Spring trip

Last weekend we took a trip east and visited with my parents. My sister came too (meaning that half this blog's readers were in attendance! Hi everyone!). This was one of those vacations that seemed like a good idea in January, when we bought the plane tickets--it's Easter! Obligations will be low! It will be spring! The Midwest is beautiful in spring!--and then the closer we got, the more misguided and downright reckless it seemed. The kids would have to miss two days of school--what was I thinking? M had a sudden onslaught of work-related obligations--why did I think that a vacation during the school year would even work? And then the weather was predicted to be rainy and miserable. As we headed to the airport in Thursday evening rush hour traffic, I was basically apologizing to everyone (note: the kids, after a brief moment of "what if they talk about something really important while I am gone?" panic, were not upset at all to miss school).

Neverthless, it was still spring: And the kids are finally old enough to purely enjoy the woods, without needing constant attendance and/or changes of clothes. They ran around for four days straight, in rain and cloudiness and even in the brief 20 minutes of actual watery sunlight we got on Easter day.

We visited the family compound of my childhood best friend, where Si got to swing on the old rope swing that flies out over this creek:

He also got to swim in that creek, in 50 degree weather, after he slammed into the concrete landing and lost his grip. Poor guy--but he recovered nicely and twenty minutes later was taking a lead role in the multifamily charades game (charades! --I was surprised at how fun it was, despite the slight overabundance of terms like "Resurrection" and "Good Friday." Our friends managed to mostly suppress their disapproval of our heathen ways).

The kids got to explore the woods every day, both with and without adults. I tried to instill in them an appreciation of the woodland wildflowers, which were out in force, but the kids were more interested in acorns, skeletons and mushrooms. I can live with that.

The mushrooms were spectacular, after all.

They also did a lot of frog and tadpole gathering--

(this guy is waiting with baited breath for the kids to GO HOME )

In the end, Si and Helen spent about fifty percent of their visit stalking the pond's wildlife. We actually bundled a slightly damp Helen straight from the pond into the car when it was time to go back to the airport.

In other words, it was pretty much a perfect visit. One which I wish we could make much more often.


Happy Monday!