boys all came down too. For a few days we all hung out and it was great fun, lots of love and a especially sweet time for pop pop and his grand daughter Denali. Denali is our first grand child ;) Enough said.
One highlight was her bedtime routine. When she traipses across the floor, traipsing is like skipping for a 3 year old saying "pop pop can put me to bed" while jumping into my arms. That's a big win there. Three year olds can be a little fickle. If she does not want her pop pop but only her mom and dad, that's bad, since our visits are short. This trip was a little longer so I got to bide my time and wait for Denali, on her terms, not mine. You cant hurry these things up. Three year olds have a special way of letting you know you have entered their inner circle of trust.
For Example;
At bedtime, Denali has a routine, big surprise. Read books, go potty, get a drink of water, brush teeth then get tucked in. Something like that. Our routine morphed over the week to all of the things mentioned and story telling. I have a special story I tell with variations called "Happy Land". Its a magical place on top of a mountain where you ride a train around a mountain to reach the top. Each nigh the happy land story morphs to include other characters and things they encounter. One night I forgot to illustrate the train climbing up the mountain and Denali reminded me with a "No, chu chu". Which meant you forgot the noise and the hand illustration of the train climbing around the mountain.
Another night Denali asked that Mamma and little baby fufu, two of her little stuffed rabbits, be the protagonists in the story. No problem.
Denali would also tell a story using all 13 of the stuffed animals on her bed :). Impressive. Her imagination is real good. While she is telling the story, she is animated and bouncing on her bed, which is problematic at bed time, so I had her lay her head on her pillow while I was telling the happy land stories.
One of the nights I was kissing her little cheek and saying "one kiss, two kiss, three", she said "15 kisses". That's a home run right there. My heart and her little sweetness, half asleep, all tucked in.
On our last day, we went fishing. All of us, Denali got a new fishing pole for Christmas. Mom showed her how to use the poll, cast it out a few times and Denali reeled in the little plastic blue fish on the end of her line. It was very sweet and hopefully starts planting seeds of "fishing is fun". This lasted about ten minutes, after that she was throwing rocks and sticks into the lake, with pop pop. We threw big stones, little stones, handfuls and single stones. We threw right, left and doubled handed. We threw them into the water and onto the little floating ice sheets, trying to land stones on top. We threw sticks from our hands over our heads and even with a spin and throw,
grunting at the end. When pop pop threw his, Denali mimicked perfectly, with a little "rouoooo" as she threw her stick. She got all wet and muddy, perfect :)
It was a special visit and I so appreciated the time with her. I know how quick time passes and the little phases that young children go through. At three, she may have some memory of this when shes older. Maybe. I know I sure will.
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