The great Spring Break boat building of 2015

Boat building, Spring Break 2015

I was planning to get some thesis writing done this afternoon but when walking home after working in the Boulder Mennonite Church's community garden for a few hours (tilling, raised beds, planting seeds, watering, etc.), my son asked me if we could build some boats when we got home. In truth, I was plum tuckered out from gardening in the hot sun and wanted to take a wee bit of a nap in our backyard shade. But as we talked about our ideas for making boats, his imagination and excitement about it couldn't help but be infectious...and I caught it. 

When we got home, I made us some lunch and we sat at the table drawing out our ideas for boats. After lunch, we got out some of our scrap 2x4 and 2x6 lumber ends from our tree-forting building and set to work. We had a lot more we wanted to add our boats - things like sails and anchors and rudders and helms and such - but we simply HAD to go try them out at in our local stream, Bear Creek in the St. Vrain watershed (check it out via the EPA's great Surf Your Watershed site). We found a few things to tweak but had a blast testing them out. And while I didn't get any writing done, I was happy to have spent those few imaginative and creative and fun hours playing and building boats with my son. 

These moments don't come around again and I'm learning to embrace them as they appear, regardless of my schedule. I've got a long way to go, but for now, I have this time with my loved ones. And I am grateful.

The waitress

Finn the short order waitress. March 2015

The other morning Finn wanted to pretend she was a short order waitress. She has so much fun making up service-oriented games and she had me hoppin' in the kitchen - one of the few times we'll make an exception to preparing different meals for everyone. As each person placed an order, she recorded it their own ticket which she pasted above the stove. And she was so excited to wear, as an apron, a scarf she recently used for fish printing (gyotaku). We figure we'd better support our kids in play or they won't want to come to us with the serious stuff, now or later. Plus it's just fun to play as a child. A fun Spring Break morning, for sure.

An American Pie family moment, Don McLean style

What were we doing this evening? Papa is cleaning up dinner dishes, mummy is packing lunches for tomorrow, the kids are getting their backpacks ready for school and setting out tomorrow's clothes...and we're all singing THIS song at the tops of our lungs - Don McLean's American Pie. I am in LOVE. With this family! And what a fantastic song to bring up and discuss society and its highs and ills, love and friendship, war and peace, politics and so much more with our children!

Side note: in February of this year, McLean publicly announced that he will reveal the original meaning behind the song's lyrics when the original manuscript goes up for auction in New York City in April 2015.