THAT had to hurt…

Every time I look back at the latest trip to the “vacation house” with Mr. B, I am going to think of those words. No, no one got hurt. However, I give you fair warning – never, ever watch “America’s Funniest Videos” with my grandson. You will watch one video, and he will then pipe in with, “THAT had to hurt! I think that HAD to hurt! Do you think that hurt, Umma? I think that had to hurt. Umpa, do you think that hurt? I think that really had to hurt.” By then, the next four videos have played (of course, those are the cute ones of kittens playing and dogs chasing their tails – not the ones of the guy getting whacked in his ganochies with a baseball bat) and Mr. B misses them all. Then his attention returns to the show and he watches about four seconds of the next video. “THAT had to hurt. I think that really HAD to hurt! Do you think that hurt, Umma?……”

Aside from two hours of “America’s Funniest Videos,” we had a wonderful vacation. We are just in love with this little town in the Hocking Hills area of Ohio. On our first morning we drove to a nearby town that, in the summer, has a scenic railroad tour – a trip we took with Mr. B last summer and thoroughly enjoyed. YES, we knew the train was not running yet, but we took the trip anyway. Mr. B was not disappointed in the least when we told him that he couldn’t ride the train.  He just wanted to see, touch and feel the train, which he did to his heart’s content! The photo above shows Mr. B “driving” the train (although he was quick to point out to me that he wasn’t driving the TRAIN, he was just using the steering wheel on that one car.)

After a back-roads adventure (Men! Why is it they prefer driving on and bouncing over dirt roads when there are perfectly good highways going in the same direction?!), we had a chance encounter with a water tower. Again, it must be a man-thang because my son had the exact same reaction to water towers 25 years ago that Mr. B. has now – pure, unadulterated joy and excitement at even a glimpse of a water tower. We had to turn around near the water tower, so I asked Mr. B if he would like to get out and TOUCH the water tower. Oh my. This is pure joy on this little boy’s face as he touches the water tower.

Next, we headed to a place where we could “mine gems”. It was so perfect for Mr. B. For $5 you purchased a bag of “dirt” and brought it to the wooden trough water system, put your dirt in the screen box and shook to see if you had any “gems”. Of course, every bag has some gems, so Mr. B was quite thrilled at his “finds” and clutched his bag of rocks all the way back to the lake house.

The next day we were lucky enough to find The World’s Best Playground. That’s not it’s actual name, but it should be! This gem was tucked away on the side streets of the town. I could not fit the entire playground into the frame of one photo! Can a 3 year old spend several hours here? You bet!  And will he be SO exhausted by the time we leave that he’ll fall asleep instantly when we get back to the house? Well, no – but we were hoping.

Aside from train driving, gem mining, back roading and playground fun, the activity du jour for Mr. B was throwing rocks at anything. Spider webs were of particular interest (will the rocks stick to the web?), but bouncing rocks off the fence, the tree, the deck and other rocks were of equal fun. He would quite literally do it for 30 to 45 minutes at a time, several times a day. Rocks rock!

 

 

No, Jeff and I didn’t really get all that much time to rest and relax. Jeff is home from work for the rest of the week and we figure we’ll have plenty of time to recover from the trip relax in the next few days. We had a GREAT time with our grandson, we gave our daughter a very nice break, and just look at this face?! How could you not love spending every minute with this guy?!