Ethan and Ehlana:
Happy 6th Anniversary, Cassie and Michael!
Happy 1st Anniversary, Rowen and Tim!
Our sister, brother-in-law, and their friends had an amazing last day in Portugal while celebrating their special days with a hike in the morning; quality beach and sea time all afternoon; and fine dining for dinner before wrapping up their celebrations with some dancing before returning to their hotel to get some sleep before they head out for home or other destinations tomorrow. Rowen and Tim will be the only homeward-bound couple, while Cassie and Michael will be in Italy by the time we wake up in the morning; and Madelana and Stefan are moving on to week two of their honeymoon without the close friends’ baggage! That sounds like the opposite of what Cassie and Michael did for their honeymoon when meeting up with us for their second week, but we’re also fairly-sure that the newlyweds had a much different experience compared to a week with parents and younger siblings!
Moving along to our news of the day, we had fun last night with Naomi, Aiden, and the Malloys through dinner and an evening that included a canoe ride, swim, and a family-friendly movie before the Malloys headed back to their cottage. The co-ed teen cuddling and movie time was a highlight of our day along with the co-ed nap time that followed; and we stayed up a bit later than we should have when we had a busy day booked for today. We still got up early for Tai Chi by the river; breakfast was quick and easy; and then church and Sunday school included some work getting ready for the holiday weekend teen service. Ehlana, Aiden, Sophia, and I will officially be joining the teen praise team now; though we’re not sure how much time we’ll be able to dedicate to the group with everything else we have on the schedule for the coming school year. We love music, but our work at the lab and archives is really important; and we are definitely going to have time issues during our high school and college years.
The entertainment highlight of our day started after church. We got everything ready to go; about half of our group hopped on bikes for the ride to Quarry Lake; and everyone else drove out to our favorite campground for a play afternoon. It was really hot today with a triple-digit high and lots of sunshine – which was why the younger kids were not allowed to bike with us; and we took lots of water and drinks along to stay hydrated. We also spent a lot of time swimming and playing on the water slides with only one rock wall climb and zip line ride – though that was mostly-due to the lack of openings for that activity on a day when the campground was packed and too-busy. For the record, I do not have a problem with staying close to Naomi whenever she’s in a swimsuit- or any other time, but that seemed necessary today when she was getting too much attention from a lot of the guys around the lakes and campground. While that was sometimes-scary when the guys were much older and creepy; let’s not even get into commenting on how many guys appreciated some of our favorite mothers a bit too-much too! Ehlana wants me to be less sexist and mention that some of our favorite fathers get that same kind of attention from the women around them, but that’s even stranger for sons to think about – even if Naomi thinks that’s funny because she really appreciates what she expects me to look like when we’re our parents’ ages.
We had a picnic lunch and played at the campground until around four or five o’clock – depending on when we needed to leave to bike or drive back to town; had time to unpack and get cleaned up; and then we headed to the Inn for the late buffet. That culinary highlight was mostly for the Malloys; since they’ll be heading home sometime tomorrow after Uncle Terry has a last meeting with the bridge construction managers. Ehlana, Naomi, Aiden, and I had that meal with Valerie, Marcus, Brianna, and Faith at our table; enjoyed the chat time that Brianna led most of the time; and then we came home for the night with just the usual side-trip to take Silkie for a walk and see Naomi and Aiden to their homes. Mom did a Magi lesson with us after that; we did some charity and family business work in the office until Dad had his work finished and ready for the morning; and then we headed up to the third floor for bath or Jacuzzi time even though we’d only had quick showers a handful of hours ago. My bath was quicker, so I had some music play time while waiting for Ehlana; and then we got to the usual nightly computer checks and twin chat fun.
One of the new top stories this weekend has been border clashes between Cambodia and Thailand – another example of leaders choosing fighting over diplomacy. There is news today of peace talks for this latest little conflict, and we’ll hope for the best, but we’re also concerned by the spread of military actions to new regions that have been quieter for years or decades. It’s sad to know that there are few places in the entire world that can claim peaceful times for more than a couple of decades – and that is only true for our country because we take our fights out into the rest of the world and haven’t had any wars on our own soil since the world wars.
Instead of getting into commentary on the still-awful situations in the Middle East and Ukraine; we want to mention the conflicts that are ongoing in Africa. For example, Sudan has been turned into yet another failed State thanks to outside forces, and one of the latest attacks in that country was on water infrastructure that could put millions of people at risk of basic, clean water thanks to the fighting between the factions trying to gain control over the country. By the time that is decided; there might not be anything left of the country to rule over, but then most of those terrible men only care about the resources and the money they can make selling them to their respective funding masters. There are many other countries in Africa with the same problems if in different ways; with most of the fighting over control of natural resources. It is always the ‘normal’ people that suffer; and we wish that we could do more to help them – though we’ll never be able to do that as long as there are evil people in the world.
Ehlana just suggested that maybe we could help everyone, but while it is funny to think about changing all of the most-valuable natural resources into useless commodities with transmutations; we do know that even if we could do that worldwide; it would cause more problems than it would solve. It is a safe bet that most of our fellow humans would not be happy with us if there was suddenly no more oil – or any products that require rare-earth minerals, metals, or other base ingredients for pretty much every product we use every day.
It appears that we’re both getting tired, since that train of thought is getting a bit silly; so let’s wrap this up and call it a day. The coming week is going to be busy as we transition from July to August, but we’ll keep you posted on the daily news; and don’t want to think about our summer being more than half-over too. Ehlana and I want to get a lot of work done this week at the lab or archives, but we’ll see how that goes when all of the nice weather is such a draw – and not just for the Naomi-in-a-swimsuit time for me! ;^)
That is a happy thought for me to head off to dreamland with; so that’s all for this report – and I’m sure that Ehlana can manage her own happy dreams too.
Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!
