"James!" she cried "James, you are here! Mommy, James is here! James, I'm going to give you a hug!"
And, of course, James ran away and tried to hide behind the door. Meanwhile her little sister Lydia, who is just a little older than Owen, was shouting Owen's name and running to give him a hug. Owen and Lydia bonked heads a few times because they couldn't quite coordinate as they tried to hug each other. But James was shrieking and trying to burrow further behind the door as Annika hugged him from behind.
After we got away down the stairs safely and the girls were loaded into their minivan, James said: "Well, you know, I guess it would be okay if we sat with our friends at dinner."
There were no parking spots at the cafeteria, and we ended up right next to the girls in the music building parking lot. Annika was crying about something that had happened in the drive over, and then James walked up to her, held out his hand, took hers, and walked her across campus to the cafeteria without saying a word.
He's making friends.
J: It's so sweet. I wasn't there. But, aww.
R: It's okay, something like this happens at most meals. Usually it ends with Annika tackling James or the four of them trying to escape down the elevator. Owen loves that thing. He's determined to press the alarm button.
J: It's only gone off twice?
R: None of our kids have set off the fire alarm yet this summer, though. Still three more days. So how would you describe Owen's eating habits at camp?
J: <laughs> Ohhh...he's beyond disgusting.
R: You know sometimes little kids make a mess of an ice cream cone all over themselves? Imagine that every night at dinner, but just as a final coat of stickiness over spit-out vegetables, marinara sauce, flattened bread, and smushed cheese.
J: We've run out of bibs. We need to do laundry just so we can have bibs.
R: You're kind of working even when you're at lunch, and you're trying to socialize, so he just gets left to his own devices for minutes at a time, and then you look over and he's standing up in his high chair and trying to jump out so he can ride the elevator, and there's a piece of pizza in his shirt.
J: We found crumbs in his pack and play this morning.
R: And I'm pretty sure he had a bath last night. How would you say we've been doing with eating healthy at camp?
J: Hmm. Overall, better than years previous.
R: Like that fried cheesecake burrito.
J: Houghton has swapped out nasty yogurt and that stuff they call fruit salad for some healthier salads that actually have a little flavor to them.
R: Like garlic.
J: I had a really good farro and sweet corn salad with my lunch today. So that helps because you don't have to eat the salad bar salad every meal. I had my first burger on a bun all summer yesterday. And it was actually pretty good, but it wasn't worth the dry mouth and sluggishness the rest of the afternoon. We've limited ourselves to ice cream at dinner, and that's worked well with the boys especially. What would you say?
R: I had some Wegmans after rehearsal in Rochester this afternoon, and it was really good to taste real food again. I think that our plan for camp has been well-conceived and well-executed, but the food tastes the same no matter what you're eating after the first day. It's either really sugary or really garlicky.
J: Or really bland.
R: I don't miss being a college student.
J: I feel like the second week has been easier to justify eating less healthy things because they're going through their weekly menu again, and you know that it's not going to be great. But...but there's a family camp here.
R: A BIG family camp.
J: ...really, really big. And when you see how they're eating and how it likely contributes to the "bigness," you reach for the vegetables.
R: Are we being mean?
J: I feel concerned.
R: In that Rachel Lynde kind of way. But seriously, these people are so huge. You can't help but notice. Because you can't walk anywhere.
J: Annika's been walking up to them and telling them that they have big booties.
R: Hopefully she hasn't taught that to James.
J: Yup. Another incentive to eat healthy is to not gas out on the frisbee field.
R; Our time there is valuable, since we have to split it between the two of us.
J: I like to think that whoever's team we end up on has a slight advantage, since they get fresh legs halfway through the game.
R: At the water break we switch out.
J: But I'm not as tall as Roy.
R: But apparently you're pretty quick. As soon as you ran on the field one of the campers yelled out "Look out, she's really fast!"
J: People think faculty are slow. Ha.
R: James and Owen aren't interested at all. They spent the entire half that I was with them begging to get into a bag of swedish fish that someone had left with the water bottles and wallets.
J: I don't blame them especially. It's really hot outside. They'd probably be happier in front of a fan. That's the only place they'd be happy, because it's also really hot inside.
R: Currently 84 degrees in our apartment at 10:17 PM.
J: Needless to say, we're in front of a fan.
R: But it's supposed to be cooler these next few days, and I'll be up in Rochester a good bit anyway, so I should be air-conditioned. For tonight, though, we're just going to look at this Lasko logo and try to stop sweating.
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