July - The Large Gulp of Summer

Summer days. Summer daze. It's all the same. We've had a lovely July. One part was a Klassen reunion at Deer Valley Meadows in Alberta. That was Pat's moms siblings and all the descendants.  Or I should say, almost all. That was great!


And then we came home to Bible School for Wyatt in the evenings, in which he consumed copious amounts of chocolate milk and cookies and proceeded to do his sleepwalking/peeing-in-the-corners thing. I think he enjoyed his classmates and teacher as well.


Also, we hosted a school reunion for Pat's classmates in Swanson. We laughed and listened while the classmates remembered numerous events. The classmates even had a volleyball game, just them, with their teacher. It was great to watch! They truly had so much fun together. The group singing Sunday afternoon was the cherry on top of the sundae, including the tears and emotions.


We've had delightful visits around the campfire, installed lights around the trees, mowed the yard and weeded garden, eaten green beans and canned and blanched the rest. We've held baby frogs and watched our mama cat swell to rather uncomfortable-looking proportions and watched the papa cat catch mice. We've walked the road on warm dusty afternoons and paid shop bills and gone swimming down at the river. We've petted baby coons at the neighbours farm, laughed at ground squirrels eating lime & black pepper chips with all the paw-licking after and eaten s'mores made over candles on the kitchen cupboards with friends. We spent days planning our annual camping trip to the northlands only to cancel out last minute because of the ugly forecast. We've read books and picked up toys and vacuumed dirt and listened to birds singing through the open windows early in the morning. We've even spent hours (Pat & I) side by side, in the middle of the night, vacuuming flood waters in the basement. We've stood together on our covered porch, watching the lightning and listening to the thunder crash and admiring God's greatness.


The best days.


These are the best days ever.


The ordinary work days and long summer play days and go 'til we drop days.


Sometime soon, I'm going to have to put on a new hat; a school board wife hat. I'm not sure how that is going to coincide with the Villa board wife hat. I've had a few moments of anxiety trying not to think about it. All the cleaning days in August and September. And the meetings. And the stuff....


And this doesn't remotely cover the work topic. We laid off our one last guy in June and just last week got a redeeming order. The prayed for work. We all have our times of drought, I know. We are so grateful for so many blessings that don't involve money.


I have this beautiful thingy that says: There is no way to happiness. Happiness is the way. That sums it up. So with these few thoughts...!

Happy July

Just for laughs! Does this even look like us?

I'm sitting in my pyjamas in my living-room with a Caramel Drizzle coffee and two cream. Wyatt is roaming and singing. It's still raining, a continuation of yesterday and it's wet, wet, wet; a good thing for our dear land.

My mom and Grandma Eidse left early this morning. They stopped for a full day on their way to Richard & Vicky's wedding and a full day on their way back. We are truly blessed. I don't think many children get to know their Great-Grandparents in that way! Also, Uncle Arvid & Aunt Linda stopped for Sunday lunch and night. Last week Bill & Penny, Kajsa and Ster stopped for a couple days. And Clint & Chels did as well. We've been blessed-blessed with company! And we love it! And just to clarify, Bren and I have split company for nights and we've spent lots of days and meals together.

Abigail's Hotel in Victoria

Yesterday was Shani's 14th birthday and Zach's 11th birthday and last Friday was Jenae's 12th birthday so yesterday we had a big ol' birthday party for all three of them!

Also, this month we celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary! Rennie's kept our boys (we traded earlier when they went for their 15th) and we flew off to Vancouver for a couple of lovely days. We had a wonderful relaxed time. One highlight for me was getting our caricatures done down at the water-front in Victoria. Les Bignold (my grade 7 teacher) had just passed away and this artist that drew us reminded me so much of Les. It was therapeutic. We also took the ferry across to Victoria, spent time at the Butchart Gardens, ate lovely food, went for ice-cream, had beautiful hotel rooms and drove along the coast. It was awesome! Refreshing, rejuvenating, inspiring, relaxing.

And! Zach got the go-ahead from the plastic surgeon last Tuesday that he is good to go with his back! Then on Thursday he got his cast off and he is truly healed! He's still limping a bit, the doctor said he would, but that day Mom bought an ice-cream cake in celebration and we all celebrated together; Bill's, Rennie's, Mom, Grandma Eidse and us.

I'm not sure what all else we've done in the last couple of weeks. The boys went to bible school (and I wasn't one bit involved); I've spent a few days at the shop (Cobra year-end); we went to Shane's for a picnic supper one night with Lance & Lana and Margaret Fehr; we went to Saskatoon for a picnic with Jays, Arley's and Rennies.

The Sunken Garden at the Butchart Gardens

And summer flies by... I'm looking forward to school starting again, believe it or not. Not the busing part or early mornings, but the schedule. One more month of holidays. School starts on September 3rd.

Have a wonderful day!