Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - May 31, 2021

 

Ethan and Ehlana:

Our Memorial Day adventures have been very, very wet.  Tai Chi was indoors, but we got rained on during the entire parade and the ceremony at the cemetery; the usual annual story time for our families was cut short; and then the picnic was split between the school and church fellowship hall this year to allow for social distancing that was mostly for non-vaccinated visitors and guests.  A short break in the rain around noon had most of our guests packing up and loading their vehicles for the trips home; and then the lack of outdoor activities at the picnic had all of our guests choosing to head out early too.  We should also mention that the rain kept all family babies and toddlers at home instead of going to the parade and cemetery; and they had some grandparent or parent support.  That was true for pretty much all of our neighbors too; though the picnic was still attended by a fairly-large crowd.

None of that really sounds very exciting, but while there have been parts of our day that haven’t been as happy as we’d have liked; we have still had a pretty good day.  After our weekend guests left, we helped out with the clean-up at the school; followed that up with a quiet, easy-meal at home with Mom, Dad, and our favorite collegians; and then we had a work-study evening while Cassie, Michael, and May were with his family for a few hours.  They’ll be leaving tomorrow because Cassie needs to be back at school to get ready for her summer session, but we’ll try not to think about that until we have to say goodbye to them tomorrow.  We’ll also have more on May’s travel plans over the next few weeks too – though we can report that Michael will be giving her a ride to St. Louis so that she can start her summer adventures with Lee and his family.  We’ll miss having her here with us all summer, but now that pandemic restrictions are being lifted; we’re glad that May can do some sightseeing even if going home to China for the summer isn’t really a workable option when risks of being quarantined at either end of those trips could mess up being back here in time for her senior year.

That is pretty much all we have for tonight.  We studied for a few hours – some of that in a time phase – while Mom and Dad worked; we’ve just wrapped up bath or Jacuzzi time; and we’ll be doing a bedtime chat with Cassie, Michael, and May soon; since they’ve just gotten home for the night.  Life isn’t going to really slow down for us as we move into June tomorrow, since we’ll also be adding in a lot of baseball games now on top of the practices, but we’re also near to the end of our school year too; so we have a lot to look forward to as we begin the countdown to our summer holidays.  Stay tuned – or flip digital pages – for the latest on all of the fun we expect to be having in June, but it’s time for us to move on now; so, until next time...

...this is Ethan and Ehlana Proctor; live from the hidden home of the Magi of the Light – and May the Magi Force be with you!

Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - May 30, 2021

 

Ethan and Ehlana:

Happy 1^st Anniversary, Rebecca and Lucas!

We’re sure that Rebecca and Lucas are happy, but a holiday weekend for store owners doesn’t exactly work well with celebrating a special event.  Rebecca has worked a lot all weekend; was at the pizzeria until late last night; and will likely be there later than usual for a Sunday night tonight too.  Compared to that; we can be very happy with all of the play time we’ve been able to enjoy so far this weekend!

Our plans for a long, double or triple update won’t be working out for us because we’re tired and want to crash and nap soon, but let’s try to at least cover some of the highlights between Friday afternoon and now.  Our family and friends dinner and hang out time on Friday was great; we mixed work with fun as our weekend guests arrived; and should note the ongoing changes to our collective families instead of the details of the fun and games.

This holiday weekend definitely feels different to us because of the new parents that are all from our generation of the family, but our Rice family cousins have all grown up now too; Violet and Dillon will be joining that new parents’ club soon; and that only leaves Jaimie, Kaitlyn, and Jayden still with us in the group of younger cousins.  Yes, we also have the kids and teens from the Johnson clan, but that’s changing too as we add in those next-generation babies and toddlers.

While we’re thinking about the young-adult cousins, we should mention that Dawn is here this weekend along with her family, but she’s also spending a lot of time with Jillian because Dawn will be busy for the rest of the summer with a job that will get her some flying time as well as teach her a lot about the cargo side of commercial airlines.  With all of the travel restrictions during the pandemic, her career choice might not seem like a good one, but even if she might need to wait a while to fly the big passenger jets; the cargo transportation business is booming; and that could lead to a pilot shortage as people also begin to travel again over the next few years.  Before we move on from Dawn, we haven’t mentioned Jillian in our journals very often, but she is here for the summer with Julian; and she has an intern job at the lab.  Jillian and Julian are also getting married at the end of June, but that won’t be a major family event here because the wedding and reception will be in Woodvale.  We’ll have more on that during that last weekend in June, but it seems strange to know that Jillian will be moving here after school and becoming part of our community and family while Dawn plans of spending a lot of her life jet-setting around the world!

Moving along, we were up late on Friday night – including some movies and gaming fun in the lounge before we eventually crashed for the night.  We mentioned the trail ride yesterday afternoon, but our morning entertainment included a chilly Tai Chi workout by the river; a hot breakfast; and then a few chores that only took until mod-morning before we were set free to go biking and playing at the park with our cousins and some friends.  The ‘free’ time was followed by a big-family lunch that Mom and Dad hosted; the trail ride was one of the entertainment highlights of the weekend for us; and then we had the major barbeque dinner by late-afternoon before splitting up for the smaller-groups plans for the evening.

We were split up for that with Ehlana and Naomi at the girls-only event at the Carringtons and Aiden and me at the Ayres’ home with the guys, but while we all had fun with the gaming or movies-and-makeovers; Naomi initiated a plan that had us meeting up and then ‘crashing’ the young-couples evening that was being hosted at our house.  We earned a lot of laughs and got teased about it, but the co-ed cuddle-and-movie time was great; and we got away with a co-ed sofa sleepover in the lounge too!  We were still up too-late, though, and this update has already run on for longer than we wanted; so let’s move along again.

Tai Chi by the river was warmer this morning; we had a smaller gang for breakfast because Cassie, Michael, and May were with his family for that meal; and then we had to rush a bit to get everyone to church on time for the holiday weekend service.  The teens led the praise and worship; they kept the mood appropriately-solemn for the occasions; and Pastor John offered a message about remembering history while also being grateful and having hope for the future.  We had a snack lunch after getting home; and then our afternoon was split between playing and going to the second buffet sitting of the day at the Inn.  We didn’t get to have that meal with everyone in the family, but the earlier time this year had a lot to do with the newest additions to the families; and there was still a smaller group that went to dinner at the last buffet so that Uncle Adam’s parents and others had company.  Our play time this afternoon included canoeing, biking the trails, park playground adventures, and back yard games.  We’ve been having a comparatively-quiet evening, but have continued to have fun with some of our cousins while also sharing bath or Jacuzzi times along with the movies and gaming.

That pretty much brings us up to now.  We’re all winding down toward nap time – including the parents and our favorite collegians.  The forecast isn’t good for tomorrow; so we could be in for a very wet, strange Memorial Day.  We can write all about that tomorrow night, though, and we really are ready to crash now; so, until next time...

...this is Ethan and Ehlana Proctor; live from the hidden home of the Magi of the Light – and May the Magi Force be with you!

Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - May 29, 2021

 

Ethan and Ehlana:

We’re just back from our trail ride at the ranch, but are too-busy for a major report; so we’ll invite our future readers to flip a digital page or three to get the weekend news whenever we do get around to writing about it.  For now, we need to get cleaned up and ready for the major family dinner party and the play night that will be going on at a handful of houses tonight – including in some groups of girls, guys, couples, and possibly couples-with-next-gen-kids!  Stay tuned, since this has been an awesome weekend so far, but we really do need to move on again soon; so, until next time...

...this is Ethan and Ehlana Proctor; live from the hidden home of the Magi of the Light – and May the Magi Force be with you!

Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - May 28, 2021

 

Ethan and Ehlana:

We’ve had a cool weather day, but no rain; so we were able to have fun with the annual work day at school as we helped with getting everything ready for the holiday weekend.  For our class, that included cleaning up at the cemetery; planting flowers; and placing all of the flags.  There was more work to do than usual this year, so we started early; had a pizzeria pizza lunch break; and then we ended up finishing our work by shortly before three o’clock.  We’ve been home and helping Mom since then – in part because Naomi and Aiden were busy too, but now we’re taking a break to get cleaned up before meeting up with our besties and going over to the Carringtons for our family-and-friends dinner and play night.

This update is early because we expect to be too-busy for the rest of the night with all of the fun while also waiting for our incoming guests.  That also means that the best news stories of the day will need to wait for future updates, but you can flip digital pages in the future while reading this, and we need to move on now to living those adventures; so, until next time...

...this is Ethan and Ehlana Proctor; live from the hidden home of the Magi of the Light – and May the Magi Force be with you!

Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - May 27, 2021

 

Ethan and Ehlana:

Happy 4^th Anniversary, Violet and Dillon!

That’s our happy news of the day, but Mother Nature didn’t give our cousins nice weather for their special day – unless you’re a big fan of a lot of rain and thunderstorms.

We were able to begin our day with Tai Chi by the river because the rain didn’t begin falling until after we got to school, but all of the damp kept us from spending any time outdoors while at school; we stayed at home and dry between the end of school and dinnertime; and then we were at the Inn for Violet and Dillon’s anniversary dinner party and game night.  There wasn’t any lab or archives time today because Dillon was off for the day anyway and Uncle Adam was busy at the clinic instead, but Naomi and Aiden were with us; so we had a music practice and did our homework before going to the Inn.  As usual, we got teased about having dates for the little event, but we don’t mind; and at least one of us would be in much-bigger trouble for not asking Naomi to be my date for pretty much every opportunity we have with our family! ;^)

Moving along, the dinner was awesome, but we were also at the kids’ table; and didn’t have much to do with roasting the happy couple or the rest of their dinnertime fun.  Violet and Dillon got teased when they opted to skip game night, but we seriously doubt that anyone making jokes about that actually believed that Violet and Dillon had been married long-enough to have no better ideas about what they could do to celebrate without the help of their family and friends for the rest of the night.

We definitely don’t want to go there, so let’s wrap this up.  We had fun with game night; came home without our best friends; and wound down our evening with some studying or work in the archives while Cassie, Michael, and May were having another visit with Sierra and her parents – possibly while having a pizzeria pizza bedtime snack.  Mom did a short Magi lesson with us to go along with the studying, but she also used a time phase; so we’ll still get enough sleep tonight too.  Our favorite collegians will be home soon, so we’re going to finish this update; wait to have a bedtime chat with them; and then get started on our nap time.  The holiday weekend weather forecast is looking decent except for Monday so far, and we’re hoping to have an awesome few days with our family and friends; so stay tuned for all of that news while we get back to living those adventures.

This is Ethan and Ehlana Proctor; live from the hidden home of the Magi of the Light – and May the Magi Force be with you!