The Grandchildren: "Grandma Camp! September 13

Actually, I drove to Michigan on Tuesday, September 11. I wanted to be there before our "grown- up kids" and their 4 month old son (my grandson, don't-cha-know?) left on a two-week trip out of the country.

The Family

Grandma Camp began Thursday, September 13. The first thing M (now 3 3/4 yrs), I (turned 2 years Sept. 11), and I (me) did was to head to Home Depot! We needed a bag of sandbox sand, a bag of sand-mix concrete, and two strong helpers to assist in the loading, purchasing, and unloading! Not only did we find everything we needed, but our two capable helpers were very good-natured and smiled the entire while.

Then we headed for the garden department... can't go to a place like Home Depot without perusing the plants! We found a couple of little "crawl on the ground" sedum for the girls to plant at some point, a medium-sized shepherd's hook and a nice, big bag of enriched dirt! Eureka! We had it made. But, again we needed (and found) able assistance.

Now we had the makings for several projects and activities: 1) sand in their sand table...

2) mixing concrete and making stepping stones (with pretty purple rocks), and garden markers - each with a name (their own as well as "Mommy," "Daddy," and "H" - baby brother)...

Before going home, we went to a huge, local shopping center... groceries, clothing, electronics, "you name it, they had it" type stores. We needed a few grocery items. And that's where Grandma discovered two (most likely "antique" if not old) "horses" for children to ride after check-out... approximately 2 minutes' ride for 1 (one) cent! An attraction and a bargain. We made quite a few trips to this store - it was quite nearby - and had many "horsie" rides. :-)

Over the next couple of days we drove to a couple of other department stores for such things as playdough tools, bubble-stuff, a sewing center for vinyl fabric to make a cover for the sand table, etc. One of the stores had a small musical carousel... another "hit."

Other yard activities included swinging, planting and watering flowers, raking, blowing bubbles...

Additional outdoor activities included playing at a couple of other playground/parks, Grandma pushing the stroller downtown (and running through sprinklers!), going to the airport to watch airplanes and skydivers and sitting in a small airplane!

Indoor activities included measuring and making several dishes: pancakes, waffles, Dutch Oven Pancake, corn fritters, 3 kinds of muffins, sugar cookies, apple pie...