I’m not doing a very good job with my
journal updates too often right now, but it’s been another very long day; and I
need to get some sleep while I can; so this will be shorter than it should be
too.
First up – Happy 14th Birthday,
Patrick!
I’m starting with that because his birthday
was the reason for why Rowen was going to be spending the night with me on
Saturday in the first place – because he was having his birthday party and a
sleepover with his friends; so Rowen was getting out of the way for the night
so he could do that. We found out that
Patrick, Jessica, and their friends switched plans last night and camped in the
back yard too – a decision that was made after they found out that we were
doing a camping night instead of the movie and sleepover plans that hadn’t
originally included Michael and Tim.
For us, after I finished my little bit of
computing last night, we finished setting up our little two-tent campsite; Dad
helped with the campfire; and then we had a few hours of campfire fun that
included the parents and quite a few neighbors joining us. Patrick, Jessica, and their gang stopped in
for a while too, but only stayed long-enough to raid the snacks and drinks;
sing a few songs; and listen to a scary story before heading back to their own
party. We started wrapping up the
campfire at eleven; Michael, Rowen, Tim, and I had our four junior campers
tucked in for the night by eleven-thirty; and then we had some wind down time
on the benches by the river that also gave Naomi the chance to sneak into the
boys’ tent and fall asleep while cuddling with Ethan in his sleeping bag. As usual, we took pictures; and then moved
Naomi back to her own sleeping bag.
Michael and I took the first turn at washroom breaks while getting ready
for bed; that gave us a chance for some privacy with the goodnight hugs and
kisses; and then we watched over the kids while Rowen and Tim did the same.
Rowen and I had a bit of girl chat time
once we were in our tent for the night; and then we went off to sleep. Our Sunday morning was fairly-crazy. We had to help out with breakfast, the
clean-up, and getting the kids ready for church. A stop at Rowen’s house was needed to wish
Patrick a happy birthday and give him the gifts they’d picked out for him; and
then Michael and I needed to get to the church a bit early because the teen
praise team was doing part of the music for the service – a pair of songs that
were promotional for the sunrise service.
The Palm Sunday service was very busy and long, but we needed that time
at Sunday school to finish up everything for the Easter Sunday services.
Because we were late getting out of Sunday
school, Michael, Rebecca, Jenny, and I all needed to hurry to the Inn to get
started on the lunch prep work. Michael
and I worked all day; which meant that we missed out on most of the nice
weather today. The temperature climbed
into the eighties again, but that didn’t keep us from being busy at the Inn
this time like it did on Saturday; so the lunch and buffet sittings had the
dining rooms nearly-full. We did go
biking on our afternoon break and had some park play time with my family; but
that feels like a blip in my day in hindsight as I’m writing this report. Among the buffet highlights was Patrick’s
birthday party at the late buffet, and since they were in my section for that;
I got to be around for some of that fun – and got to have a pretty nice tip
too! ;^)
This isn’t exactly a micro-update, and I
really do need to get some rest; so let’s move this along so I can do that.
We ended up working until ten-thirty by the
time we had the dining room set up for the breakfast shift and we could head
home. I stopped at Michael’s for a short
bedtime visit; we did our goodnight hugs and kisses on the front porch; and
then I came home and did my Magi lesson with Mom while Dad finished up his
homework in the office. The twins were
in bed already by then, so I stopped into their rooms for goodnight hugs and
kisses – and another pair of short bedtime chats. They’d both still been awake and doing some
like, doctoral-level reading; but they were mostly only doing that to be awake
to see me and they were both ready to go to sleep by the time I left and came
up to my room.
I’ve had a lot of work to do since climbing
into bed with Mandy and my computer. I
did as much as I could in a time phase, but had hours of work that needed to be
done in real time; which is why I’m pretty much wiped out now. Let’s not bore all of us with the details of
that work or studying. I’m getting a lot
accomplished, but there’s a lot of boring involved in those business and
language study details; and I don’t need the help to crash into nap mode.
We’re going to have a busy week heading
into Easter, and I need all of the town time I can get even though we only have
a four-day school week; so that’s all for tonight.
Until next time...
...May the Magi Force be with you!