Ethan and Ehlana:
Happy 1st 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!
