Spring Break

I wish I took this, but I didn't.  I got it from the web.  It was taken by David J. Laporte @  footloosiety

It's already day six of spring break (that's counting the Friday off school last week) and it's going so fast!  We took a couple of days to go 'camping' at Hapuna, in the wooden tents.  It was a great mini-vacation, but we didn't pace ourselves very well and played super hard the entire time.  This means that by the third day (we spent two nights) we were just barely holding on.  Charlie spent the entire morning in a hole, happily puttering about in the sand.

Aaron planned the excursion, and he invited some friends to go.  It was great- more kids to play with for Emi and Charlie and a couple of adults to chat with.  The cabins are in a dry, desert area with a few scrubby trees.  This picture is exactly how it looked both evenings at sunset.  Gorgeous.  We actually stayed in this specific cabin, by the way.  About a hundred feet from the cabin is a big, screened pavilion with a stove and picnic tables and it faces due west, so both evenings we sat, chatted, and ate dinner with our friends while bathed in gold and pink light.

Now we're home, and all day yesterday was a rest day, just trying to recover.  Until the evening, when Aaron once again instigated an event.  This time he invited our friends Dough and Quenna over for s'mores.   It ended up being a last minute bbq dinner, and the boys from next door came over to join us.  Their mom, Carla, makes the best cookies I've ever had.  She makes Mrs. Fields look second rate, and she's MY neighbor!  She likes to share her cookies, which means she always sends over a plateful when she bakes.  So she sent over some fresh chocolate cookies with peanut butter chips.  Put a warm marshmallow on top and it's perfection.

Today I am trying to catch up on laundry.  Camping in dry, dusty cabins after spending all day playing in the sand results in a serious laundry day.  I'm also trying to convince myself to do some needed homework, but that just might wait until later.  It's a lovely day and kids are goofing around outside after doing their chores.  I'm the sort of Mom who says spring break is a break from school, but not from chores.  The kids have resigned themselves to this by now, since any whining and complaining is bound to result in me suggesting that since they have the energy to whine and complain, they should help me with another chore.  This tends to help curb the whining and complaining.  Emi is busy slicing oranges to take out for snacks, after spending the morning planning her birthday party.  She's smart.  She knows that giving me a list three weeks early means I have time to plan.