A Little Break

My friend, Dani, and her husband, Chris, left us today. I tried talking them into staying a few extra days at our house so they could explore the Northwest a bit more, but they were anxious to keep movin’ on down the road. They picked up their dogs from the kennel, and they were off. I hate goodbyes. But we were leaving too, so it was understandable.




We rented a beach cottage for this week, on Camano Island, not far from where we live. Actually, we won it at an auction at our church, as it belongs to members of our congregation. They donate one week a year to raise money for whatever event needs it, and we were the lucky ones to win the bid. It’s a wonderfully safe place for kids to hang out because the water isn’t too deep when the tide is in, and it’s possible to walk for miles from shore when the tide is out. This is the third time we’ve stayed here so it feels a little like home away from home. Lucky us.



It took a few hours to get packed up and say our good-byes to Dani and Chris, so that took up the morning. We were at the beach by lunch and the boys immediately started building a raft. We brought hammer and nails. Last time we were here, Kaleb built a bonfire on top of a raft someone had already made. When the tide came in, it set the raft afloat and he and Kory went chasing after it in the canoe and roasted marshmallows from the boat. It was pretty funny. The boys wanted to do something similar, but it proved more challenging than they thought. They had a hard time keeping the fire away from the boat, so one of them had to hold the raft at a distance, while the other tried to work the paddles and roast the marshmallow. At least they worked as a team, and I’m pretty sure, had a little fun in the process.



Our friends, the Annemas, came out to have dinner with us later in the afternoon. This place is too nice to keep to ourselves. Kaleb is good friends with their son, Carter, and they haven’t seen each other much in months. We all took a leisurely walk on the beach, picking up beach treasures as we went. There is so much driftwood here, I’m hoping Kory makes something cool with some of it. He’s very visual and artistically gifted, so the possibilities are endless.



The three boys took the row boat out for a spin(see photo), but only Tobias knew how to row. It was a bit of a comedy routine, watching Kaleb and Carter try to coordinate the paddles. They finally gave up and let Tobias do all the work.



It looks like we are in for some good weather this week, so I’m looking forward to some family time where we aren’t all involved in our own projects and only see each other at dinnertime. Our life is so weird.



Tonight we watched “Jurassic Park,” a movie neither Kaleb nor Tobias had seen. Kaleb was not at all interested in watching it, but once the action got going, he was bouncing in his seat, and yelling at the people in the movie on what they should do next to escape the attack of the dinosaurs. He was so wound up afterwards, we had to play Monopoly just to get him to settle down and to take his mind off the action. It worked. He fell right to sleep, but since it was nearly midnight, I’m sure he would have slept no matter what.