Ethan:
I’ll leave the big news of the day for
Ehlana to write about. She might be
awake half the night thinking about that anyway!
We had a fun start to our day with Cassie
and Michael back for Tai Chi and breakfast.
Trading stories about what we’d all been doing over the past two days
kept us entertained, but the Ehlana and I were set free to go and play with our
friends while Dad went to work and Mom and Cassie worked on chores and the family
business at home. Michael went home to
do some work too before heading to the Inn, but while everyone else was
working; Ehlana and I had fun biking, playing at the park, and swimming in the
river because it was another hot day. We
came home in time for Ehlana to get ready for her birthday party – Happy 8th
Birthday, Samantha! – and then we had lunch before Mom took Ehlana, Naomi, and
four of the other ‘town girls’ out to Samantha’s farm.
While Ehlana was busy with the birthday
party fun, Cassie went back to work on her family business job in the office;
Mom took care of her grocery and supplies shopping run; and I went out to play
again with Aiden and the other guys.
That kept me busy until dinnertime; Mom and Cassie had dinner-for-four
ready by the time Dad and I got home; and then we had time to enjoy that meal
and clean up before Mom and Dad needed to get to the ball park for their co-ed
game. They took me along; I went back to
biking and playing with Aiden and the other guys that were at the park again
tonight while they played that ballgame; and Cassie did the run out to the
Norton farms to get Ehlana, Naomi, and the other girls from Samantha’s party
because it was over by then – and they could get back here in time to help out
with the cheer squad for the Locusts.
That brings me around to another news story
that I can leave for Ehlana to write about, but that I thought was funny; and
could work out nicely for me too – though I’ll have to let you know how that
goes for me in a few weeks!
Mom, Dad, and the Locusts won their game
over the Exterminators; and then our parents actually decided to go out to
Sheldon’s Pub with their friends for a few hours! I know, it’s been a while since they’ve gone
out on a date; so we’re obviously a bit overdue for getting them to remember
that there is life beyond work and kids.
They had to hit the showers and get cleaned up after their ballgame
first, but while they did that; Cassie, Ehlana, and I got ready to watch a
movie in the lounge – and I was glad that Cassie wanted to do that with us instead
of doing something with her friends instead and sending us over to Uncle Adam
and Aunt Leanne’s along with the other kids being left there with
babysitters. Cassie and Ehlana took pity
on me and we watched an action movie with just a dash or ten of romantic
comedy; Michael caught the end of that movie with us after he was done at the
Inn; and then Ehlana and I headed for bed while Cassie and Michael cleaned up
and then went back up to the lounge to continue watching over us while waiting
for Mom and Dad to get home from the pub.
That’s my news of the day; I need to get to
sleep now so I’ll be ready for my ball game in the morning; and I’ll let Ehlana
have all of the fun telling you about the best stories of the day!
Ethan – out!
***
Ehlana:
Happy 8th Birthday, Samantha!
Okay, I’ll get to the birthday party report
in a bit; but I have to write about the best part of my day – and that just
happened a couple of hours ago!
Cassie’s offered her bedroom suite to me!
I’m not saying that this totally makes up
for being separated from our big sister for the next five years; but it is
really awesome! Ethan didn’t want to try
and get Cassie’s room instead of me, but then he loves me; is going to move up
to the third floor into the other room with the alcove view of the back yard;
and we’ll share the lounge. I’ll even
lend him my Jacuzzi now and then; though I don’t expect that he’ll use it all
that often.
Before I forget – thank-you, Cassie – I love
you!
Cassie made that offer as we started
watching our movie tonight after getting home from the park and Mom and Dad’s
ballgame. We do still have to get
approval from Mom and Dad, but we’ll get that at the speed of hugs and kisses –
and they’ll likely try teasing us about taking over Cassie’s rooms themselves
even though they already have a great bedroom suite too. This will also keep the four of us busy for a
week or two as well after Cassie’s moved away; so I’m sure that’s part of
Cassie’s plan – to keep us busy and distracted and keep us from missing her too
much.
We’ll still miss her a lot, but the plan is
going to work; and I’m okay with that – and getting my new room! ;^)
I’ll also guess that Naomi and our friends
will want to come over and hang out at our house even more-often from now on;
though I’ll have to keep you posted on that.
There will, obviously, be much more to come
on that over the next few weeks; but let’s get to the rest of the news of the
day.
Cassie and Michael got home late last night
– after midnight by the time they got to town; and then they still needed to
drop off the truck and trailer at Landry’s before taking Tim and Rowen home and
then coming back here. I loved hearing
their stories even though that’s also been an irreversible step toward their
transition to being freshman college students; and then Ethan and I went out to
play with our friends for the morning while everyone else was busy with work
and chores. We’ve had another hot,
beautiful day around here; had fun biking the trails, swimming in the river,
and the rest of the summertime fun that we love to have with our friends.
I needed to be home early-enough to get
cleaned up for Samantha’s party; we had lunch, and then Mom took Naomi, me, and
four other girls out to Samantha’s farm.
In this case, Naomi was really the guest that Samantha wanted at her
party the most; and I was invited along too because she knows that I’m Naomi’s
best friend while she’s Naomi’s best same-grade friend. We do hang out together during school breaks
and other times when we get together with our friends or Samantha can spend a
day with us in town; but that is different for most town-farm-kid relationships
– at least until we’re old-enough to at least go biking that far or have our
driver’s licenses. That point is only to
note that Samantha mostly had her same-grade friends with her for the party
today and I was one of the few exceptions – along with a couple of the farm
kids that are a year younger than Samantha and Naomi too.
I do love getting to go to parties on
farms; and Samantha’s family did a great job celebrating her special day with
everything from the games and water play fun to the barbeque dinner and the
usual birthday cake, treats, and gifts for Samantha. Life on the farm can’t stop in the summer for
birthday parties, so the work went on around us, but then there was some fun
with that too, since in addition to the games and play time; we had a short hay
ride and were even put to work for a while – though that was technically a race
with prizes too as we tried to work in teams and get bales of hay onto an
elevator and up into one of the barns.
No Magi Master powers were allowed in that
contest, but while Naomi and I could have won anyway; we made sure that
Samantha and her best ‘farm-kid’ friend won instead. I can tell you that if Dad had been a farmer
instead of a lawyer; I’d find a way to use my Magi talents to do all of that
work!
Moving along, we really did have a lot of
fun at Samantha’s party; and then it was time to head home again not long after
dinner – in part because the farm work goes on around here until dusk this time
of year; so everyone that works on Samantha’s family farms got back to that
after we finished with her birthday dinner.
Cassie picked us up; took the other four girls to their homes; and then
Naomi and I walked over to the park with Cassie after she parked Mom’s minivan
at our house first. We were there in
time for the start of the Locusts-Exterminators’ game; and that brings me to
the next fun story of the day – a plan by four of the Witch Falls Wasps players
to get rid of the Locusts’ junior cheerleaders so that we won’t be here for
their final ‘regular season’ game in three weeks.
Since Brianna, Faith, and I did help our
parents’ team to win tonight with help from Cassie, Naomi, and some of the
other girls; that does seem like a brilliant strategy, but then Violet and
Christina helped to cheer with us too; so they’re a bit inconsistent too. That plan, by the way, is to get Aunt Melissa
and Dawn to take Brianna, Faith, and me home with them for the weekend of that
game after going on the back-to-school shopping trip with us on that Friday
while Violet and Dillon have promised to go up to Woodvale on Sunday and bring
us home again – presumably after winning that ball game and wrapping up first
place and the home team advantage for the championship game on the Labor Day
weekend. We think it’s brilliant because
we’d love to spend the weekend in Woodvale – especially since we haven’t gotten
to see Dawn very much at all this year while she’s busy with her summer job at
the airport that also allows her to help pay for the flying lessons and flight
time that will help with making her dream of being a pilot flying the big
commercial jets a reality.
While that was fun, we had fun watching the
game and cheering for our team. Ethan,
Aiden, and some of the guys checked in on the game now and then, but Zack was
more-interested in biking or playing at the playground; and Ethan and Aiden
helped out with taking care of him, Eli, and some of the other younger boys. We went home with our respective parents
after that; Mom and Dad got ready for their date at Sheldon’s with their
friends; and I’ve already covered the top news from our movie-watching fun with
Cassie. Michael caught the end of that
movie with us; he and Cassie are cuddling in the lounge and possibly not
watching another show while they wait up for Mom and Dad to get home; and I may
need to do some research or something for a while after I wrap this up before I’ll
be ready to sleep.
I do love this bedroom too, but Cassie’s
bedroom is amazing – and it’s going to be mine in another week – or two; since
we do need to do a bit of work with moving her things out and mine into it
first. That’s something that I’ll keep
you posted on too, but I guess that is all of the news for tonight; so I’ll
wrap this up and move on to something a bit more-productive while waiting to be
ready to sleep. This has turned out to
be a surprisingly-amazing day, so thank-you again to Cassie – and to everyone
else who helped to make this one of those remember-forever kind of days!
This is Ehlana Proctor; coming to you live
from what is now my past!
