Wrapping it up

And here I sit in 42 degree heat with a little wimpy fan blowing warm air in my face, attempting to take a short break from the unpleasantness of packing up a household in such humidity. This process is taking alot out of us, and we just can't wait for it to be over!! Thankfully we've been supplied with food, support, help with Hudson, and tonnes more - we just still are terribly anxious for this part to be done. But in between the work we've managed to squeeze in some time for play, too. Here is a little of what we've been up to in the past little bit:

We were extended a cordial invitation to the Eidse's cabin about a week and a half ago, and gratefully accepted! The kids had a great time together (as did the adults) plus we had perfect weather - so all in all, it was fantastic.

Hudson loved "driving" the boat, and even made the sound effects along with it. Near the end of the trip, Erik really did let Hudson drive the boat - we kinda went in circles, but he was thrilled!

My little minnow swimming for the first time!

The party boat.

Yep, that's me behind the boat waving dorkily. I'd love to do more water skiing in the future!

This was our second sand castle, The first one was tragically demolished by...you guessed it...King Kong, er, Hudson.

Hangin' with the girlies...and boy.

Just previous to this, Ty and I celebrated our 5th anniversary. He took me out to the restaurant that we went to on the night we got engaged, and then to see Hunger Games. In the middle of dinner he also surprised me with...a wedding ring!!! I have only ever had an engagement ring to wear, because as thrifty newlyweds, we decided that me having an "extra" ring to wear wasn't important at the time. I guess now was the time to make that investment!

Ok...apparently I have no pictures of our anniversary to show. They are not on the computer and I'm just going to go ahead and assume the cord is packed. Blast...

And finally here are a few snapshots of Hudson's Curious George birthday party that we had on Sunday. This wasn't the party I initially envisioned, but it was still lots of fun! The original plan involved Hot Hundlies (hot dogs...Hundley is a weiner dog), Bessies on a Bun (Bessie is the Rankin's cow), a giant yellow hat pinata, and monkey sugar cookies. As you'll see, due to time constraints, none of these things came to be, but it all worked anyway!

We had a banana split bar, munchies, fruit, and homemade lemonade - complete with George-esque paper straws.

Mmm...marshmallow fluff...

Singing to the birthday boy. This is his desperate cries of, "Treeeaaaatttt!"

Typical kid - picks out the fruit!

As you'll see, my yellow hat pinata was a no-go. The night before the party it had caved in on itself...and so I got this little brainwave to do a banana pinata at about 10 p.m. and just went for it! This is Hudson's littlest cousin, Eden, taking a crack at it. We went easy on her and didn't give her a blindfold.

Madsy's turn! This thing actually hung on for quite awhile, until Ty's cousin Noah whacked the whole bottom end clean off (as in it disappeared behind those trees back there!).

Amber (photographer)'s cleverly captioned photo of Hudson stuffing M&Ms in his mouth whenever he got the chance.

 So our last days will be filled with to-do lists, deep cleaning, and tetris-ing all of our earthly belongings into a U-Haul trailer. But these are not the memories I am leaving with. I leave with thoughts of biking the River Trail, suppers with close family and friends, and savoring these last few moments in this tiny town, where you can hop on your bike at 10:30pm without a worry in the world, leave your front door unlocked, and actually get to know your friendly neighborhood grocer. There is such freedom out here in this simple little world - at least the one that I've come to know, in a small way. We will find a different kind of freedom in our next adventure though, and we couldn't be more excited to see what happens next!