Year: 2015

It’s great if you’ve figured out your “what,” but it’s likely that everyone else’s “what” is different from yours! How to handle that? I’ll tell you what we do.

Mom and Dad decide.

Really!  When we start thinking about our next vacation, everyone chimes in. “I want to go see [insert historic site here].” “We haven’t been scuba diving in ages.” “Let’s go hiking.” “That last place was TOO HOT. We need air conditioning!” “I want to go zip-lining!”

But we, the parents, know better than anyone else what our family needs. Hopefully that goes without saying. Vacation planning, though, is a great place to practice benign dictatorship.

As I think back on our vacations, this idea is a lot more important now than when the kids were little. Real opinions seem to have kicked in around 8-10 years old with each one. That’s why this idea of balancing competing interests is on my mind so much now! When you have all littles, or only one big, the idea of balance is really more about keeping kids happier in the moment. I’ll write about that in another post.

But here I have people who are on their way to adulthood, with legitimate interests. Trips represent such great opportunities for growth and learning that we really do want to maximize that for each member of the family.

A couple of years ago our “what” was an adventure. We wanted to do something kind of exotic and off-the-beaten-path. Bill and the boys were interested in scuba diving. However, I have no interest in sitting on a beach all week.  I’m too fair for that, and I would feel like a slug after about a day and a half. The idea of breathing underwater also gives me the willies! Also, islands are not my favorite. They make me claustrophobic. That is weird but I am owning it.

Both girls wanted to be around animals, especially horses to do a little riding. Paige wanted time for beach reading, and Darcy wanted a pool, not a beach. Matthew was also interested in hiking. Bill thought we needed some history built in. And weather–no hurricanes, please, and no rain and not humid. We live in Georgia and we are well acquainted with humidity, thank you very much.

The boys got scuba-certified in the fall, so they were absolutely determined to pick a great scuba spot.

That year we decided on a resort in Belize. We managed to accommodate the scuba diving (and the girls and I snorkeled, very cool), hiking, and animals. We added zip-lining as one of our favorite things to do! We didn’t get to ride horses, but Belize is full of amazing wildlife and we saw monkeys, alligators, toucans, and leaf-cutter ants.

I didn’t have to sit on the beach all the time because there were lots of other activities, like kayaking and bird-watching (surprisingly fun even though I’m not 83 years old). The resort had a lovely pool so Darcy, not crazy about sand, swam there. The beach wasn’t great because of the resort’s proximity to a river, but there was sand and surf.

We had a very, very tiny bit of history by visiting Mayan ruins one day. But our trade-off was getting to know and love Belizean culture much more than we expected.

The weather was, well, the tropics in July. Hot, hot, hot, and super humid. We bathed in DEET every day to fend off the bugs. But we picked a resort known for its delicious local cuisine. It isn’t surprising that Paige still talks about the food and our sweet waitress and bartender (smoothies only for her, of course!).

Bill and I also knew we needed some good family time and an extended break from technology. Our resort had no televisions and no wifi in the rooms which gave the kids withdrawal symptoms on the first couple of days. Instead, we played cards and sat and talked and read together. We also played so hard during the day that we were all exhausted by 9 at night. It was such a sweet time!

There are other times you impose your will, and still others where the kids pick most of the trip. A couple of years ago we took a trip to New England, as far north as Ogunquit, Maine, and then down to Cape Cod. That was an “impose our will” vacation, because we felt like a great way to soak up some history. But we did build in beach time and we sought out great restaurants.

My boys made a school trip to Boston last spring, and it was gratifying that they remembered that vacation fondly as they saw familiar sights on the Freedom Trail.

This year we are trying to let the kids, especially Matthew, really pick the trip. Like I said earlier, this may be his last regular summer vacation with us, and we want it to be somewhere really special to him. He is getting a taste of what it’s like to balance all these interests, though, as the other kids lobby him to their favorite idea.

There are other ways to balance out these interests, too, and I’m going to talk about an alternate method tomorrow…See you then!

We used to say that all the time–“Where are we going this year?” But in fact, the real first question is “What?” As in:

• What do we want to do?
• What’s been going on at home?
• What do we need a break from?
• What do we want to EAT? (seriously. We ask that.)

Here’s a great example of how important the “what” is. A couple of years ago, we decided to go to Walt Disney World as a surprise trip at Christmas for the kids. In fact, that WAS their Christmas present that year. Our fall had been pretty quiet and we were up for the craziness that is Disney at Christmas. (By the way, that was a really fun time. More on that another day.)

But the next year was grueling. In the spring we had bought our horse farm. And then the fall just got insane. It was Matthew’s first year of high school, both boys were playing fall sports, and Darcy had just moved to a new campus. But more than anything, Bill’s work was changing and required day after day of stressful negotiations and evenings filled with discussions and planning. We knew that his work stress would ease around Thanksgiving, so we started planning a short (four day) getaway after Christmas.

A Disney vacation that year would have been a nightmare. We needed rest. We needed time together. We needed quiet.

At a friend’s suggestion, we headed to Naples, Florida, and had a completely wonderful few days. We came back feeling rested and more connected. The weather, cold and dreary at home, had been delightful in southwest Florida. It was one of the best uses of our limited vacation time that we could have come up with.

Our “what” that year was rest. The “where” could have been a lot of places, although I have to say we fell in love with Naples and have returned a couple of times since then.

Sometimes we want a physically active vacation. We live in Georgia, where winters are often gray, rainy, and just kind of miserable. It’s not too cold, but it isn’t the kind of weather that you want to go outside in very much. The result is a bunch of kids who are feeling very cooped-up by the end of February. Cooped-up mom and dad, too!

The antidote, at least for us, is a week out west skiing. We embrace the cold and wear ourselves out. The story of how we started skiing is pretty funny but needs to wait for another day. But we discovered that we love the sport, and each one of us can ski (or, ahem, snowboard) well enough to have a great time.

So our “what” in the winter is a ton of physical activity and outdoor time, as well as time for Monopoly and cards before the onslaught of a busy spring. We also know that our “what to eat” will include some great Western wild game or fish! The “where” has been several different places out west.

Right now we are just starting to think about next summer’s vacation. Our “what” is definitely good time together, possibly with some college visits, and with a special nod to Matthew because it might be his last vacation with us for a while. (SOB) But our “what” probably includes some outdoor time as opposed to a city-based trip. There are a lot of fun places to think about!

Do you have a “what” for your next trip? Have you ever gotten it wrong–where you thought you needed relaxation and ended up antsy, or the opposite? Please share!

 

Who doesn’t love a vacation? When I think of our favorite family memories, a ton of them seem to be made away from home. We’ve taken some great, and some less great, trips over the years and we have learned a LOT about how to make a good vacation great.

For this series, I want to share some of our vacation “lessons” that have helped us over the years. The idea here is to spark some thinking for your own awesome trips–and hopefully save you some trouble, too! Along the way I’ll share some of our favorite destinations, but travel is really about so much more than simply the place you go. It’s a way to reconnect and grow family legends, to relax and get out of your day-to-day routine, to learn and grow and eat great food. And it’s FUN–maybe not every single minute (Philadelphia spend-the-night, I’m looking at you!) but the highs make up for it.

Let me introduce you to my family, so you have an idea of the crew I love and manage:

Of course I’ll introduce my husband Bill first. Years ago, I did virtually all of the planning, but Bill has started taking charge of this in many ways because he discovered that he loves it. He aims a little higher than I do, and many of the things we’ve done lately are due to his adventurous spirit. His work is very intense, and so when we vacation now he wants a true break. He has a love for museums and a great knowledge of history, especially Greek and Roman history, and that knowledge has made some of our trips even better. And as you can see, we are terrible about getting pictures together. More on that another day.

What do I like? I love a good restaurant, and my priority is honestly a great bathroom wherever we stay. Much to my sons’ regret, I do not want to spend the night without a shower available. That is not fun to me. But beyond that, I’m pretty much open for anything. I tend to be the artsy one, always happy to linger in a museum or cathedral.

Matthew is 17, and he loves to do anything outdoors. At home he plays football, wrestles, and is on the Quiz Bowl team.  He enjoys hiking and everything history, and he loves museums.Jack is 15. He’s my cross-country runner, pole vaulter, and trombone player. (Actually he can play any instrument he picks up–it’s kind of amazing.) He’s my scuba and beach kid, happiest in or on the waves.

Paige, 14, is also outdoorsy, a big reader and art lover. She’s also utterly devoted to her pony Bailey. Paige is athletic and loves to just go–zip-lining, skiing, boating, she’s good. While she likes museums, she loves a good restaurant.

Darcy is turning 12 during this challenge. She’s my shopping buddy when we are on vacation, but at home she is all about horses (like her mare Lucy) and Harry Potter. She is happy to go anywhere, but of all the kids she is definitely the one who likes her downtime.

I’m sure you see at least some of your family’s interests here. It can be tough balancing all the interests of this crew with the sheer logistics of travel and home schedules.

This month I’ll share some of our methods, along with several destinations we have especially loved. I hope you will join me!

A note about the budgets–we all have them. Our circumstances have varied widely over our family’s life, and we have taken small and big vacations over the years. I’m going to talk about a lot of types of vacations, but I’m not going to talk budgets just because that’s such an individual thing, even year-to-year, and prices have changed so much over the years. I am firmly convinced that many of our lessons apply everywhere!

Oops, a week in review in the middle of the week.  We are deep into the fall routine, and I actually had to check the pictures on my phone to help me remember what we did!

Construction continues in dribs and drabs, as it is wont to do. Except I had a huge problem with my covered arena! I’m not sure if I’ve talked about the fact that we have four construction projects going on right now and I’m about to lose my mind. The house is the obvious project, and we also have a covered riding arena going in. The grading for the arena is done, and the building is in fabrication. The next step is the concrete foundation work. It’s challenging because everything is new to me and I’m on a steep learning curve. We’ve also got the plans for a party barn that we want to get started–our builder wants to put that in at the same time he builds the pool house. And so the pool and pool house are project #4. I need a score sheet just for contractors!

Anyway, we had a pretty dramatic setback with the covered arena last week. It shouldn’t affect the delivery date but it is giving me gray hair right now. I think the issue should be settled by Thursday but it has been a tense few days.

That’s an x-ray of our little Chico’s pelvis. Somehow he injured himself in his cage. Chico is our chinchilla. If you’ve never been around one, I highly recommend it. He is very social, and right now he is unhappy because he has been confined to a tiny cage while he heals. It’s always helpful having vets for neighbors–we were able to get a diagnosis really fast!

Our football game was one of the best I’ve ever seen…and it ended in a loss. Our boys thought they had one snap left on a first down with five seconds left on the one yard line, but the refs said it was a fourth down and let the clock run out. Tragic. There were quite a few tears in the huddle after the game, but I was so proud of our team as the head coach told the boys how well they had played (they had!) and how much he loved them.  It was a moment that made me sure that for now, our school is just the place I want my kids.

The next morning, bright and early, Jack set a new Personal Record on his 5k time at the Cross Country meet. His team placed first in A division schools–War Eagle!!

The weather here has been drab, especially considering that late September is usually a clear, brilliant blue. It’s starting to affect all of our moods, and the intermittent rain makes it hard to plan on actual outdoor time. Obviously that covered riding arena can’t get built soon enough.

Darcy and Bill took off for an overnight field trip at a 4-H camp with the entire sixth grade. They are back with smelly laundry (how does it get that smelly in 36 hours?) and tales to tell. We are looking forward to a fun homecoming weekend at the high school, and maybe even some time to grill out.

Finally, starting October 1 I’ll be participating in the “Write 31 Days” challenge. We’ve taken a ton of vacations, mostly great and some less great, and so I decided to write about all that fun. I hope you’ll join me as I share some of what we’ve learned in 17 years of vacations near and far with our four kids.

Have a great week!

My heavens. This has been one crazy weekend, and I don’t remember one quite like it for a while. I checked the girls out of school at 1 p.m. on Friday to go to Columbus for a horse show and watched them along with other girls from our barn school cross-country. That is the fancy term for practicing the cross-country course before the show.

I hopped back in my minivan and drove back to school for the 7:30 football game. My football player is a junior, and we only have FOUR home games this year, so I am doing everything I can to be at every single game. I love being a football mom, love the other football moms, and love those boys. It is a special culture.

Back to Columbus (about an hour and fifteen minutes every time) to go to sleep around 11:45. I woke up at 5:50 in one of those “holy cow, where am I?” moments, and realized that I had to be downstairs for breakfast in a little more than an hour. We had a long but incredibly rewarding day at the show. We had six riders from our barn, and everyone finished in ribbons. Hooray! Meanwhile, Jack had a cross-country meet on Saturday morning. And in the epic parenting department, we discovered that what Matthew had described as “quiz bowl practice or something” was actually a meet in Braselton, Georgia, about two hours from campus! I discovered this because some of my friends on Facebook are quiz bowl moms, and they had very responsibly posted pictures. Awesome.

So that is a weekend of football, horse shows, cross-country meet, and quiz bowl. It gets…more.

We arrived home at the barn around 8 p.m. with all the horses. One of them had bumped his head when, as he loaded on the trailer, he decided to rear and back out. We had thought it wasn’t too bad, and made the one-hour trip home. On our arrival, we saw that poor Johnni P had blood dripping on his head and had in fact tried to scalp himself on the trailer. A call to the vet resulted in twelve stitches and an extra hour at the barn.

Bill’s dad John is visiting this weekend, too. I’m afraid he has discovered that we aren’t exaggerating when we say our weekends are jam-packed! He has been to the game and the show, but not the meet or the other meet. (I’m a terrible quiz bowl mom–don’t even know what to call it!)

The results from Saturday? The football team won, 35-13, all six of our Shady Oaks riders finished in the ribbons, Jack’s cross-country team placed first in A-division Cross-country (and continue to be ranked #1 in A in Georgia), and Matthew’s quiz bowl (the “B” team at their school) placed 4th out of ten teams. I think the kids have a lot to feel good about.

Sunday, today, is typically restful. Not so much today. I was worship assistant with our wonderful Pastor Buba, a member of our church but also the director of international missions for our entire denomination. What great fun to help lead worship with him! I highly recommend his Vimeo videos (here’s a sample) to get a flavor of what we are doing to reach nations where it is dangerous to preach the Gospel in person. He delivered an amazing sermon. How cool is it when the kids come home talking about the different points he made in the sermon. Pastor Buba really made an impact on them as he talked about “Alpha and Omega,” and everything that comes in between.

We did get a chance to eat all around the table for a (veeeeeery) late lunch, which is just such a joy to me because I think it reminds us all that not only do we love each other, because we are family, but we truly like each other. We laugh a lot.

This evening we had the great privilege of going to a celebratory dinner for our very first pastor and his wife, celebrating his (really, their) FIFTY years in the ministry as Naval chaplain and Lutheran pastor. What a delight to be with our friends to celebrate this sweet couple. Pastor Larry taught Darcy her First Communion Class, and he has been such a steadfast presence in our lives for the last five years.

Just writing this is exhausting, and that was only the weekend! The new farmhouse continues apace, and I have so many thoughts about the building process. Mostly right now I just want to be sitting on my front porch typing this. That feels like it is a long time away.

I hope that you had a wonderful weekend as well. It looks like this week will lend itself to a calmer weekend, which will be welcome. It also looks like the weather should finally get cooler and more fall-like, which we will definitely be happy about around here!

That’s what a sleeping blog is. The mere idea of posting again, no matter how small, becomes daunting.

But I’m waking this blog up! So here’s where we are right now.

Summer was fun but FAST. I mean, I blinked and it was over. Tons of traveling for all of us, some together and some independent. It changed how we viewed our summer, not as a series of warm, lazy days spooling out, but more as chunks, weeks we were here and weeks we were there.

The house construction continues, more slowly than I’d like, and we have a huge variety of things going on at the farm.

And now school has started again and we find ourselves in a whirl of football and cross country and riding and homework and work and laundry. And I know more than anything that it will speed by in a blur if I can’t stop myself and notice the precious ordinary beautiful days that make up our life.

Here’s a glimpse of the past few months:

 

I was in a muddle most of January. In the whirl of wrapping up loose ends from 2014, and deciding on new things for 2015, and getting on with life and four busy kids, I’ve felt a little lost. The weather has been unpleasantly unpredictable, to boot. Add the stress of a new home that I just want to start building already (but keeps getting held up by silly things like septic permits) and it wasn’t the greatest month. And it’s easy to dwell on that.

Modern Mrs. Darcy had a post a day or two ago where she talked about the things and ideas saving her in the midst of a gloomy Chicago winter. I didn’t think I’d want to link up, but as I counted the things I’ve really enjoyed this month, my mood lightened and I find myself looking forward to February. So here are a few things that are saving me right now:

This boy, Dr. Finnegan. I get out to ride as much as possible. Right now, even if I shoot for four times a week, I’m lucky to ride twice because of the weather. But my rides are a couple of hours outside, even when it’s cold, for some much-needed sunshine and fresh air. The mental break is just as important.

 

This book, Well Fed 2, and the site Nom Nom Paleo. Tonight marks Day 27 of Whole30, and I can see the ending. These resources have kept us from getting bored with what could be an incredibly limiting diet. I still miss cheese.

This book, On Becoming a Writer, an ebook by Denise Hughes that I bought as part of the Ultimate DIY package. I’ve never taken a writing course or even really concentrated on a book about writing. But every morning for the past couple of weeks I’ve gotten up and gone through a couple of chapters. I have learned so much! I can highly recommend this book if you are at all interested in writing. I paid about $34 for the entire bundle, but I have already gotten at least that much enjoyment out of this one book. (And the bundle isn’t available anymore, but you can sign up at that link for notifications when it happens again.)

This space, a clean sewing-and-everything-else room. I haven’t gotten to my clothes yet, but I applied the KonMari method to my sewing room and spent two days throwing things out and finding logical homes for the things I kept. This is the room where I write, and it feels so good to walk in at 5:15 in the morning and know I’m not going to trip over something!

So this is a short list, but heart-felt. I hope your 2015 is off to a great start. I’d love to know what is really working for you right now!

Hey! I think it’s time I summarized our Whole30 experience. We are on Day 20, going strong. Here’s a summary of what we’ve been eating, with some random thoughts about how it’s going. I’ve tried to link to the recipes I found on the internet. I’m also using Well Fed 2, and I really like that cookbook. I have to say that between this book and NomNom Paleo we have indeed been well fed.

Back on Day 12 we were firmly established in the “hash for breakfast” routine, and that continues to be our breakfast routine. This was also a day to eat dinner out. My in-laws invited us over for my sweet father-in-law’s birthday. With some careful eating and not too many questions I was able to stay approximately on Whole30. My MIL had fixed pork roast with potatoes and carrots, along with a salad and some other vegetables. I made it work and didn’t police the kids too closely. Besides, under the new rules they were free to eat anything.

The next day we repeated the delicious Hamburger Soup from the Pioneer Woman. Bill had come home from 10 days in China and we all felt like a homey soup was a good choice for the day. It went over as well the second time as the first. It’s really just a basic, delicious soup.

Day 14 was a Wednesday, and I tried to get ahead of the game by cooking a bunch of chicken nuggets (four pounds’ worth) and a batch of tuna patties. I also roasted a huge amount of sweet and white potatoes for breakfast. We took some of the nuggets for the boys’ wrestling meet in Atlanta, and when we returned…the girls had eaten all the meat I had prepared. Every bit of the tuna cakes and the nuggets. So much for getting ahead of the game!

Day 15 found us traveling to North Carolina for the day. (My grandmother had passed away earlier and this was her funeral.) Breakfast was the filling of a sausage burrito from Chick-Fil-A. Don’t judge. We had to be on the road by 5:30 a.m. and the girls had eaten all the chicken nuggets! Lunch was a steak at Chili’s, but it was so tiny I was starving on the drive back home. Dinner was tough that night. Ordinarily we would have ordered a pizza and called it done. But on this day I made salmon patties and cauliflower soup, both from Well Fed 2, because it’s what I had on hand. They were both delicious but they didn’t exactly go together.

Day 16 was another wrestling day. I was absolutely not prepared, so I threw some trail mix and Lara Bars in the car for the very long drive to the meet. I ended up just having a Lara Bar for dinner. Not ideal!

The next day the girls stayed home while the boys left to wrestle. I had time that evening to prepare Pina Colada pork with one of the biggest surprised yet: cauliflower rice!  (All of this from Well Fed 2, of course.) To make it, coarsely chop a head of cauliflower in a food processor. Saute some garlic and onions in a little coconut oil, add the “riced” cauliflower, and saute. It takes about ten minutes but the cauliflower tastes great. It was a huge hit with the delicious sauce from the pork.

Sunday was Day 18. It was a surprisingly busy day, between church, some school activities and a meeting at the farm. We decided that a repeat of bacon burgers, along with watermelon, roasted zucchini and mushrooms would be tasty.

Yesterday I roasted a couple of chickens, which we ate for dinner along with some broccoli and spaghetti squash fritters. The fritters were kind of a pain to make but so tasty. I could have eaten the whole stack!

Tonight we just sat down to a beautiful pot of  Oven-braised Mexican Beef, cauli-rice, veggies and fruits. The recipe, from Nom Nom Paleo, is outstanding. We were talking about how we want to eat it in a couple of weeks! (Think tortillas and cheese, and a margarita for Mom.) This is worth making no matter what kind of diet you are on. The “rice” was perfect for catching all the delicious sauce that the meat was in. This is a home run.

I am so glad we are twenty days in. I feel in some ways like I can see the finish line. On the other hand, I hope we don’t go right back to eating junk. I don’t really think I will, at least not right away. I can tell that my tolerance for sweet flavors is down quite a bit, and that’s a good thing. I have some other thoughts about this, too, but I want to sit on them til we are done with the program.

I hope the recipes are helpful. I’d love to know if you have found other sources for great meal ideas or recipes!

For my photography class I had to practice a little composition. Darcy and I went to the farm and then the bookstore on Saturday. These are just a couple of my favorites from the shoot.

We went to the farm because…the surveyors staked our our property lines!! Yay!! This is a big deal. Our farm consists of about eight pieces of property. We are redrawing the property lines to have the farm on most of the land, with our home carved out on about five acres. All of this has to be filed with the county before we can get started building. Like paint drying, I tell you.

At any rate, it was a lovely day to take pictures.

I have come to the conclusion that if I continue writing every single day about Whole30 I will die of boredom. I’m done.

Of course we will keep on doing it, and I’ll give a summary every few days. You can always check my Pinterest board to get some ideas of what is good for dinner.

But I think about a lot more than food, usually. And I just really want to write about it. And if you spend some time reading, well, what an honor. Thank you.

So here’s something. Of course Penelope Trunk was off on one of her rants about how school is terrible. She linked to an article where a guy who funds lots of start-ups says that one of the big problems is that people who do start-ups aren’t good at doing the start-up. They are good at looking like a person who does a start-up. And so they spend some money and start looking for the trick. The short-cut. Maybe they don’t even realize it but they are unable to do anything real.

Doesn’t this seem like “participation medal” writ large? Like we’ve given the smart kids a pass because they look like they know what they are doing, but we never ask for actual results.

How do you go about raising a kid who is the opposite? Who understands what real results look like and doesn’t care if they have the cool start-up office with the fun co-workers and a pool table in the breakroom?

More later.

Oh, also, this:

Isn’t it cool when Nature reveals her order? And it seems too beautiful and too perfect to just happen? Galileo said that “Mathematics is the language with which God has written the universe.” I came across a discussion of the beauty and orderliness in biology, from the well-known chambered nautilus to fractals that describe pulmonary vessels. It was the same day that my DAB reading was Proverbs 3:19-20:

The Lord by wisdom founded the earth; By understanding He established the heavens; By His knowledge the depths were broken up, And clouds drop down the dew.

As an engineer and a Christian it is just logical to me that we would see God’s handiwork not just in sheer beauty but in the mechanics of His creation. It was just interesting that the timing on these two things was so close.

And then: look at these Victorian era mug shots of children. And then go hug your children again because they had enough to eat, didn’t wear rags or need to steal a coat to stay warm. If you’ve ever read Dickens’ Bleak House these children look familiar. (via Two Nerdy History Girls)

Thanks for reading! What has caught your eye lately?