Vacation Summary

I'm posting all my material in stages, as time permits. First of all, as for the vacation: we had a lot of fun as usual. This time, David slept in the downstairs bedroom with his cousins the whole 4 nights we were in Cape May - and that represents the first time he has ever slept with anyone other than himself. He had a blast 3 of the 4 nights - on night 2, he woke up around 3AM kind of upset, and came up to stay with us. Which was OK since we had a king bed. The last two nights his cousin Caitlin (who is closest to his own age - 5 months older) stayed with them, too, which marked a similar milestone for her as well. Nice.

The fireworks were somewhat of a dud due to fog, but we made up for it with other activities. David spent 2 days at the beach, and the second day we got him into the water just a little bit. And then I put him up on my arm to carry out into the waves some distance. He thought it was cool until one nailed him in the head without warning, and then I had to take the crying boy back to shore. But he was wading again by the time we were ready to head back. And we also went to the Cape May County Zoo with him one afternoon (which, by the way, is a very good zoo), and he really liked it. Seeing a tiger close-up was very impressive.

Driving back in midweek was remarkably easy, which almost made up for the hellish drive down that Saturday. I hate the Garden State Parkway. With a passion. The drive down took nearly six hours, compared with just under 4 hours on the way back. And had I not detoured through Staten Island on the way down, it most likely would have been even longer.

If we go back next year, it will not be July 4th weekend anymore. Everybody agreed with that conclusion.