Happy twelfth birthday, Vanessa!
The crossing over continues, and Vanessa joins the growing group of girls in our class to have their first girls and guys birthday party. Rowen and I were both good with missing out on that action; though I’m sure our more ‘advanced’ classmates all had fun.
While about two-thirds of our classmates were in party mode, Rowen and I had another play day with my cousins. We took Jaimie, Kaitlyn, and Kara on a canoeing and exploring picnic adventure while Mom, Violet, and Alicia entertained Ethan, Ehlana, Eddie, and Nicole. Our little excursion included paddling as near as allowed to the falls; a few hours of park exploring and playground time; two swims in the river to cool off; a picnic by the falls on the park side; and a paddle across the river for Emporium ice cream snacks before going home again.
Ethan, Ehlana, Eddie, and Nicole joined us for some back yard play time until we had to take a break for dinner, and we mostly floated around in the river or played games under the trees where we had some shade from the hot sun. As usual on a baseball night, we ate early, and then headed over to the park for the Arrows’ practice. The younger kids weren’t much interested in watching baseball, so Rowen and I took a fairly large group to the playground, including, Ethan, Ehlana, and Naomi. Grandma and Grandpa helped us with kid control after getting to the park too, and earned grandparents of the day award when they sponsored a trip to the Emporium for ice cream that wrapped up at about the same time as the Arrows’ practice.
Our original plan was for another night of camping, but the weather forecast is calling for thunderstorms overnight and tomorrow, so we’re doing a sleepover instead, and Eddie and Nicole are staying overnight too. Mom, Dad, Uncle Adam, and Aunt Leanne also had wanted to do at least one campfire for our cousins, and had planned that for their last night with us, but decided to move that to tonight too in case we actually do get all of the rain they’re forecasting. That worked out great for everyone, including the members of the Arrows team; since they all came over for the campfire too.
I didn’t expect to have the usual neighbor drop-ins for a weeknight campfire, but even though all of the adults had work in the morning, we ended up with a big group joining in for the fun, food, music, and scary stories. Bill and Sylvia Bassett brought their kids over; Rowen’s parents and brother arrived at about the same time; and the Stone family made an appearance after closing the Inn. Dad and Bill took care of the music; Aunt Leanne and Miranda were the primary storytellers this time; and we toasted marshmallows and made s’mores for our snacks.
The party started to break up by a bit after eleven, and while most of the guys pitched in for the cleanup, Rowen and I had lots of parental support for getting our sleepover buddies upstairs and ready for bed. Ehlana ended up having a sleepover too when Naomi was added to the guest list, and got to be the first to try out the other new bed in Ehlana’s room. Since this was officially a sleepover, we set up sleeping bags in the lounge, and had Kaitlyn, Kara, and Nicole on the sectional sofa while the rest of us, including Eddie, were on the floor. I put a movie on, but none of the younger kids lasted fifteen minutes into it before dropping off to sleep, and Jaimie fell asleep about half-way through.
Rowen and I have been chatting while I’ve done my usual nightly computing, but we’re both ready for some sleep now too, so I’m going to wrap this up and do that. Until tomorrow...
...this is Cassie Proctor, live from Witch Falls; signing off!
