May 24 Cottage Adventures

Last weekend we went up to the cottage for May 24 and let me tell you, the little man had a ball!  This summer will be so much different than last summer.  It will be more difficult in that Parker is very mobile and so will need constant supervision.  But it will also be so much fun, because Parker just loves it outside!  

Elf on a shelf?

Maybe he's musically inclined like his uncle

 Every May 24 there is an annual canoe trip down the river.  Parker is way too young to go, but we decided that he could canoe across the lake and I would pick him up at the bridge.  Just a short 10 minute canoe ride!  I wasn't really prepared for it, so I didn't bring his blue lifejacket.  He wasn't impressed with the pink one.

 But once he was in the canoe he was very content!

 It was definitely a smaller crew this year than usual, a lot of people had other plans, but I think they all had a good time anyways!

 The whole family isn't up every weekend, just long weekends, but I loved having the other kids there to play with Parker!  Parker thought that he was one of the big kids and he didn't even notice that they gave him a smaller noodle for the noodle fight!  He had a great time running around the lawn playing with the kids.

We are so lucky to have a close family and I feel even luckier that the other kids love Parker.  They don't see him as the annoying little cousin, they really love to take care of him and play with him.  I even had my 7 year old cousin make him breakfast one morning!  Bonus!

 It was a great weekend and I'm looking really forward to the rest of the summer!  

May 24

I'm finally getting around to posting about my weekend.  And what a weekend it was!  For the Victoria Day long weekend we always go up to the cottage with most of the family for the annual Canoe Trip.

The canoe trip started as a father kid bonding thing.  I guess now that most of us are in our 20's it's changed a bit.  Fathers and kids still go, but sometimes spouses and friends go as well.  It used to be an overnight trip, but this year we decided to do the whole thing in 7 hours.  This was also my first time going in about 3 years.

And they call me bits and bites - they are digging through a bucket for candy

One of the highlights would be this tricky tree.  Ryan and I couldn't manoeuvre around it and almost tipped.  So we moved to the side and watched 2 more canoes almost tip and one actually tip.  Then we decided that we should help. 

Tali had to go swimming to catch a paddle and some shoes. 

It was a beautiful day for canoeing.  We have had years where it has snowed, or been pouring rain.  Luckily this was not one of those years.





  Another recent change to the trip is that it's now acceptable to shotgun beer.  And don't I look thrilled to be holding onto the canoes while this is going on.

I told Ryan we had to scope out this section before canoeing down it.  Then everyone else came along and just went for it.  I felt like a dorkstick.  To make myself look a bit better though, many years ago, this area of the river and I got in a bit of a fight.  A rock, a tree and a big scar on Kaileigh's leg later, I'm a little bit wary of the rapids.

Mama Bear (aka me) tried to be healthy and bring along some carrots to snack on.  I was made fun of for it.

And just to increase the cuteness factor on the blog, look at this kid!

 He made my weekend.  He's hilarious and he knows it.  We call him the little dutch boy because, well, he looks dutch.  And his family really doesn't look dutch at all.  Most of the time when he talks, you can't figure out what he's saying, so we had him saying "I don't speak freaky deaky dutch."

 Seems like a good way to start the summer right?  It got me pretty excited for the next 3 months!  Hopefully this nice weather sticks around for awhile!