In retrospect I feel like I was in a rare era for my relationship with Finn last year. Certain campsites opened up just when I wanted to go, or I got sick just on the weekends I didn't have Finn. In particular a good memory was how I randomly was looking on Leander's website in late March and doing that I found information about the camping event at the end of my neighborhood and it happened a week later. It was like serendipity was looking out for me the way that timing lined up.
The first camp at Lakewood park in 2025 was so much fun that memories about it almost feel sacred in my head. It was stressful at first, when we showed up it was raining some and I had to go quick to setup the tent in the rain. River also made it extra, so once I dropped her off at the house it got a lot easier. The people running the show fed us pizza, then we all sat and watched Wild Robot on an inflatable screen, and then we made smores on fire pits they setup. Finn and me had never seen that movie before, and Finn enjoyed having a space to rock and move when he got excited during the show. The campout ended with donuts the next day, and overall the experience became my talking point for a year: "camping on easy mode."
I wanted to make sure I could do it again this year, so a few months ago I called and made sure it would happen again. They let me know the day the sign up page was added and I was maybe the first person to sign up. It was a much more popular even this year, with maybe double the number of tents compared to last year so I am glad I got in early.
I got out there early the day of too and setup in a prime spot. Where last year I felt a little like an imposter wrangling my brand newish Coleman tent this year its a well work piece of equipment I put up with ease. I was the only person there this year it seemed with an electric inflator so I was quite popular, and that night I was the only one to use Christmas lights (a trick I picked up at real campsites) to light my tent to make the bathroom trips easy. Just due to luck of being close to the front when they announced it me and Finn were the first to eat dinner, which were awesome Blackstone burgers he loved. Overall they were less organized this year- we ended up bailing on breakfast when it wasn't coming together well for example- but they had new additions like bouncy castles that Finn enjoyed.
A new addition that I have enjoyed overall in life has been riding scooters with Finn, and so I walked all the way from the campsite to his daycare to pick him up after I did setup and we rode scooters back to the park. Once he got done with dinner and the bouncy castle we rode over to the splash pad and he played there for a bit, then we rode home to wash off when the water from the splash pad made him itch. This meant we missed the first part of the movie during all of that, but given it was Elio meant I had already soaked up the movie last year and therefore once they overlapped smores with the movie (again it was less organized) we were quick to take on smores. I kept fearing a rain that was forecasted but didn't come, and overall our combined camping skills acquired since last year made some of it all a breeze.
Finn slept pretty good in the field but I didn't, it remained loud like a party well past midnight. Maybe in my head it felt less magical than the last year one that just kinda came together at the last minute, but I think Finn loved the novelty of riding a scooter to a campsite- likely the last time that happens. I guess it just didn't feel like we were breaking new ground like those early camping trips were last year, which inspired me to find some ground to break this weekend.
That happened yesterday when I loaded up our scooters and took them to the Brushy Creek Park. Actually Brushy Creek is more than one park- it is multiple parks connected by a long paved trail. Before Finn was born we had brought the dogs to one of those parks and explored it, but it felt like there was a lot we didn't get into back then due to a limit of how far a fat black dog could walk in the sun. Finn had been there before too at one of the parks that had a good playground for a playdate, but he hadn't really been on the trail except a short ride in what was his baby carriage.
Yesterday I had confident we could cover a lot of ground with the scooters, and so I planted us in what was the middle park of the bunch and we rode over to the park with the good playground. After he played for a bit we then rode the other way, getting all the way to 183A- over three miles covered total. I finally got to see where all these paths I had wondered about lead to, and we found out the range limit of his scooter (along with how Finn could ride one without getting too tired). We finally broke new ground like we did last year!
I expect new ground to be a theme for the rest of the Spring and Summer. As I wait to find out what the plan is for the big move down south I am trying to maximize what I can get out of the area around Leader, and part of that going places I have been before with maybe a younger Finn and seeing what a current day Finn can pull off.
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