Weekend Favorites

Beautiful Sunday! Actually, it was a really great weekend in general! We had company over on Friday and Saturday, thoroughly enjoyed it, and on Sunday we just relaxed and played, had a few adventures, and spent time together as a family.

First Adventure: Pigeon Rescue Attempt.

Guess who showed up yesterday?

He’s come back so many times, we were wondering if he had a wife stuck in there.

Sure enough, as we were playing in the backyard this afternoon, we heard this horrible, scratching, flailing sound in the roof. There is a poor bird stuck in there, struggling for life! Ben called the home builder, who gave him permission to open up the roof!

We’ve kept our eye on the opening, but no bird has appeared yet. We keep hearing it in the roof – worst sound ever. If you think nails on a chalkboard is bad, you should hear birds’ feet on the soffits. Ew.

Second Adventure: Family Bike Ride!

I have not been able to join my family for a bike ride since before Kaylia was born, and I LOVE biking, so this was an extremely significant day! My therapists have given me permission, which is a huge step for me. These weak birthing hips can ride again! (And maybe aren’t so weak anymore. Things seemed to go pretty well!)

Anika was my photographer for the momentous event. I think she’s showing some skills!

The rest of the day, we spent time outside, playing games, having snacks, reading books, and eating supper.

And then we had some Chocolate Avocado Pudding for a treat! This stuff is weird, and incredibly rich and delicious. Weird, because it makes no sense to me that you can put avocado, cocoa powder, almond milk, and honey into a food processor, and it becomes really delicious pudding…

What did you do with your beautiful weekend?

Weekend Favorites

How was your weekend, everybody?

We had a great one! It was relaxing, and the weather was so nice! I love being able to get outside together as a family.

One of Ben’s jobs each winter is to get the camp’s ice rink going, so he needed to work on that a bit yesterday.

Hope you were able to get your fill of fun and sunshine this weekend, as well!

I’ll see you on Wednesday – I’m reading a fantastic new book that I can’t wait to share!

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What Living at Camp Has Taught Me About the Great Outdoors

It’s kind of ironic that I’m writing this post right now, when we spent the day inside yesterday. Normally we don’t do that, but 36 degrees? It was too hot even for the beach. I didn’t want to toast my children to a crisp.

And really…. sometimes it’s nice to take a break from the beach. I love being down there, but I don’t want to get tired of it. So we stayed home for a change.

The wonderful thing about that is that it felt very strange to be inside on a beautiful, sunny day. It felt like a waste of sunshine. Since coming to camp, my attitude about being outside has changed a lot. At camp, we go outside. Even in winter, we go outside every day, no matter how cold it is.

At camp, we have learned to go to the lake when it’s hot, and to put on (many) more layers when it’s cold. And then regardless of the temperature, we go and have fun. (Except on days when it’s 36 degrees outside, apparently.)

Before moving to camp, my life was getting far too comfortable. I enjoyed being the perfect temperature, all the time. If I didn’t like the temperature outside, I stayed inside. When I was home with Anika after she was born, there were many days when I didn’t go outside at all. Now, that sounds really gross to me. Now I crave fresh air. It actually really bothers me every time I have to close the windows, and turn the air conditioner on, because then I can’t hear the noises of camp, or feel the breeze coming in, or lie in bed and listen to the loons out on the lake. I feel shut off from the outside, and I don’t like that.

I never used to be that way. I’m liking it. I like being surrounded by people who are choosing to have fun at camp, regardless of the weather. Winter has become fun. The more snow, the better. And summer is what we live for. Sunshine makes the biggest difference in our lives now. If we stay inside for too long, people start to think that something’s wrong – we must be sick if we’re not going outside.

I like that, too.

I like it that Kaylia asks to go outside first thing in the morning, when we’re still in our pajamas. I like it that we actually own clothing from MEC. I like to pretend that we’re getting all rugged and outdoorsy. We have a long way to go on that one. But we’re closer than we used to be!

 

Favorite Parts of the Weekend

We had a beautiful weekend! After the group left on Sunday and Ben was done working for the day, we had a great time relaxing and playing.

My two favorite parts? I went down the tube slide a couple of times because I wanted to, and I had to convince Anika to come along (That slide takes years off your age – if you want to feel like a kid again, come visit us and go down the tube slide!). And seeing Anika zooming around on skis was my other favorite thing! Oh, and the sunshine. Three favorite things.

I have the good feeling of being family-fun-filled and ready to tackle another week! Hope you do too!

Pictures From Our Weekend

Ben had to work on Saturday, but Sunday was a beautiful, sunny, relaxing day of enjoying family time.

Anika wanted to learn how to juggle, so we spent some time doing juggling practice with some toy eggs.

Kaylia spent some time getting into Anika’s dolls again. Although Anika is getting better at sharing, she still covers up her dolls on the couch with a blanket to hide them from Kaylia. As soon as Anika is out the door, Kaylia heads straight over to the couch, whips the blanket off, and digs her little hands into that pile of dolls.

Ben had to do some stuff in the chapel in the afternoon, so we all went along, and the girls had lots of fun playing on all the empty chairs.