A Sandbox with a Past

I thought about apologizing for the amount of pictures in my blog today, but I decided against it because there is a lot of history in today's blog.The picture above shows my grandparent's camp. This picture was taken in about the year 1966. It shows my sister Sue wading in the same spot that I and 8 of my ten children also waded over the next 40 years. My grandfather named his camp the "Shadywood". A very fitting name for a camp in the heart of the Adirondack mountains.

For as long as I was alive we had this rowboat up at camp. My Grandmother G enjoyed rowing, as did every grandchild that came along. The picture of my grandma was taken in about 1961, she was born in 1909. She has been gone for 11 years.

All of us kids have rowed this boat between the camp next door and our dock. I'm sure the miles had reached up into the hundreds. Above, I am giving my brother Bob a ride. The year was 1972.

The rowboat fell into disrepair and sat in the yard of camp for the last 10 years or so. I always said that I would love to have it as a sandbox for my children. (I have fond memories of a boat sandbox at our neighbors house when I was growing up.)

Well, this spring, I got my men busy. It wasn't a real big job, but it is certainly one of the jobs that I have appreciated the most.

Everyone had a hand at painting. I wanted the small children to have a big part of making the boat their own.

We have christened it the "Shadywood", in memory of Grandpa G. and the many great memories I have of our camp, and the many hours of memorable rowing on the channel.

Hopefully, the "Shadywood" has many more years of memories left in her.