Ethan and Ehlana:
Happy 4th of July, Everyone!
Happy Un-Independence Day, Mom and Cassie!
We’re still in the middle of our holiday fun; and this update is being multi-tasked while we transition from our afternoon adventures at the park to the play time we’ll have for the rest of the day.
Since our last update, we have had a lot of fun; and have been very busy too. As our weekend guests began arriving, we got to play with our cousins and friends except for some food work around meals and next-gen kid control duties. Some of our younger cousins decided on a camping night in the joint back yards at the Carringtons and Everetts; and we were among the teens that got drafted to help with supervising and camping too. We only set up three of the tents, but then we also ended up with next-gen campers in our tents and no co-ed sleepovers. That wasn’t exactly work, but did take some time out of the swimming, park play, and back yard games that filled up a lot of the rest of our afternoon. Ehlana and I didn’t end up helping much with unloading vehicles at the cottages or family homes yesterday, but we did take on the younger kids so that their parents could welcome the adults and help out when possible around their own work. The Carringtons hosted the barbeque dinner yesterday; we – the kids and teens – had a campfire starting at dusk; and Naomi and our little band provided most of the musical entertainment while some of the boys took care of a toddler-friendly round of campfire stories. The youngest kids were tucked in by eleven o’clock – though some of them napped through some of the campfire fun; and that’s why we stayed close to those kids and the tents after that even though we stayed up pretty late before most of the campers ran out of steam and crashed for the rest of the night.
Our day-so-far has been awesome. Tai Chi by the river was with a gang of exercise buddies; the major camping breakfast was an adventure; and then we needed to hand off the next-gen kids to others while Ehlana and I needed to meet up with the school band at the school staging area for the parade. The weather has been perfect; we loved playing with the band and entertaining our family, friends, and neighbors; and we only wish a bit that we could have done that and enjoyed the rest of the parade too. Our four best friends were with us and the band too, but this might be the last year for that; since we may need to split up in the future to help with the teen praise team or other parade projects through our high school years. The parade was a big hit again this year; and then we had time to pack up our gear and the band equipment before heading to the park for lunch and the annual noon co-ed ball game.
Ehlana, Naomi, Sophia, and most of the other girls were drafted to join Cassie and Miranda’s cheer squad in support of the Witch Falls Whirlpool, but we helped with rounding up food and drinks first; and then I was part of the group of guys drafted for next-gen and younger cousins’ kid control. There is a very good chance that ‘our’ cheer squad helped the Whirlpool to the big win over the Valley View Vortex today, but having all of their best players helped a lot too. The Vortex only managed four runs today; and they earned three of those runs later in the game while our team kept the lead from the start and took it easy in the late innings and only traded runs-scored to keep their six-run lead through the final two innings. We – the guys – didn’t catch half of that game – we took the kids swimming once and played at the playground for quite a while – which is part of the reason for why I wanted to come home and get cleaned up and changed ahead of the dance and fireworks tonight. Naomi loves me, but wouldn’t have wanted to cuddle or dance with me tonight without this little break! ;^)
That pretty much brings us up to now, and we need to get back to the park soon; so let’s wrap this up. Our plans for the rest of the day include dinner with our families at the park that won’t include kid control for us because the adults are giving us a break from that; the dance will start after that; and then the fireworks are scheduled for eleven o’clock. We’re camping again tonight; will probably have junior camping buddies again; and expect to be up late again too. We’ll have all of those stories for you with our next report, so stay tuned for that while we get back to living the adventures with most of our favorite people!
Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!
