I forgot to take my camera on two snapshot worthy occasions in the past couple of weeks. Doh! We went to pick apples with our friends Kristin and Eva. Eva is also two and she and Kai picked nearly 30 pounds of apples by themselves while the mommies snacked on apples and watched/directed the picking. We will be going again since all of the apples were used up in mere days. I made applesauce and a giant pan of apple crisp and that was the end of the apples. I have a new plan for the next picking. I am going to get some of the lower priced, less than perfect apples for applesauce and small pans of apple crisp to put into the freezer. Then, I found a great plan for storing apples through the winter that I think will work well in our basement. It involves wrapping the apples individually in newspaper but I think it will be worth it to have awesome apples around this winter. Especially since Kai really likes to eat them.
Then, this week we went hiking with our camping friends, plus another mom and toddler, Heather and Gracie Jean, from the Attachment Parenting group. Snoopy came along and I was surprised by the trail that was chosen but Kai and Snoopy both did fantastic. Up and down hills, over rocks, near shears...it was impressive. During the hike, Gracie Jean was less than thrilled with the activity early on and sat down to express that feeling. Kai heard her crying and told me, "I want to hug her!" and "help her feel better", then took off back up the trail to where she was sitting. He gave her a hug and helped her mom to encourage her to get back on the trail. They all came down holding hands. Was this mama ever proud! I am not sure that there could be anything better than such a sweet display of empathy from a nearly three (!) year old boy. There are definitely time that people close to us have questioned our parenting choices and have labeled us as "over-protective" for helping Kai to work through situations that arise when playing with others. That is a moment that helped me to realize that we are absolutely doing the right things (you know...most of the time...). Back on the trail lots of racing and stick finding and a little tousling among the little boys occurred. We had a picnic after the hike and then played at a playground until it was declared time to head home. Kai was a champ at pushing a merry-go-round and jumping on while it was spinning. A pretty impressive feat if you ask me. And a skill that will be hard to show off as I am pretty sure that is one of the handful of merry-go-grounds still in existence. We will definitely have to head back to High Cliff for a fall family hike and to show Jake his merry-go-round prowess.
Sorry for no pictures. Rest assured that Kai and his friends were adorable and at times dirty. I may be able to update with some pictures later since other moms do not have the same slacker tendencies in the camera department.
Then, this week we went hiking with our camping friends, plus another mom and toddler, Heather and Gracie Jean, from the Attachment Parenting group. Snoopy came along and I was surprised by the trail that was chosen but Kai and Snoopy both did fantastic. Up and down hills, over rocks, near shears...it was impressive. During the hike, Gracie Jean was less than thrilled with the activity early on and sat down to express that feeling. Kai heard her crying and told me, "I want to hug her!" and "help her feel better", then took off back up the trail to where she was sitting. He gave her a hug and helped her mom to encourage her to get back on the trail. They all came down holding hands. Was this mama ever proud! I am not sure that there could be anything better than such a sweet display of empathy from a nearly three (!) year old boy. There are definitely time that people close to us have questioned our parenting choices and have labeled us as "over-protective" for helping Kai to work through situations that arise when playing with others. That is a moment that helped me to realize that we are absolutely doing the right things (you know...most of the time...). Back on the trail lots of racing and stick finding and a little tousling among the little boys occurred. We had a picnic after the hike and then played at a playground until it was declared time to head home. Kai was a champ at pushing a merry-go-round and jumping on while it was spinning. A pretty impressive feat if you ask me. And a skill that will be hard to show off as I am pretty sure that is one of the handful of merry-go-grounds still in existence. We will definitely have to head back to High Cliff for a fall family hike and to show Jake his merry-go-round prowess.
Sorry for no pictures. Rest assured that Kai and his friends were adorable and at times dirty. I may be able to update with some pictures later since other moms do not have the same slacker tendencies in the camera department.
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