Not only is Wes done with school (except for the pesky math and reading his “strict” mother makes him do), but now he can do his favorite things. And while you might think that, since he is wearing the same clothes, these are taken the same day, you would wrong. He rarely changes out of these lounge jammies.
He finally got to have his BFF for a sleepover before she joined us on a Me & 3 4 camping adventure. Summer.Sound asleep until 10am, snuggling with himself when big sister gets up earlier. Summer.Eating a ham-cheese-mustard sandwich while hoverboarding through the neighborhood on a sunny day? Summer
Kyla started doing her puzzles when school ended and didn’t stop until every puzzle in the house was completed and covering the dining room. Then I promptly ordered her a few 3D puzzles and a 2,000 piece puzzle.
To go camping often! Bring along friends, mine and the kids.
To read my brains out–particularly nonfiction feminist and anti-racial books, writing up my notes.
To see at least one national park.
Go through all Algebra II book.
Complete clock hours for STEM/ teaching certificate.
Play on the beach!
Finishing painting and staining the deck and roof line.
Heave both side yard projects completed by end of August.
Clean and organize garage (because if I didn’t get it down during 4 months of quarantine, then I’ll definitely get around to it this summer).
Eat veggies we’ve grown.
Get down to x pounds, by walking and eating healthy.
Connect with couple-friends.
Visit Dan and Deborah.
Kyla’s Thoughtful Goalsas written in the third person (edited for b/d reversals):
This summer, Kyla wants to ride her bike, feel the wind through her hair, and her muscles continually pulling. A summer trip to Cannon Beach. To clamber on rocks and splash in the waves. Get a donut sometime.
Kyla plans on seeing her friends. Maybe for a move or walk. Go adventuring, swimming, exploring. When all is done have sun-kissed skin to show the fun.
On a more academic note, Kyla wants to make sausages and practice Spanish. Listen to lots of books, and I mean lots.
How Wesley Will Spend His Summer
Get to Wave 100 in Balloons TD6. (If this makes sense to you, you have wasted your life.)
Play with Abigail.
Have a sleepover with Abigail.
Get laser tag as a summer surprise.
Go to Oregon in the RV.
[Mother’s Note: All but the sleepover were pretty much accomplished by Day 4 of Summer Break. Well played, Son.]
I’m about to embark on a new blogging platform that gives me more control of the basics– font size being primary. This platform is driving me mad. Let’s see if we come out of this on the other side intact, shall we? (These are the 5 font sizes I get: smallest, small, normal, large, largest.) I need “normal” to be more, well, normal.
The best thing I’ve ever done for my kids is to have this man (allegedly) father them.
We had to pack up from our Oregon campsite, but we only headed to Chehalis (sort of the midpoint) and doing one more night at our first Thousand Trails park, making use of the “free” membership with the purchase of an RV.
Like KOA, the Thousand Trails have some non-camping features that kids love: mini-golf, pools, country stores. However, this summer, none of those are open. Wes found a golf ball in the bushes, and Piper found a stick, and together they played all 18 (18!! Overkill, anyone?) holes in a hilarious gift to Papa: Play happily together for an hour.
Kyla loved the castle with fierce dragons!
Speaking of facilities that aren’t open…
This guy guards the pool.
Sigh. So empty.
The tablets were still at home, and both girls found themselves engrossed in reading, while Wes found himself engrossed in snuggling with on Kyla after a family bike ride. Typical. 🙄
Our site was close to a view of the valley. We made our taco dinner and ate dinner on the benches up here.
Dwayne and I felt even more justified with the No Tablet rule when Wes could barely be entreated to eat his favorite dinner because he was too busy bringing gravel to the rooftop of the play structure. He had such a great afternoon of solitary play.
Piper was pleased for the warm gravel for another reason.
Happy Father’s Day, Babe! It’s a pleasure parenting with you.
For Fathers Day weekend, we were able to plan a family camping trip. My parents have a camper, Keith’s family has a motorhome (which our covetous of partially our own purchase), and Brian’s family have a 2-year-old. The 2-year-old is the antithesis of a camping weekend, so we camped just across the Oregon border at Hudson-Parcher, and Brian and Sandi and girls spent all Saturday with us. It was such a good weekend!
Dwayne had the brilliant idea of making the tablets stay home. Kyla and Wes were cheerful enough about it, but….
… Piper pouted the entire 4 hour drive. And I caught her in the back using her blasted FLIP PHONE to watch youtube videos. Trust me, Dwayne and I were shocked her phone was capable of that, going south on I-5, to boot.
Piper cheered up significantly when her youngest cousins showed up.
\
Jarrod did some heavy lifting this weekend, pushing the kids on the merry-go-round and hours underdogging the hammocks.
The hammocks were a big hit, but I’m too embarrassed about the damage done to the trees to show evidence. We will use hammocks for contemplative reading in the future, not war games.
I don’t know what these two discussed, but I’m guessing Brian ended up compromising to this cutie.
Here is the elusive Parker, who rarely slows down enough when he and Wes are together that we can get a picture of him. The power of s’mores!
This is the first time the kids (and Dwayne, it turns out!) got to travel in the Unnamed Beast. It is exactly what they love about motorhomes, sitting in a moving living room. Being a newb, I let them go into the convenience store themselves when we stopped for gas, and I let them bring their tablets. So they basically ate candy (I found out how much later when we arrived at our destination) and played video games in their moving living room.
We liked the location of our Leavenworth park–it was less than a mile from town, and Dwayne and I discovered some new neighborhoods to walk around before we fortuitously stumbled across the Icicle Irrigation Creek trail.
We spent the rest of the weekend camping and adventuring–and working on the broken motorhome, exactly as we’d be cautioned by….everyone.
Downtown Leavenworth was even more enjoyable than usual, with slightly fewer crowds and the main streets blocked off to cars. Restaurants were doing take out, and the Gingerbread Factory was still selling cookies, so we survived.
Yep, Baby Sam Doll is riding the goat. He goes where Piper and BFF go.
I always think I love downtown Leavenworth best, but really, I try to spend most of my time on the trails along the river. We walked in both Saturday and Sunday, returning to a “secret” place with a rope swing over the water.
Those familiar with the maternal genes will not be surprised how quickly Kyla fell in and got drenched.
I read that Starbursts are THE new s’mores. My review? There really is no need to look beyond the regular s’mores…particularly with dark chocolate or Thin Mints.
And the RV repair? Either we brought it home this way, or the connection was so tenuous that regular road bumps shook it loose, but when we showered Friday night, the drainpipe was not connected to the shower drain. Fortunately (?), we were unlevel enough that the water ran out toward the front door, so we quickly discovered we had a major water leak somewhere. Dwayne wormed his hand back through the spaces, and discovered the gap:
We were unable to reattach it ourselves, but we have an appointment to have it fixed (under warranty) before our next outing. I was able to easily reattach the pantry door that fell off, and minimalize the water damage, so we’ll get the hang of it eventually.
Overall: I love it. Even the first trip, when I had just hours to go from bare shelves to outfitting it with everything we might ever need (from tools and power converters to TP and dish soap) while still packing all the usual camping gear…well, it may have been a bit too much to do single-handedly. But the kids loved it, I slept well, we ate well, and mostly, it was an easy camping experience.
In a fit of madness and enthusiasm, we bought an RV! Dwayne, kindly, graciously, capitulated to my desire to have a motorhome. And today, we picked her up and brought her home. Her name was only “Baby” until we got her into the driveway. Now she’s missing a first name, but I’m pretty sure her middle initial is “T” for “Trouble”.
We got the red carpet treatment as we got our 2-hour tour and boot camp on our 31′ 2018 Entegra Odyssey.
I decided to take point on driving, as the two times we’ve rented Class C’s in the past, I never drove it more than a foot, and part of having this beast is so I can go camping during the week with the kids (and your kids, too, so you can have a break).
This time, I drove Baby all the way home from Fife, singing “On the road again!” at the top of my lungs. (I was alone.)
This is a temporary solution, but we can park Dwayne’s car in front so we have at least one driveable car, while mine is blocked in the garage. Good thing there’s a pandemic going on and we don’t go out too much….
“Does this driveway make my butt look big?”
Yes, yes it does. We had hoped to have already started on updating the driveway and installing a pad in the side yard, but we’re on Busy Contractor Time. Which means…by end of summer? And at twice the cost? Perhaps. But we are going to have the Most Adventurous Summer regardless!
Wes needs academic breaks that are full-body, and ideally, ripe with opportunity to damage himself or property. So he took what was meant to be a target practice dummy and decided to replace throwing balls with throwing his body. After 10 years, it takes a lot more than this to impress Mama. Jumping jacks on his hoverboard almost did it.