Monday, July 21, 2008

Camping with the Crazies


We came back from our little camping weekend (that actually started on Thursday, so it wasn't so "little") early. And boy, am I glad!

The first night there I was setting up my tent and my grandpa, who was sitting on a lawn chair, kept commenting on how he didn't know this trip was going to be an over-nighter. We told him over and over that he DID know, but he forgot, but it's hard to convince him of anything anymore.

I tried to get my little Jake to sleep in his playpen, with a sleeping bag tucked in it, but the boy refused. He'd get laid down and would begin to scream! So I ended up keeping him in bed with me....for the whole weekend!

The first night we were in camp, we had an interesting event. Our camp neighbors came over to ask us to turn off my mom's generator because it was past quiet hours. It wouldn't have been SO bad, except the neighbors were SO noisy after we'd turned off the generator. Uh, can't you follow the rules TOO?! (Oh, it was a guy who speaks French, so all weekend long we would say, "Turn off ze moter. Turn off ze moter.") The next morning, my mom turned her generator back on to vacuum and the wife came over and threw a major temper tantrum. My mom had turned the generator back on after 8:30! We decided that we needed to find out what time quiet hours really were. 10:00 pm until 6:00 am!! We were on the other side of those hours, we COULD have used the vacuum!! What a brat! (Oh, they were tenting in an RV area of the campground. If they were so annoyed by generators they SHOULD have camped in the tent area!!)

That next day my grandpa did really well with his remembering. He'd comment on how he missed Grandma and going home wouldn't be the same.

Then came Saturday. Grandpa woke up not knowing where he was, why he was there, how he got there, or that Grandma was dead. We'd tell him over and over...even showing him pictures...and he couldn't understand or remember anything we'd tell him. I was beginning to go a little crazy. Answering the same question over and over is so hard!
Cameron tried wading in the river (which looked more like a really wide creek) and was wearing his Walmart brand crocs. He ended up losing just ONE shoe, and screamed a "my-life-sucks" kind of scream. We couldn't get the shoe back, and the kid was devastated!
Cameron also played the Wii all weekend with my handicapped uncle. Wouldn't you know it, they BOTH skunked me on Wii bowling! :P
Cameron got to go fishing with his Grandpa and caught 3 fish! I wasn't being very smart with the camera, or I would have captured the image of my little fisherman carrying the creel with the bleeding fish on it. He was so proud of himself!
We took the day on Saturday to drive to West Yellowstone and do some sight-seeing. While I was there I ended up running into my bestest friend, Kimby! It was so nice to see her and her mom. They got the chance to hold Jake and visit with us. It was so fun!

We laughed and tried to have fun, but with Grandpa's memory as bad as it is, it was hard.

Now that we're back, we're finding out everything that we need to do to get that guy into a care facility. We do have a place picked out with a room reserved, but we're worried about how he'll react to the change, even though he's already decided for himself that he needs to go. (Well, he decided one day, but promptly forgot the next!)

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