Saturday, March 30, 2013

Getting around in the Springtime

 Spring truly arrived this week and are we ever enjoying it!

 We actually had a puddle in our driveway this week. I noticed it first and mentioned it to the kids and pretty soon there were children out playing in it. :-) I have so many good memories of playing in puddles so I love seeing my kids have that fun as well. We don't get a lot of puddles around our place as there is a slope to our land and we have quite sandy soil. That is nice for not having a mess for a long time but it means that they need to seize the day and play in them while they are around.
 They had fun digging channels and making rivers and bigger lakes and such until they had effectively drained all the water away. At that point they headed inside thinking that they could take buckets of water outside to keep there rivers running. However at that point I became the party pooper mother who said they needed to be content with what was already out there.

  On Thursday we went to visit some friends who have been wanting us to come for months (but one or the other of us always seemed to be sick or busy) to go sledding. We figured that is was basically now or not this year if sledding was going to happen. We went and had a great time together.

 On Friday we went over to my parents to help get the maple trees tapped for the season. I always love the maple syruping process! It is so much fun to get out in the woods on these early Spring days! Going over to visit was extra fun as my sister Martha and her family had just arrived from North Carolina. We loved being able to spend time with them.
I mentioned that I love to get out in the woods but I failed to say what a challenge that is currently! The snow is still up above my knees in most parts of the woods. Walking up and down the hills is quite a workout! Since walking was a bit difficult various other methods of transportation were tried.
I looked up once from my plodding along to see Mara and Martha crawling through the woods on top of the snow (for the most part) while hauling big 5 gallon buckets. It was rather humorous. If you look closely in the photo above you can see Mara crawling in the distance.

 I did try the crawling some as well but that had it's own trials like when your hand suddenly would fall way down into the snow and you would land practically with your face in the snow.

 Dad went around with snowshoes which worked fairly well but he was the only one that had a pair.

Since Dad could make a bit of a trail with his snowshoes quite a few followed along behind him, hauling buckets and helping out. (We had a good crew of workers as my parents were there, my sister Martha, my sister-in-law Molly Bea, 7 cousins, our friend and their neighbor- Benjamin as well as myself. All that help wasn't really needed but it was fun for us all to get out and enjoy Springtime in the woods together.
 In the picture above Martha tried another method of getting around - simply scooting down the hill on her behind.
 Aaron tried rolling his bucket and then rolling himself behind it. That worked fairly well except he and the bucket didn't always go exactly the same direction and he found himself rolling in somewhat of a circle.
 Molly Ann also tried out rolling.

 Molly Bea attempted walking on a downed tree.
 I tried sliding down a hill on my bottom and Molly Bea was following behind me. None of our moving methods were very fast but we did have fun and got some good exercise and I can hardly wait until we have sap ready to boil down and can taste maple syrup again!
Today we tried out some faster transportation as our road and lane are now all melted off and we got out the bikes. What fun!

 Are you enjoying Spring? What is going on at your home?

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