Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - January 4, 2019

Ethan:

Our hotel didn’t have any public areas suitable for a Tai Chi workout, so we skipped that this morning; got ready for the day; and checked out of our hotel before heading to a nearby pancake house for breakfast.  We were there for nearly an hour thanks to me and the other guys needing to eat a lot after all of the exercise we had yesterday; and then we went shopping at the girls’ favorite mall for a couple of hours.  That trade-off might not seem fair for the guys, but that wasn’t for long-enough to have boredom set in; and we were able to keep entertained at the fun stores while the girls mostly played dress-up with Christmas spending money that went further thanks to big, after-Christmas sales.

I definitely don’t want to get into a shopping commentary; so I won’t.  We had fun; picked up fast food to go for lunch – and for Aunt Leanne, Zack, and Brianna; and then hit the road for home.  We got back by one-ish; had a few chores to do – including unloading the van and getting our bags back to our rooms; and we had a break near the start of that work for a chat with Mom, Aunt Leanne, Zack, and Brianna while three of them enjoyed their warmed-up fast food.  We made some decisions about what to do for the rest o the day then too; which is why this update is being written at Aiden’s house.  I’m doing a sleepover here because Ehlana and Naomi decided that they needed to spend some time with Naomi’s parents; they’re having a sleepover there; and Cassie invited Brianna to have a sleepover with her while Eli’s spending the night at Zack’s house.

Once that was decided, we got our chores done; some of us went out to play with our friends for the afternoon; and then Ehlana went home with Naomi; Aiden and I stayed to have supper with Mom, Dad, Cassie, Michael, May, and Brianna; and then we went home with Aiden’s parents after they closed the baker for the night.  We didn’t do a family and friends dinner and a movie night this week, but that was because the parents didn’t want to book another family night after two busy holiday weekends.

Aiden and I hare hanging out on our own now, but we spent some time with his family first; and now we’re the last two standing – or sitting – because his Dad always needs to go to bed early when he has to start work at the bakery so early each morning they’re open.  As long as we’re quiet, they don’t mind when we stay up later and play video games, but we won’t be doing that for much longer because Aiden and I are tired after two long play days.

This has been another good day – if not quite as exciting as yesterday, and while we don’t have any major fun plans for the weekend; I’ll be okay with it if we get to spend a lot of time with Cassie and Michael before we have to get back to school on Monday.  I’ll let you know how that goes for us, but that’s all for now; and I have some gaming to get back to before Aiden and I crash for the night – and I’m not talking about in our video games! ;^)

Ethan – out!

***

Ehlana:

Sleepovers at Naomi’s are always fun – when Zack and Eli aren’t here too.  Liz had a very long day at the salon, so we didn’t not sit up and have mini-makeovers, but we did watch a movie before we all came up to bed for the night – and Naomi’s parents likely fell asleep soon-after.  We’ve been having some girl chat time while watching music videos and alternate entertainment on YouTube; and now I’m getting this out of the way before we get some sleep.  I skipped over pizzeria dinner with Naomi’s Dad that included dropping off a pizza for Liz and Vicky; and we had fun hanging out with him too while we waited for Liz to get home, but Philip is a teacher; so we can’t go around admitting that we had fun – at least around our friends!

As for the rest of the day; Ethan pretty much covered the highlights.  Naomi, Sophia, and I didn’t find many shopping bargains, but we did pick up a few things each; breakfast with the boys was a bit scary – even when none of them were playing any food games but were just ravenously-hungry.  Yes, we all burned a lot of energy yesterday, but they guys also ate a lot too – including major snacks while at the movie theater last night.  Lunch on the road wasn’t quite as scary, but the guys still ate a fair bit; and Cassie pretended to hide the food we brought home for Aunt Leanne, Zack, and Brianna so that it didn’t get devoured too.

Okay – it didn’t get devoured until Zack got his hands on the bags of food; but you know what I mean.

The afternoon play time with our friends was fun too; Naomi, Sophia, and I spent some of that time telling the other girls about our trip; and the rest of the story for our day has pretty much been covered.  I’m with Ethan and hope that we’ll get to spend as much time with Cassie, Michael, and May as we can this weekend, but we’ll see how that goes; since Michael may need to spend extra time at the Inn after two days off; and Cassie might help there too – especially if they try to give his parents, Jake, and Stephanie a chance for shorter work days while they can help out with that.  I will keep you posted, but that’s all for now; and I expect that Naomi and I will be napping very soon.

This is Ehlana Proctor; coming to you live from what is now my past!

Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - January 3, 2019

Ethan:

This update is coming to you live from our hotel in Crystal Springs, but I’m also in a room full of other guys; and need to keep this short; so I’ll have to skip a lot of the details for our amazing play day.

On the not-so-fun side of our adventure; it was very early when we got up and hit the road for the Blue Ridge Ski Center.  I didn’t sleep all the way there, but we didn’t party all the way up either.  There was a stop for fast food breakfast that ended up being a sit down meal because of the decision to have pancakes by a few of us, but we had time; and still made it up to the ski center close to when the lifts were starting up for the day.  We got razzed a bit about starting our snowboarding adventure on the bunny hill, and Ehlana and I didn’t actually need to do that despite the fact that we haven’t been snowboarding that many times, but that was the safer option for all of the younger members of our group; and we had fun with that warm-up anyway before moving up to the more-challenging ski runs.

We are still kids, so it’s a bit unfair that we can’t try the tricks that Cassie and Rowen are so amazing at – or even the tricks that Michael and Tim do on their snowboards, but Ehlana, Naomi, Aiden, and I do the best we can for our age; and we had an amazing day on the slopes.  Cassie had everyone paired up with at least one buddy, so we got to have a bit of extra fun with May whenever she was paired up with Sophia and the six of us played together.  Cassie and Michael spent close to half of their play time with us too; and they paid for lunch for everyone – which is why even Patrick, Jessica, and Ryan joined us for that meal – and dinner – instead of having to fend for themselves with their own spending money.  I loved all of the snow play; and getting to do that with some of our favorite teens and best friends.  Staying for the night-time snowboarding would have been great too, but I voted for the early return to Crystal Springs and going out to a movie instead.  We did that; checked into our hotel near the highway and our favorite mall – not the one that Dad usually stays at downtown near the courthouse; and then took fifteen to get ready to go out.  We split up to watch two different movies – one of them kid-rated; Cassie and Michael were with the kids for that show while May opted to go with Rowen and Tim to the other movie; and now we’re back at the hotel and some of us are ready – or getting ready – for bed.  The college teen couples have their own rooms; May and Jessica have Ehlana, Naomi, and Sophia with them; and Aiden and I are in the ‘guys’ room with Patrick and Ryan.

That’s the main reason for why I need to wrap this up now, since Ryan’s nearly-done taking his turn in the washroom; and Patrick will likely be back any minute now from saying goodnight to Jessica.  I will not say anything about that, since I’ve already been razzed about goodnight hugs and kisses from Naomi – even though Ehlana had hugs and kisses for Aiden and me too.  This has been an awesome, remember-forever kind of day; I’m glad that Cassie, Michael, Rowen, and Tim offered to take us on this adventure; and now it’s time to hang out with the guys for a while longer and then crash and get some sleep.

Ethan – out!

***

Ehlana:

We have a couple of non-Magi in the room, so I’ll need to keep this report short too – particularly since I have the same issues as Ethan; including the girl side of Jessica and Patrick’s alone time while May is taking her turn in the washroom.

The highlights of my day included the snowboarding and movie; I loved another chance to see Cassie and Rowen show off their daredevil, tandem tricks; and Naomi and I had a blast with Ethan and Aiden – and with May, Sophia, and everyone else.  We probably should have invited extra friends for Sophia and Ryan, but that would have meant an extra vehicle; which is why the teens decided against that.  It worked out anyway, since Ryan made some new friends and went snowboarding with them a lot; and Sophia had fun with us – and with May when she played with us too – which was a lot.  Our movie time was a great way to wind down our day, and while the night time snowboarding would have been awesome too, we don’t get many chances to go to the movie theaters in the city; so I’m glad that we did that instead – and I was ready to get warm by the time we made that decision anyway.

As always, it’s the ‘who’ we had fun with today that matters most to me, and now that we’re just a few days from going back to school again on Monday; I’m glad that we’re getting to have this adventure with Cassie and Michael.  I’m not going to even think about them heading back to college yet, and I have a bedtime girl chat to get to next; so that’s all I have for tonight.

This is Ehlana Proctor; coming to you live from what is now my past!

Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - January 2, 2019

Ethan:

The news of the day is actually about our plans for tomorrow and Friday.  Starting with our breakfast chat, we’ve set up a trip for snowboarding at Blue Ridge for tomorrow; followed by a hotel sleepover in Crystal Springs; and then some shopping on Friday before we come home again.  Naomi, Sophia, and Aiden are spending the night with us so they’re here when we’re ready to hit the road early in the morning; and that’s why we’re also heading to bed relatively-early too so we can be at full-power for all of the snow fun.

There was outdoor snow play today too, but that was mild by comparison to going snowboarding, but Cassie, Michael, and May came out to play with us too; so we still managed to have a lot of fun.  We had gangs of kids and teens around the house off-and-on too – when we needed to warm up; or just have some indoor play time.  We’ve been in since late-afternoon; video gaming and a movie kept us entertained; and now I’m ready to wrap this up and crash for the night.

Stay tuned to this archive journal channel.  The next couple of days are going to be a blast!

Ethan – out!

***

Ehlana:

I have sleepover buddies, and no time for an update; so let’s just go with Ethan’s short report; and I’ll get back to the bedtime girl chat with Naomi and Sophia.

This is Ehlana Proctor; coming to you live from what is now my past!

Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - January 1, 2019

Ethan:

Happy New Year!

We had a blast last night having our ‘family’ New Year’s Eve party at the Inn.  The buffet dinner was amazing; and then there was something for everyone at the party – whether that was video gaming in one of the small dining rooms; football in the other; or dancing and socializing in the main dining room.

Ehlana and I spent nearly all of our time there with Naomi and Aiden, but we had fun with our cousins, family, and other friends too.  Aiden and I got involved in the gaming and football; I danced with Naomi a half-dozen times; and yes, Naomi shared a midnight kiss with me too.  Don’t have too much fun with that – at least we didn’t get the whistles, cheers, and cat-calls that Cassie and Michael – and some of the other couples – got for their more-serious sort of first New Year embraces.

We wrapped up that party and eventually came home and crashed into nap mode; and then we had a rush around here this morning as we got through breakfast; helped our weekend guests to pack and load up for their trips home; and then do the rounds of goodbyes that included doing a bit of running around for some of us as we said goodbye to the gang staying with Uncle Mark and Aunt Grace.  They left first, since they had the longest drive; and everyone was hoping to get home or elsewhere in time to still catch most of the New Year’s Day football or other parties while missing out on most of the holiday travel crush.

There was some work to get done around our house to get ready for the football watching party that we hosted this afternoon; and Ehlana and I helped with getting the lounge and our rooms ready for the kids to play in while the sunroom was again set up for chick flicks and the living room was reserved for the football.  It was time to have fun again by noon; we had rotating groups of visitors all afternoon along with the guests that were here for the long haul of the football marathon; and we – the kids – got to play for the rest of the day.  For Aiden and me, that meant a lot of video gaming in the lounge with Zack, Eli, and all of the other younger guys with cameo appearances from some of the teens – including Michael and Tim.  Lunch and dinner were both buffets; there were lots of snacks; and more pizzeria pizza was involved in the food fun today too; so we were happy campers all day.

We’ve been partying and gaming all evening; I’m not going to comment on Cassie and Michael’s bedtime visit to us at around ten o’clock because some of us don’t need to know the details for why they wanted to be alone for the rest of the night – though we did take the hint and stay away from their room.  The parents rounded up their kids after the last football game, chick flick, and bedtime chat; took them home; and Ehlana and I helped out with the clean-up once we’d seen our guests out.

Now I’m ready to crash after four very busy big-family days, and that’s all I have to report for this amazing first day of 2019; so I’m going to do that for the handful of hours we have left for our naps.

Ethan – out!

***

Ehlana:

What Ethan said; and add in the following:

Boys are scary eaters.

Brianna tired all of the rest of the girls out with her non-stop need to play and have fun.

We had fun with some mother-daughter time – and with the teens too when Cassie, May, and Rowen had time for us in return.

It’s a good thing that Dads are cuddly; since football is boring for younger girls – even when we’re Magi Masters and can at least appreciate the strategy part of the game; if not the need for boys to go around pounding on each other while fighting over a ball.

Learn to share, kids! ;^)

Finally, I danced with Aiden last night whenever Naomi got Ethan to dance with her; and we shared a tiny little New Year’s Eve kiss too that almost nobody in the room noticed by comparison even to Naomi’s kiss with Ethan.  Aiden’s the youngest of us; and I don’t have a problem with waiting until we’re both old enough to truly be interested in that kind of romance – even if Naomi would be happy to get married to Ethan and move in with him now if they could.

That’s not a joke – just a fun fact.

Okay, I’m ready to crash now too; so I will.  We’ve had an amazing end to last year and start to the new one; so let’s hope that we continue to have an awesome 2019!

This is Ehlana Proctor; coming to you live from what is now my past!