Today is the day that our 14 year old goes on his marching band trip to the east coast. He’s gone for a whole week, and I’m not there to see him off. The control freak side of me is having a hard time with this. The anxiety side of me is having a hard time with this. The 14 year old side of me is thrilled & can’t wait for this adventure!

When we moved to Alexandria, the band director suggested that he join the marching band. Dallas wasn’t so sure that was a good idea. Having gone on a band trip myself, I though this would be a good experience for him, so I encouraged him to sign up. Neither of us were prepared for what a commitment of time and money this is would involve. Competitive marching band is something I hadn’t experienced before. He had an intense band camp where they learned their whole “show” that they would march to in many parades. We traveled around MN to watch every parade.  We sat in the rain, the heat & the cold. We raised money for his trip. 

It all leads up to today. They will board 2 busses and head out east for two parades, Niagara Falls, Boston, New York & many other stops. I’m sure those Independence Day fireworks will be more amazing than anything he’s seen before. 

As much as I’d love to be there and experience this with him, I know that it is an important part of his growth. He will make new friends, see new sights and learn some things about himself. It will be good for me too – to be able to see him as more of a young adult and not my little boy. I’m so proud of the man he’s becoming & I can’t wait to hear about his adventure! 

Love you to the moon and back, Dallas! Have a great time, be good and don’t forget the sunscreen. You’ll always be enough for me. ❤️

We live in a pretty fast paced world. We get impatient if we have to wait in line too long, wait for a video to load or wait at a red light. Faster isn’t always better. We are in the process of planting at our new place. The back area has a lot of low spots, dips and rolls. We are trying to fill in some low spots with dirt. The faster way would be to rent a Bobcat – we’d have the project done in no time. Instead, we are using 2 shovels and 2 wheelbarrows. It’s harder and takes longer but it saves us some money. It also causes us to gain things – time with the boys, the value of a hard days work, strength training and extra “unplugged” conversations. 

The picture is of the boys taking down a mound of dirt that was in the way for mowing. It also seemed like a good use of the free dirt we already had. Each time I went back to get another wheelbarrow full, I’d overhear them talking about fishing, or the parades, or even sod houses and how hard they’d be to build. It might not be an ideal way to spend Fathers Day, but we didn’t work the whole day. While we try to teach the boys how to work hard, we also enjoy spending time together having fun. 

We hauled our kayaks over to the lake and fished a little. We didn’t catch anything huge, but it was fun to catch little fish and build sandcastles. Even though it was windy, we went anyway. Why? Because Cameron knew it was something Dallas wanted to do. We cooked some fish from a Canadian fishing trip and went to town to see the Cars 3 movie. Why? Because Cameron knew it was something Myles wanted to do. It would have been a good day to get more done on our outside projects, but he knew what his boys wanted to do and made it happen. Will they remember this Fathers Day? Probably not. Did they realize that he did these things specifically for them? Probably not. But what they will remember is spending time with their dad. 

Faster isn’t always better. Sometimes the things you gain far outweighs the time savings. Our years with these two guys under our roof are fleeting, and I want to soak it all up. Peace be with you on your journey of enough. May you have enough of a breeze to keep the bugs away. May you have enough air in your wheelbarrow tires.   And, may you have the opportunity to soak up some mundane moments that turn into memories.