Mother Daughter Retreat

In January, a friend from church shared information about the May Mother Daughter Retreat at Camp Hickory Hill in Varysburg, NY.  We’d never gone on any such event, and it did not have a limit of one child per mom, so I decided I’d embrace my newly acquired camping gene and sign us up.  I also told my friend Lindsay about the weekend and she signed up to join us. 

It was pretty cold and rainy as we drove down, but we met our friends at Mark’s for dinner and continued on to our destination. 

I didn’t take photos of our lodging, but our church had a large enough group that we were placed in a lovely building right next to the bathrooms!  SCORE!

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We headed to the game room for a while

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As we were playing games, my girls rushed to the windows.  They saw princesses walking by.  It wasn’t long before we headed up to the fellowship hall to see what was going on.

The theme for the weekend was Princesses…. since we ARE daughters of the KING of KINGS.

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We played a “who am I?” game where we had to ask questions to see if we could guess who we were tagged as.

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We had singing, and some games, and ice cream!

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It was maybe the worst night’s sleep ever…
Having JUST gotten over the bad back I had endured for about a week, the rock-hard bunk I slept in was enough to cause me to have spasms hour after hour through the night.

My little girls and I were awake bright and early, so I took them out and around to keep the cabin quiet.

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We headed back as others were rising, and then we all enjoyed breakfast at the hall.

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I realized why my purse was so heavy!  Thank you, Stewart, for getting me the flashlight, etc., I may have needed.

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Tab and Janessa are special buddies.

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Our first assigned activity was archery.  This was a lot of fun.

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We then did kayaking and canoeing.  And then Katriel met this “friend.”  (She often embraces the scary to get ahead of it.  Not a bad tactic, if it works.)

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We had fun doing Nerf wars.

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Katriel stayed on top of the ammo.

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Lunch was excellent!

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Finally it was time to zip line.  This was TOO MUCH FUN!!

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Why yes.  Even my five year old tried it!

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We did a few other things, including a few minutes of dress-up with friends.

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I love this picture!  The Butler and Nickels ladies.

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Best playdate ever.

Some special people are moving to Florida.  Though we didn’t hang out that often, it was always a given that this family would be doing the same fun things we were doing in both our homeschool community and their church community.   Our kids have done VBS’s together since 2005.  Their sons have been in a few of my boys’ short films.  The DAD has even been in one.  Two of their sons and my boys have done Cub scouts, a boy’s club, homeschool co-op, CBS, and seasons of youth group together.  It has always just been the given that we would do things with them.

And now – a new chapter in their lives has them moving south.

So, when the packers came to their house today, I picked up these lovely ladies and we had what more than one of these girls has deemed “the best playdate ever.”

They played outside, and had a tea party, and played with princesses, and went to Bounce it Out, and came home for popsicles, and watched Mary Poppins.  And every last iota of the day was fun.  Said the girls.

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Easter Egg Art

The fact that we skillfully decorated 24 eggs is marred only slightly by the fact that they somehow all ended up pretty close to soft-boiled.  Ugh.

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But we still had a blast.  ♥

Curl problems

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When braids won’t behave.

Proverbs 31:30
Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.

Katriel is FIVE

Her fifth birthday fell on a Saturday.  How fun is that?

We decided to pack all the fun into one day. 
We woke her up at 7 A.M. (she was actually awake and waiting for our arrival) and sang happy birthday.
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Balloons and banners greeted her.
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as did a spiffy breakfast.
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The boys had to work parts of the day, so we did family meal and gifts early on.
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We cleaned up and turned our attention to getting ready for her 11:30 A.M. turtle-themed birthday party.
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We had a craft for the basement.
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Friends arrived and got their turtle backs.
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Lunch was pizza and fruit.
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Lots of lovely gifts and home made cards. 
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And cake. 
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Big sisters had some friends here, too.  (I love these girls.)
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And then the kid party was over at 1:30 P.M.

Somehow, we flipped the house again.  Mom lay down for an hour, then made dinner, and grandparents and aunt arrived for 4:30 P.M.
Pasta Alfredo was the birthday girl’s choice.
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And look… more gifts! 🙂
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We had a Princess Tiana cake for the evening.
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And we may have reached our party-food-limit.
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Don’t underestimate the Butler’s ability to party, friends. 

Birthday Prep

As Katriel’s birthday loomed, we sent out invitations and did some planning.  Again and again she would mention the piñata she wanted.  And, again and again, I would remind her we were not having a piñata.  Her February birthday has dictated we would have an indoor birthday parties, and how do you do a piñata in the house?  I’d explain this, and she would verbalize understanding and then mention a substitute activity…. until the NEXT time the subject of her birthday party would come up, and we’d repeat the whole conversation.

Today, Katriel and I went to Walmart for some groceries and a few things for her birthday. 

We went down the piñata aisle….

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And there you go.
To be continued.