A big hello to all our Femina friends!
I would describe the past month around here as overflowing with activities. Though you might have thought we had checked out completely, that would not be the case. Blogging is a get-to, not a have-to, and we haven’t “gotten to” in a while. Not that we haven’t had some smashing ideas, but they usually occur to us while we are in the midst of demanding activities, like keeping these boats of ours afloat. And whenever we get a free minute, those smashing ideas evaporate into thin air. Some call it writers’ block; I call it a blog jam.
Tonight we are all getting back from a week-long vacation. We’ve flipped over the page on the calendar, and we are now looking at the long lovely months of June, July and August. Ahh. Summer.
Doug and I started off a week ago by heading to Lynnwood, Washington for a family conference, which felt a little like a family reunion. It was wonderful to reconnect with old friends and be encouraged by what God is doing over on the Eastside.
Then we did something we have wanted to do for about thirty-seven years….we took the ferry to Victoria, B.C. and spent a couple of days exploring that beautiful city and taking in all the top-of-the-tourists’-list activities like tea at the Empress and the knock-out gardens of Butchart. Doug said those gardens were worth the whole trip. But we also found a perfect little used bookstore and unearthed some treasures. (Book shopping is much easier when you drive your car…lots of room for books and no weight restrictions.)
Then we headed south to meet up with all the rest of the clan on the Oregon beaches, which was having unheard-of-for-the-end-of-May sunny weather. I just finished shaking the sand out of our shoes and setting them outside to dry off. Heather got some good surfing time in, the grandkids need no help figuring out what to do with a beach, and we spent some great bonfire-on-the-beach time last night, drinking cocoa and listening to the crashing waves.
So now it is officially summer. Bekah and I have finished the school year: Hoorah! (We teach high-school literature classes, and we’re just as excited as the kids to end the year!) Heather, Bekah, and Lizzy will be adjusting to their kids being footloose. And it feels very smart of us all to have already had our vacation! That is a real accomplishment!
Rachel is due with her baby boy in August, and, hot news, she is also writing her next book. I expect she’ll birth that manuscript before she births this new son (Lord willing, that is the plan).
My downstairs bedrooms are booked for a couple weeks with grandkids visiting. Merkle kids will be here while Ben and Bekah go to Oxford in July so Ben can wrap up his dissertation. My Wilson grandkids will be here while their folks do a trip to NYC.
My yard is looking very much like a jungle in need of a haircut. Doug laid down the fertilizer before we left, and it did its work while we were gone. After visiting the Butchart Gardens (see that gorgeous picture above), I’m feeling very inspired indeed. But they have fifty or so full-time gardeners, so I must pace myself.
So onward! And happy June to you all!
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Sounds like much to be thankful for! I’m sure you’ve made many new sweet memories. The picture is beautiful. (The trees look familiar, but I don’t know what they’re called.)
Happy Summer!
Lovely to hear from you and very glad you got to visit somewhere you really wanted to. I love that photo. What a great idea to fix all that dead grass area underneath a tree! Kinda falls into the ‘why didn’t I think of that?’ category. We have mostly evergreens (eucalypts) where I live, so there is always that ‘patch’ that looks awful. Now I have a solution. Thank you!
Enjoy your summer.
In Him
Meredith
Yay, you went!
Yay, you’re back!
I’ve missed your musings and exhortations!
Happy Summer!
It sounds like you had a wonderful time. I love your picture — I need to add those gardens to my bucket list 🙂
Sounds like a lovely trip 🙂 I’d also like to recommend the San Juan islands next time you’re in that neck of the woods. My husband and I took a brief side trip to Friday Harbor on our Last Great Roadtrip before leaving Cali and enjoyed it so much. There’s a great little lighthouse where you can hang your hammock and just watch the whales go by. Definitely a trip highlight for us.
I love to hear about the day to day life of you and your families, Mrs. Wilson. Thank you for sharing all of this with us. It is its own grace to our hearts.
My husband and I just celebrated our fifth anniversary last week, and our honeymoon was spent in Victoria ~ so you reminded me to bring out the scrapbook and enjoy those gardens & our own Empress tea in my memory today. 🙂
Grace and peace.
Welcome back Mrs Wilson! I took to reading all your archived posts to get my fill of Wilson wisdom. Good to have you back! Literally did a big ol happy dance when I read that Rachel is working on another book. Yaaaaaayyy!!
And I’m not anonymous! I’m Sandy! oops!
Haha! My husband calls it “Maymageddon!” June is very welcome at our house too, Nancy!
My family had the funniest experience this evening in Spokane. Every time we turned around there was a Wilson or two walking past. You are a busy bunch!
Missy,
So your family must have been all over the place too! Next time holler at us and say hi!!
We were up in Spokane for the Hugh Laurie concert at the old Fox Threater. He was just fantastic, and we loved the show. Doug calls that kind of music “Slop Kettle Blues.” It was crazy good!
Doug has had the week off so we are wrapping things up and heading home.
Cheers!
I heard that’s why there were Wilson everywhere. I heard it was a fun evening. I actually didn’t see YOU…..and the four or so times I past your men, they were engrossed in conversation. Or walking really fast. Looking very busy.
Beautiful picture, and so nice to see when we have just entered winter, and all our gardens look quite different to that (Tasmania – VERY bottom of Australia – go further south and you hit Antarctica). It’s nice to be reminded of the seasons God has created, and the different beauties they all bring!
Also, wonderful to hear that you have all been busy with good fun things, and that that is the reason for your “blog jam” 🙂
Hooray for another book from (Lizzie? Rachel?, I still can’t figure that out! haha)…Her first was such an encouragement, I recommend it to all my mom friends!
YES!! So excited about Rachel’s next book!! Will it have the same general subject (all about parenting) as Loving the Little Years? ‘Cause I thought her thoughts on pregnancy were pretty awesome, too. 🙂
Lovely to see Butchart again in bloom. I visited this past March, and enjoyed the many shades of green!
Best wishes to the Merkles. 🙂
Thanks for sharing, Nancy!
Blessings!
Thanks for the reminder that blogging is a ‘get-to.’ It’s so tempting to feel virtually pressured by the blogging community to write every day and guilty when you’re too busy living to write. Must not let the virtual command the actual.