Summer Hiking and Camping in West Virginia

Hello, friends. :)  

I mentioned last post that I've been scouting out hiking trails for my family on AllTrails and other resources lately.  Darryl is not enthused, but the kids and I love it.  My mom came with us last time, and the time before that, she, my stepdad, my brothers, and my brother's girlfriend joined us part of the time.

I'm 205 pounds now.  I'm 5'2.  I'm nearly 35 years old.  I gained a ton of weight after I had my kids, especially after I had my second.  I know most of it is just because I have a pretty sedentary lifestyle - I work a desk job, my main past times involve reading and crocheting and cuddling with my kids, so I'm not really getting much exercise in aside from walking from spot to spot in my house or office.  So basically nothing of note.  I don't eat terribly bad, though I can definitely use more vegetables in my diet and am working on that.

I have a slight heart condition called inappropriate sinus tachycardia, and after being diagnosed with that, I realized one of the traits of it is "exercise intolerance".  My heart rate tends to jump way too high sometimes all on it's own, and heavy exercise can exacerbate that - more so if I'm not completely hydrated because dehydration can trigger it as well.  I get dizzy and nauseous and black out.  So, exercising hasn't been something I've put a lot of time into the past 8 years or so, and the results of that are obvious and frustrating.  

I've started doing some easy home workouts to ease myself into it and slowly build up to more intense exercise, and I've been working harder to try to get more steps in when I can.  The other night I walked half a mile just by pacing around my house for 20 minutes.  Before the weather got so hot, I was trying to go walking with my friend and her dogs on a regular basis, but hot temps and busy schedules have disrupted that.  I have a walking pad at home that I plan to start getting out more and setting up in front of our window AC unit when I can't do anything else, but what I've found I really love is hiking in the woods.

I spent much of my childhood playing in the woods at the house we lived in when I was young and at my grandparents' house.  So, I guess it makes sense.  And now that I know my kiddos like it too, I want to focus on that a bit more.  We live in the mountains, so it's not just miles we rack up; it's changing elevation too.  Not to mention the scenery is absolutely gorgeous. 

Hiking a trail is just so much more dynamic than walking through town.  Our neighborhood has some pretty scenery in some areas, and there's another neighborhood I think I'm going to like walking in on my lunch break at work.  It has tons of pretty flowers and beautiful old houses; I walked there last Monday.  But getting to go somewhere away from other people is just so peaceful and serene.  Even if I have two goofball kiddos and some other family with me.  

In going to Blackwater this past month, it reminded me about the Waterfall Trail challenge we have in WV.  If you click that link, it will take you to the Waterfall Trail page of the WV tourism site where you can sign up (for free!) and learn more, but basically, you go to as many of the waterfalls as you can and check in with the QR code there (see photo below!) or on the website.  As you explore them, you earn prizes.

Not all trails I've looked into exploring at some point are waterfall trails, but they definitely make a more exciting "splash" for the kids to see while we're there!  And I can't deny that I love seeing them as well.  It's just one of the many cool nature things here, and I've definitely rediscovered my love for what our state has to offer.

What are some cool kid-friendly trails you've explored?

Another thing I've started doing is including my kids in my workouts if they're interested.  So far, Leah has done two with me (to varying degrees).  She may not do everything the way I'm doing it, but she's having fun and doing something with me, so she loves it.  It gives me a little more motivation to stay with it when she comes over to me and asks if we can exercise, too!

Another thing I would like to combine with our hiking trips this summer is camping.  We went once last year.  It was fun, but our tent experience was miserable.  My mom gave us a queen sized air mattress, which we put in my old 4-6 person tent.  It fit, but it meant we had zero room for anything else in our tent, and we slept with the kids in between Darryl and I, so I was up against the back wall of the tent all night.  Darryl apparently slept with one foot on the ground.  The condensation on the inner walls of the tent was crazy; I was wet from it.  We went in late August, so it got pretty cold at night since we were up in the mountains.  That part of it just wasn't fun even though most everything else was.

I bought us a 9-person cabin-style tent a few months ago.  Haven't had it up yet though because every time I think about it, it's pouring the rain outside.  Every weekend I've wanted to maybe camp, we've had other obligations, or the weather has been crappy.  I'm still hoping for at least one or two camping trips before it starts getting cold at night.  

What are your tips for tent camping with small kids?  

The last time we went, we took some dinosaurs and trucks and a set of building toys with rods and connectors that they built forts with.  We were camped next to a river, so we obviously took bathing suits and water shoes for the kids.  I don't think I took mine, and I regretted it, so that will change if we're in those circumstances again.  I've got the bigger tent, and I'm honestly thinking of buying a full-size air mattress to add to our set up, in hopes that the kids can take one and Darryl and I can take the other, or we can each take one with one kiddo.  I've not done it yet because I was also kicking around the idea of getting the kids cots that they can put their sleeping bags and blankets on, which would save floor space, but I think if we do that, they'll end up in our bed anyway, so the second air mattress might be the way to go.

The air mattress idea may sound bougie to some, but listen.  Darryl has old sports injuries, and I've just got a lot of stress on my body at this point.  Sleeping on the ground is not comfortable at all, so the air mattresses are a much better option than a sleeping pad.  I got a car adapter to plug a couple of extension cords into, which we can plug the air mattress cords into, so as long as the car is somewhat close to the tent, we can air them up with no problem.

 I've already got some camp meals planned out.  Frozen burger patties, hot dogs, chili or taco soup that I'll make ahead, mac & cheese, ramen...and many more.  I bought a two-burner camp stove a few months ago as well so that we can have more variety and more options than just cooking over the fire.  Don't get me wrong; that's fun too.  But last year I found myself wishing that I had a different option for some things, and we were only there for one night.

The max we can probably go is for two nights since we're working around a weekend in most cases - I don't plan to take off work for this unless it's just to leave a little bit early on a Friday.  Maybe when the kids are older, we can plan a slightly longer stay on our summer vacation week that we always take, but for now, two nights seems good to me.  I just want to be able to get out in nature and away from civilization for a couple days, and maybe we can mix some hiking into some of those trips as well.

Hello Again, Blog World!

It's been so long since I've written a blog post - my last drafts that I never published were in 2020!  Shew!  Life has been so busy, often chaotic, and sometimes overwhelming, that I stopped writing in almost any form altogether for several years.  However, writing has always been therapeutic for me, so when a close friend I reconnected with last year invited me to join her writer's group, I tentatively went to my first meeting.  I didn't have a prepared piece that day, but it was so nice to get out of the house for a few hours and talk to other people who have a love and appreciation for writing that I've been to nearly every monthly meeting since.  It's my one night a month that I can get out and socialize with someone other than my family or coworkers.

I don't always have something prepared, and sometimes what I take isn't a fresh piece.  But it's felt nice to exercise that muscle again and get creativity flowing in a different way than I have been of late (crafting - specifically crocheting - still creative, but an entirely different mental/creative muscle).  

What I've noticed is that even though when I was younger, I enjoyed writing whole stories - books, even - I don't feel like I have the time or mental space to give to that right now, so often what I share are scenes or essentially journal entries that I've realized could easily be blog pieces when crafted the right way.

So here I am!  Back at the trusty old blog that I started in college.   Life looks a lot different than it did then and the subsequent years that I was writing and publishing here.  

I no longer own a horse - I gave Orion to a wonderful person who had bought a mare at our barn and was looking for a pasture mate for her for when she would eventually move her to her own land.  He will always hold a piece of my heart even though I don't go out of my way to see him anymore - just a little too painful knowing he's not mine.  But I did not have the time to dedicate to him and honestly let that go on for too long as it was.  I still hear about him sometimes, and it's a bittersweet feeling.  I'm glad he's doing well and that everyone is happy.

I am a homeowner now, for the past 9 years, and I have two kids under the age of 6.  They're 21 months apart and are amazing but definitely a handful! 

My son is 5 and is scarily smart - he's going into kindergarten this fall and was doing fourth grade level math last year in preschool and can read just about any word he sees.  He loves music and is Taylor Swift's biggest fan. We navigate dealing with big emotions daily because he feels all the emotions he experiences in a huge way and doesn't always know how to deal with them.  He's the sweetest boy though and just wants to help with and be part of everything - and also wants to share all the music facts he's ever learned with us at the same time.

My daughter just turned 4 and is also very smart but not obsessed with learning math and reading like my son - she's very play-oriented and learns that way instead.  She loves story time and animals, and she can tell you any dinosaur you put in front of her - usually even the more obscure ones.  We were doing one of the little dinosaur egg excavation kits a couple weeks ago and got a plesiosaurus.  Darryl and I said something like, "Cool, we got a swimming dinosaur!"  She was very quick to correct us and say, "No, the plesiosaurus isn't a dinosaur!  It's a swimming reptile!"  We were skeptical.  I Googled it.  She was correct.  We were blown away.  

She also loves being outside and observing every little thing about the world around her.  I've been trying to find places to hike (not hard in WV) that we can take the kids to this summer when we aren't otherwise busy and the weather is cooperating, and we've discovered that while both of them like it, baby girl loves it!  Blackwater Falls State Park has tons of trails that I've been looking at, as well as things a little closer to us.  I've downloaded the AllTrails app, and it's opened up a whole new world to explore.  We've done a few trails at Blackwater so far and loved them.  It's fun to include other family members and make it an outing all of us can enjoy together - in today's fast paced world and with everything my big family normally has going on, it's hard to find time to get everyone together.

So, I don't know exactly what this blog will entail going forward, and I'm not going to try to plan.   But you can probably expect things about family, crafting/trying to start a small business eventually, hiking/nature, motherhood, trying to get back in shape and be healthier, cooking, gardening, very amateur photography with an iPhone...all the things I'm experiencing and trying to bring into reality if I can keep up with writing about it all.  I hope those who used to be here with me will come back.  I can't wait to talk to you all again!

Fitness Plan

So, I have failed miserably at my exercise goals that I set a few weeks ago. I don’t feel that badly about it though, because I have for the most part been doing other things that are productive. And while not entirely comfortable with my body, I am more so than I was at that time.

This doesn’t mean I don’t think I need to become more fit. I definitely do. But I think all the writing I’ve been doing and the focus I’ve had on completing other goals has helped my overall outlook, too. In a lot of areas, I feel more confident than I did.

This isn’t to say that confidence couldn’t all come crashing back down. It definitely could, and has before. But I’m just trying to keep it going and ride it as long as I can. I’m trying to limit my focus to a couple things at a time outside of my normal day-to-day routine, instead of trying to do everything at once and setting myself up for failure.

I knew I was probably doing it at the time, but I definitely set myself up for failure with how many workouts I scheduled. I don’t have the time or energy at the current time to do 2 workouts a day, 6 days a week, even if 1 or both of them are short. I’m not sure why I thought I could even entertain that idea. 

So I think, from here, I’ll restart my plan today, and only commit to the 3 workouts a week that FitOn gives me. And now that Tank has a good, bulldog-functioning harness (I love that lol), I might throw in some more walks with he and Kam. 

And from here, we’ll see how it goes this time!

Kameron’s First Blanket (From Me!)

I’ve been working on this blanket since a few weeks or so after Kam was born, so for at least 9 months or so. I think I underestimated a bit how much less time I would have for things like this once I became a mom. I still love crocheting, but most days if I get to at all, it’s in 5-10 minute increments!

 

Now that I’m finally finished with this one (as of Sunday night - I was determined to get it done by the end of the weekend), I’m excited to also to finish my other in progress projects and get to some new ones!

I’ve got a 6-Day Kid Blanket that I’m working on for myself. Look up Betty McKnit’s website for the free pattern. It’s pretty easy and fun to do. It can be resized to whatever size you want to make! There is also a Facebook group that just has people who make this blanket, and they’re all (including the creator of the pattern) willing to help out if you have questions along the way. It’s also a great place to get color way ideas. It’s where I first saw the yarn I ended up buying for mine. 

Once I’m finished with my 6-Day Kid Blanket, I might make some in baby blanket size to sell in my Etsy store. It has been long abandoned, though not forgotten, due to sheer lack of time to dedicate to it. That’s something I would like to have back underway by next year at the latest. I have plans for lots of new things to make and sell - new hats, shawls, blankets (baby-adult size, hopefully), hand warmers, and maybe other things yet to be imagined. Due to the aforementioned sheer lack of time, I’ll probably just make things and sell them as they’re finished rather than doing many made to order items. I’ve experienced how quickly those can pile up, and I just don’t have the time to dedicate to solely making 20 hats in one week to ship out. That time crunch was sometimes an enjoyable challenge (and other times a stressful one) pre-baby, but now I’m not interested in getting myself into that. I can pretty vividly imagine how that would end up. Yikes.

Fall Cooking and Planning to Use My Smoker for the First Time

I really want to start cooking more. Now that it’s fall, I want to use my crockpot and my smoker and make awesome soups and stews and meats and....oh my goodness. My mouth is watering so much right now.

Fun fact is that I’ve had my smoker for almost two years now, and I’ve still never used it. Things have calmed down somewhat in life recently, and I’ve been thinking about it more lately. I think I might try some baby back ribs to start. I found and saved a recipe on Bloglovin’ that looks easy and great. I’m really thinking I might look up some how to videos (about my specific smoker) to get started, buy some baby back ribs, and get to it this coming weekend. 

This is the recipe I found:

Easy Smoked Baby Back Ribs (The BEST Ribs!)

And that recipe referenced some suggested side recipes, and this one jumped out at me:

Homemade Baked Oven French Fries with Parmesan and HERBS 

We are big fry connoisseurs in this house, and these herbed oven baked fries jumped out at me as looking really tasty and easy to make. It’s something different. We love our tried and true fresh cut deep fried fries, especially smothered in Colby Jack cheese and bacon, but it’s nice to change it up once in a while!

For myself, I might also throw in some grilled Brussels sprouts or broccoli and cheese. Darryl won’t touch the green stuff, but I definitely will!

Social Media Cleanup

So I went through Facebook last week and unfollowed/followed a bunch of people. I’ve decided that with all the negativity on Facebook (conspiracy theorists, anti-maskers, and just people who just generally make inconsiderate statements), Facebook was becoming too much for me. I’d been considering deleting it altogether, but I didn’t want to because that’s how I keep up with a lot of my family and friends and how I keep all of them updated on Kam, especially since a lot of them haven’t even been able to meet him yet (thanks TOF and COVID).

I’ve been emotionally struggling as it is lately and trying to navigate this crazy world and make the safest, best decisions for us and Kam is hard enough without seeing all that crap and feeling like it’s pointed directly at me. And before you say something along the lines of, “Well I’m entitled to my opinion and it has nothing to do with you!” - yes. Yes it does have something to do with me, because our household is one that has a tiny person who IS high risk and you’re effectively telling us to go screw ourselves and saying we don’t matter when you say, “For most people it’s not that bad, and all these measures are overkill and unnecessary.” Or, “If you’re that worried about it, just stay home and let the rest of us live our lives.”

I could go on and on, but I won’t. I don’t want to dwell on it more than I need to anymore. I started this whole journey, before Kam was even born, with the thought that it doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks. I’m going to do what’s best for us no matter what. And I still feel that way, but when it feels like negativity coming in from all sides, it gets really freaking hard not to care and not to let it get to me. And the majority of people who actually matter in my life understand, but even that is hard to hold onto when there’s so much other crap being said by so many other people. 

So I did some social media cleaning. I don’t need to see just people with the same opinion as me, but I do need to see people who are respectful if they have differing views. So anyone who doesn’t fall into those categories on social media was unfollowed. I made sure I was following people I really want to see and enjoy seeing updates from - people who make me feel positive, not sad. And in the several days since I did that, I’ve started to enjoy Facebook again. It doesn’t get rid of the actual events happening in the world. I can’t turn that off, and as long as it’s happening, I don’t feel like anyone should try because we all need to deal with it. But I feel much better about the kind of things I’m seeing from people there now. Instead of people blowing up about politics and COVID and BLM and spreading misinformation, I’m seeing more thoughtful posts about all of the above and more overall positive things about everyday life. Nothing has to be comfortable, but I do want to see thoughtful and considerate and inclusive things. And I think I might have my news feed going in that direction now. 

It might seem trivial, but so far I think it’s helpful for my own mental/emotional health in this crazy world we live in right now.

The Perfect Evening

This is from last Wednesday. I’ve been trying to write more often, both to work through stuff that stresses me out and also to remind myself of the really good moments and capture them to read back on later. I’m really glad I wrote this evening down. It was just a regular evening, but everything just seemed to fall in place, and it was fun. I didn’t feel super stressed out, which is what I really needed, because it had otherwise been a really stressful day before I got home. 

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Last night, little man fell asleep with me on the couch, and it was the best feeling in the world. Prior to that, we played outside for a long time before dinner and inside playtime and bathtime. Outside, Kam ran around the porch in his walker and watched me water plants and grill our pork loin for dinner, and then he had his bottle out there while we waited for the pork to finish cooking. Once we went back inside, we were all ready to chill out for a little bit. I could tell Kam was content. His belly was full for the moment, and when I put him in his pack n play so I could finish dinner, he didn’t scramble back up wanting back out; he just picked up his lovey and started quietly studying it. He likes playing with tags, so he was turning it over and moving the tag back and forth and just generally looking it over, it seemed. I love watching him study and figure out things.

After his bath, we played on the couch for a little bit, and then he eventually settled in with me when he heard “The Greatest Show” being played on my phone. He was super interested in that (he’s always loved that soundtrack), so I pulled up the final scene of the movie, which started with the reprisal of “The Greatest Show”, and he laid down with me and watched it. By the end he was completely still, and when I got a look at his face, I realized he’d fallen asleep. We laid on the couch like that for about an hour before I woke him up to take his vitamin and have his last bottle of the night.

I live for evenings like this. We were all happy, not stressed, things went smoothly and we got all of our main important things done, including some things outside that needed done but really felt more like play/therapy than work. I didn’t do everything I had planned to do, but I always over plan things into my evenings anyway, and I do know that. Still need to bathe Tank and clean the hamster cages and put clothes away, but I kept the house clean, made a good dinner, and I spent quality time with Kam and Darryl and didn’t feel overly pressured to do too many things at once. I didn’t feel like I was failing.