shaving cream wars

On Monday morning Maddy and I headed into the big city, Winnipeg, for a little reunion time.  

On the way I decided I was sick and tired of Harriet, so Maddy changed the GPS voice to a man’s.  That was when Pierce entered my life.

Unfortunately Pierce doesn’t have the strong, manly, rugged voice I was hoping for.  

Note: Later when we left for the west (and south), Eric met Pierce briefly.  They didn’t get along.  So we compromised and settled on Paulina - the Spanish-speaking friend.  Why not work on our Spanish while driving, right?

So, I got to see “my twin” Tracey after years of separation.  We worked at Cedarwood, a Youth for Christ camp near Winnipeg, for four summers together.  We didn’t get to meet her husband, but simply fell in love with her son.  I stop my beating heart, he’s going to be a lady killer.

Later we lunched with two friends from childhood.

Carolyn was one of my first friends ever in life (My first transgression that I can remember was with her.  I lied and told her I was taking ballet lessons and I showed her some of the moves I knew.  She called my bluff and asked by parents.) and Denise (fondly known as “Wiener, Wiener the Social Conviener”) and I became friends in junior high.

It is alway great to hang out with them at catch up.  The only problem is that it happens way to infrequently.

After a brief bit of shopping (books for Mia) we returned to Brent and Glenda’s in time for Shaving Cream Wars.

 This type of day brings Eric to his knees and sends him into night sweats.

Why do anything that is going to make a mess and will most definitely require cleaning?  Why would you do anything, no matter how fun, if it is going to require work afterwards?  In his mind, it is simply the thoughts and ideas of imbeciles.

Kim bought 10 bottles of shaving cream for a little war....one for each kid.

 Not much needs to be said for these pictures other than everyone and everything smelled like shaving cream for a good long time after.

 Maddy didn’t want to participate so after a while I decided that I should join, waiting until most of their shaving cream was all gone.

In true Carla-not-thinking style, I jumped out there only to immediately break the first rule of the war - no spraying in faces.  It wasn’t intentional... I got a little bumped, but I wasn’t not being very careful.

I’m a bad auntie as I got some s.c. (that’s cool people speak for “shaving cream”, kind of like “dope”, “phat” and that sort of thing) in my nephew’s eyes.

Sorry Jesse.

Glenda went to take pictures of the whole crew.  Mia seemed to think that I didn’t have enough shaving cream on me for the photo.

 I will say, regardless of Eric’s aversion to these activities, he will still help to clean up - he is usually the first to start and the last to finish cleaning.  That is quite possibly part of the reason he hates it so much - he knows he will spend a good amount of time being thorough.

 Bless him.

We had dinner at dad and Rose’s, along with Jodi and Jared and of course had to end with goodbyes.  It really is never fun to say goodbye to people you love.

back from the lake

Leaving the lake on Saturday (July 9 - a very important day:  birthdays of both my best friend and Mia’s) was a bit of an interesting time.

Only Kim, her kids and our family were left.  We did most of what we could the night before and finished up in the morning.... we had to out of the cabin by 9:00 (please note: while we do have kids, the three of us adults are all most definitely night people.... 9:00 is very early to have anything done!).

As we were loading up the car, the kids jumped in and immediately started fighting.  Now granted, they were tired.  They had a fun filled week with lots of activity, lots of sun, lots of family/cousin craziness and too many late nights.  But seriously.

Eric, after just having his hair cut (he could not wait until we got back to some clippers - he was going nutty.... I believe it is the first time since we’ve been together - getting close to 18 years that someone other than me has cut his hair), was looking, and apparently feeling, rather militant.

Nipping it in the bud, he verbally dragged the kids out of the car and had them run.

Back in the car.

More arguing.

Back out of the car.

Push-ups.

 (I was, at the time, trying desperately to subdue my laughter - particularly with having my sister there who was also laughing.  I finally clued into the kodak moment, but a little too late.

Back in the car.

Angels.

Sunday was off to church with mom.  Great message about the relevance of the old testament laws.  Then off to mom’s for a waffle lunch.   

Scrumpdiliumptious.

The evening back at Brent and Glenda’s, after dinner and having a relaxing evening, the topic of breakdancing surfaced.  Someone somehow managed to persuade Cade to do a demo.

It was quite fantastic.  I really should have video taped and loaded that on here.  Definitely something to do at a later date.

After that it was just a plain old dancefest - a rather unruly and mostly rhythmless one, but fun regardless.

flipped

Being reunited with California friends and cousins is a good thing.  But from all appearances, they all seem to have gone a little nutty.

They flipped their lids so to speak.... or at least flipped the things for their bottoms and put them on their tops.

 Cade seems to be going for the Spy Kids version of Captain Underpants.

 At lest they are having a good time....

 The next morning things definitely were flipping as well.

Blake made pancakes.

Apparently it is a frequent occurrence in this house, however, today was a little special.

They were chocolate chip colored pancakes.

 Note the excessive amount of chocolate chips.

Now for the flipping.

 Look at that focus.

Lucy got a pink one.

 The problem was that there was such a high ratio of chocolate chips to batter that no matter what color he made them, they were all brown.

I cut Carson's open...

 You can see some swirls of batter in there if you look really close.

Carson said to me when he started eating "Do you ever get that feeling when you like something so much you just don't want to eat it?".

I think it was just a little too much chocolate for him.

Lucy, however, pretty much cleaned her plate.

 I suggested to Blake that next time he just buy some chocolate bars and fry them.

at Bemidji - day five - forced floatilla

Our final day at the lake we had a forced flotilla.

No one but the female adults wanted to participate so it was a event under duress.  The kids ended up having a great.....    time of compaining.  Well, they had an okay time.  It wasn’t exactly what we hoped for - no “thanks for making us do something so super fun”.    They spent most of their time begging to switch modes of transportation.

Oh well, we tried.

 Cade did a great job paddling by himself.

 Kim headed up the canoe.

 I took a kayak.

 Glenda manned the paddle boat.

 Lucy jumped in a little way from shore and swam back.

 After all had retreated to the more enjoyable shores, Kim, Jesse and I continued to kayak for a while.  It was a highlight for me.  Lake kayaking is so peaceful and beautiful.  I love going through the rushes and lily pads, looking for turtles and seeing all the dragon flies busy flitting around.

It also gave Kim and I some good time to talk.   Wonderful to have that.

Later on some of us went swimming. 

 Some went critter dipping for minnows and beetles with Auntie Glenda. 

  I sat and read by the pool for a bit, enjoying a favorite childhood treat.  Lucy, being the generous gem that she is gave me her Double Lolly after I exclaimed that I hadn’t had one of those for a good 30 years.

Those things are so good, but be carefully not to lick it too much.  It can make for a sore tongue.

It was also rather enjoyable to watch Lucy and Riley pretend to be elephants as they ran around the pool.  

Then they were deer, mice, dogs and kitties, and any number of other animals.

 Eric also took them out later to catch crawdads, but without any luck.  When they bored of that, Cade took to his new plane, given to him by Jesse.  He worked for long time trying to get that thing to go, spinning the propeller around and around.  I think he had a few successful flights.

Brent, Glenda, Alex, Lauren and Maddy took off soon after to head back to Steinbach.  They had to pick Cole and Brooklyn up from camp the next morning (they left on Tuesday night).

We ended the night with a big screen movie - The Spy Next Door.  

That Jackie Chan’s got some moves.

at Bemidji - day four - hikes and marshmallows

Thursday was the last day for Grandpa and Grandma Rose as well as Uncle Chris and Auntie Jann.

That was sad.  I guess some people need to be responsible and earn a living...

Before they took off, we put in a little hike.

The hike was forced for Cade, who really wanted nothing to do with it.  In fact, he wanted nothing to do with anything that morning.  

Being the meany mommy that I am, I made him come with us (only a select few had the privilege of going).

Sometimes (rarely) I kick myself for bringing along my camera and having to haul it with me and protect it.  Other times, like this hike, I kick myself for not bringing it.  The rationale was that I didn’t know how difficult a hike it would be but I needed have worried.  It was a completely paved walk through beautiful woods, dappled sunlight, glorious smells and the cheerful twittering of birds.  I tried to put the frustration of not having my photo-capturing ability out of my mind so that I could enjoy what is one of life’s greatest pleasures - enjoying God’s amazing creation.

(Thankfully Glenda brought hers, so I got a picture or two from her).

Living near and being able to go to the jungle is fabulous.  We are privileged.  But I love love love the forests of my old stomping grounds.   Maples, birches, pines, wild grapes and berries.

Complete gorgeousness. 

After the hike, there was more pool swimming, bike riding and all that good stuff.  The highlight, though, was probably the marshmallow roasting in the evening.

Big marshmallows.

Here is one next to a standard size mallow.

I’m feeling like I might have to bring some of these treasures back to Ecuador.

Brent set up a perfect marshmallow roasting situation they way he stacked the wood.  You could stick the mallow sort of under/in between the logs and it would get roasted on all sides simultaneously.

Of course, you didn’t want to be the one roasting when the stack finally crumbled.

Boys, being boys, managed to turn the roasting event into a life saber fight of star wars proportions.

We would roast them, pull off the cooked part and then roast them again.  We could get about five or six roasts out of one mallow.

I was thinking that it would be pretty cool to roast one, pull off the outside and use it like a cup to serve a dessert in.  Might have to try that sometime.

Lucy got a little sticky and eventually turned it into a game.

It was only fun for her.

Riley enjoyed her ring pop from her scavenger hunt reward.

It was fun for all of us.

There is something rather endearing about a blue-lipped, The Joker-resembling five-year-old.

In between marshmallows, Alex and Maddy took a few dips in the pool.  They had spent a good deal of time during the week trying to convince anyone to throw them into the pool.  Who wants to throw someone into the pool when they want to be thrown in?

Finally, they threw themselves in.

Smart girls.

(or not)