John Y’s Musings from the Middle: Father-Daughter Trips

Each year about this time my daughter and I take a father-daughter trip.

And this year is no exception.

We started with a bitterly cold weekend at Camp Piamingo for our first father -daughter weekend about 8 years ago. It was called Indian Summer, I think and was designed for dads and daughters. We gave oursleves the nicknames Papa Bear and Baby Bear and brought board games like Hooskerdu andCandyland. We slept on the floor of a cabin in below freezing tempretures as I kept an eye on a large spider that was either lazy, dead or frozen into the woodwork a few feet away.

The next year we went to Chicago to the American Girl Store and to see the Cheetah Girls in concert. Except I mistakenly bought Cheetah Girl tickets to a concert 2 hours from our hotel and didnt have a car. Maggie, my 9 year old and very wise daughter shrugged and suggested we just go to dinner, adding “This is supposed to be about bonding with each other anyway. Not about concerts.”

She just gets more awesome each year. And I look forward to bonding and seeing what she teaches me.

This weekend we decided to repeat last year’s NY weekend instead of repeating the original Camp Piamingo weekend.

And this year Momma Bear will be joining us.