Towards the end of 2016 we laid out a plan for our family nights, outings and retreat days for 2017. It was, as seems to be a common tendency with our family, a tad more complicated than 2016's plan. Kali determined yesterday that maybe we should simplify it for 2018. I was supportive of that idea, as the one who tries to keep track of and implement this crazy family's cooked up plans! In short it didn't sound too bad - we plan a quarterly family night together, each above 2 years of age member of the family plans one family outing in the year (so we have one quarterly) and one family retreat day (so one of those quarterly also). So we do one "special" thing monthly - either a family night, an outing or a retreat day. Sounds easy right? Well then you get into who wants which months, and if we do an outing or a retreat day or a family night in that month, and it starts to get a more complicated. That said, we have had a lot of fun and special times together this year so regardless of how we plan them into our year, we will definitely continue them! It happened that Kali's retreat was yesterday and it will be a hard one to top!
After the last family retreat day, in which we tried to do way too much, I was determined for this one to have more of the retreat aspects of the day. Kali and I worked together on a plan and then trimmed it down a bit and it worked! We woke the girls bright and early and by shortly after 7:30 we were on our way to the blueberry patch. We were there to glean "blueberry matter" for syrup. The berries in the back patch are now mostly soft due to a small but mighty fruit fly, the spotted wing drosophila. But soft berries make grand jam or syrup so we picked as fast as we could and got 4 or so gallons of berries that were soon cooking down our stove. I love being in a berry patch in the early morning and the older 3 in the family had to more or less close our eyes and walk out of the patch or we would have kept picking for awhile. The 2 younger were ready for move on to the next thing (you will see that theme later in the day as well).
When we got back home, Kali and Jason headed out to do duck chores together (an attempt to have Jason help Kali streamline/shorten her process). Mom and Dad had arrived the day before and Dad graciously offered to do chicken and pig chores for Jason, which freed up an extra hour or so of Jason's time in the day. Of course the 2 younger gals quickly gravitated towards a morning visit upstairs. I got the berries washed and cooking and our brunch started and then went up to check on them. I think it was the most precious moment of my day - I love, love, love that our girls get this kind of time with my folks on a regular basis. They were both soaking up some morning reading and snuggle time!
Mom came down with us for a momentous occasion- she had brought my Grandma Bucher's cottage cheese bag along and I was eager to use it. It's so fun to be doing a process that she did, that I didn't get to ever learn from her, but that now makes me think of her whenever I made it (which right now is about every 2 days!). I got as far as taking this picture and seconds later the age of the bag showed when it burst in the middle. To be honest, no disappointment here. It was fun to try it, and I knew that I liked my current system of using a thin mesh strainer better anyway, so maybe it is good it broke so I didn't feel compelled to use it. :)
While the cottage cheese drained, I got working on our nutty sweet potato waffles. This time they were made with our sorghum flour and then some cultured buttermilk - it was a hit! There were a few leftovers that are quickly disappearing as family members wake and get some breakfast before getting into their day. When I was setting brunch on the table, it didn't necessarily feel all that remarkable, but then again there were so many little components that were special: the steaming mugs of coffee with freshly skimmed cream, the homemade pecan butter made with our soaked dehydrated pecans, the fresh blueberry jam from berries gleaned next door, the hot cooked blueberries from our morning family berry picking excursion, the fresh cottage cheese just salted and fresh cream added, wineberry banana yogurt smoothie from the evening before's wineberry picking family fun, and of course the aforementioned nutty sweet potato waffles with the end of last year's sweet potato harvest. It was delicious!
With our bellies full, we packed up water and a few essentials and headed out for a midday hike. You might wonder about the wisdom of such a plan on an almost 90 degree day. But my how shade transforms a space in mid-summer. We took the first mountain entrance and were soon under the canopy of trees. The plan was for us to take turns choosing what direction to go at each fork in the trail. The youngest was soon sacked out on my back so didn't get to make any of those decisions and Alida wanted to make the 6th and the 9th decision. We worked it out and had a fun explore through the woods until right at the 9th fork in the road we found ourselves back almost to where we had started. Terah had just woken and Alida was on the verge of beginning to complain about how she couldn't walk another step. So we decided to go with her mischievous grin as she pointed left, which meant towards home. It took a few minutes for it to compute in Kali's mind where we were and what Alida was up to. I know Kali would have hiked a lot longer and on our walk home Jason and I quietly cooked up a future dream of a mini-trip where we go for an overnight hiking/camping trip
just with Kali. She would have gone for hours on the mountain and is often so gracious and accommodating to the younger members of our family! I think it would be so much fun sometime to have a day stretched out in front of us where we could just let Kali lead us for hours. She would love it, as would we - but I think we are a few years out from being able to enjoy that as a family of 5!
Ending our hike early meant that it was just 2:30 p.m. when we got back and the afternoon/evening stretched out luxuriously in front of us and Terah had already had her nap. So Kali and I got busy making the wineberry jam with some of the berries from the night before and I started canning blueberry syrup. Jason got the propane burner set up on the front walk and in the next few hours we got 4 rounds through the canner! Jason got the badminton net set back up (had taken it down pre-wedding) and the younger girls played outside, and gave Terah's baby doll a bath. We then even managed as a family to "save all the whales" in our game before we moved outside for the rest of the evening!
Mom and Dad joined us for a fun evening of swinging at the swingset, playing badminton, enjoying an outdoor fire and making pizza pockets for our dinner. Terah is getting to be a bit more of a nix nux around the fire so took a bit more monitoring. She now wants to also throw bark and sticks into the fire just like her big sister! I think the early morning and short nap was also starting to show for her, and the early morning and hike was beginning to show on Alida. So we didn't linger around the fire as night fell, but got the ducks and chickens put to bed and then polished off our homemade peppermint patty chocolate bark before getting ready for bed. We all gathered in our bedroom for some James Herriott (which we all thoroughly enjoyed and I didn't hear the end of). A good day!
After the last family retreat day, in which we tried to do way too much, I was determined for this one to have more of the retreat aspects of the day. Kali and I worked together on a plan and then trimmed it down a bit and it worked! We woke the girls bright and early and by shortly after 7:30 we were on our way to the blueberry patch. We were there to glean "blueberry matter" for syrup. The berries in the back patch are now mostly soft due to a small but mighty fruit fly, the spotted wing drosophila. But soft berries make grand jam or syrup so we picked as fast as we could and got 4 or so gallons of berries that were soon cooking down our stove. I love being in a berry patch in the early morning and the older 3 in the family had to more or less close our eyes and walk out of the patch or we would have kept picking for awhile. The 2 younger were ready for move on to the next thing (you will see that theme later in the day as well). 
When we got back home, Kali and Jason headed out to do duck chores together (an attempt to have Jason help Kali streamline/shorten her process). Mom and Dad had arrived the day before and Dad graciously offered to do chicken and pig chores for Jason, which freed up an extra hour or so of Jason's time in the day. Of course the 2 younger gals quickly gravitated towards a morning visit upstairs. I got the berries washed and cooking and our brunch started and then went up to check on them. I think it was the most precious moment of my day - I love, love, love that our girls get this kind of time with my folks on a regular basis. They were both soaking up some morning reading and snuggle time!
Mom came down with us for a momentous occasion- she had brought my Grandma Bucher's cottage cheese bag along and I was eager to use it. It's so fun to be doing a process that she did, that I didn't get to ever learn from her, but that now makes me think of her whenever I made it (which right now is about every 2 days!). I got as far as taking this picture and seconds later the age of the bag showed when it burst in the middle. To be honest, no disappointment here. It was fun to try it, and I knew that I liked my current system of using a thin mesh strainer better anyway, so maybe it is good it broke so I didn't feel compelled to use it. :)
While the cottage cheese drained, I got working on our nutty sweet potato waffles. This time they were made with our sorghum flour and then some cultured buttermilk - it was a hit! There were a few leftovers that are quickly disappearing as family members wake and get some breakfast before getting into their day. When I was setting brunch on the table, it didn't necessarily feel all that remarkable, but then again there were so many little components that were special: the steaming mugs of coffee with freshly skimmed cream, the homemade pecan butter made with our soaked dehydrated pecans, the fresh blueberry jam from berries gleaned next door, the hot cooked blueberries from our morning family berry picking excursion, the fresh cottage cheese just salted and fresh cream added, wineberry banana yogurt smoothie from the evening before's wineberry picking family fun, and of course the aforementioned nutty sweet potato waffles with the end of last year's sweet potato harvest. It was delicious! 
With our bellies full, we packed up water and a few essentials and headed out for a midday hike. You might wonder about the wisdom of such a plan on an almost 90 degree day. But my how shade transforms a space in mid-summer. We took the first mountain entrance and were soon under the canopy of trees. The plan was for us to take turns choosing what direction to go at each fork in the trail. The youngest was soon sacked out on my back so didn't get to make any of those decisions and Alida wanted to make the 6th and the 9th decision. We worked it out and had a fun explore through the woods until right at the 9th fork in the road we found ourselves back almost to where we had started. Terah had just woken and Alida was on the verge of beginning to complain about how she couldn't walk another step. So we decided to go with her mischievous grin as she pointed left, which meant towards home. It took a few minutes for it to compute in Kali's mind where we were and what Alida was up to. I know Kali would have hiked a lot longer and on our walk home Jason and I quietly cooked up a future dream of a mini-trip where we go for an overnight hiking/camping trip just with Kali. She would have gone for hours on the mountain and is often so gracious and accommodating to the younger members of our family! I think it would be so much fun sometime to have a day stretched out in front of us where we could just let Kali lead us for hours. She would love it, as would we - but I think we are a few years out from being able to enjoy that as a family of 5!
Ending our hike early meant that it was just 2:30 p.m. when we got back and the afternoon/evening stretched out luxuriously in front of us and Terah had already had her nap. So Kali and I got busy making the wineberry jam with some of the berries from the night before and I started canning blueberry syrup. Jason got the propane burner set up on the front walk and in the next few hours we got 4 rounds through the canner! Jason got the badminton net set back up (had taken it down pre-wedding) and the younger girls played outside, and gave Terah's baby doll a bath. We then even managed as a family to "save all the whales" in our game before we moved outside for the rest of the evening!
Mom and Dad joined us for a fun evening of swinging at the swingset, playing badminton, enjoying an outdoor fire and making pizza pockets for our dinner. Terah is getting to be a bit more of a nix nux around the fire so took a bit more monitoring. She now wants to also throw bark and sticks into the fire just like her big sister! I think the early morning and short nap was also starting to show for her, and the early morning and hike was beginning to show on Alida. So we didn't linger around the fire as night fell, but got the ducks and chickens put to bed and then polished off our homemade peppermint patty chocolate bark before getting ready for bed. We all gathered in our bedroom for some James Herriott (which we all thoroughly enjoyed and I didn't hear the end of). A good day!
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