A Beautiful April Weekend

It's looking like spring in Michigan! Everything is in bloom and the weather is warming up. We had wonderful weather this last weekend. On Saturday, it was in the upper 70's to low 80's. As you can imagine, we spent a lot of time outside enjoying the weather. Friday night, Alex went to a hockey game with a church friend's family. Spencer went on an overnight 11-year-old campout with his boy scout troop. Fathers were strongly encouraged to accompany their sons so Joshua went as well. Jessica, Logan and I took a bike ride to the park.

Here's Spencer doing his favorite camping activity --
Playing in the campfire.

Eating breakfast after a long, cold night sleeping in the tent.

Spencer and Josh had plenty of room in our 10-man tent.
(Ours is the one on the right).

On Saturday morning, Jessica, Alex, Logan and I met some friends at a free morning matinee showing of "Eragon" at a local movie theater. We saw it when it came out in December and really liked it so we thought we'd take advantage of the opportunity to see it again for free. Afterwards, we met Spencer and Joshua at Spencer's soccer game. He had a double-header that day. During the first game, Spencer scored 2 goals and they won 6 - 2. He's become a really good soccer player! With every new soccer season, he becomes a more determined and aggressive player! He knows how to handle the ball well and take it across the field to score. His best attribute in the game is speed. He is everywhere, all over the field! The other players can always count on Spencer to be there to pass the ball to. Anyway, after the first game ended, Spencer's team only had 15 minutes to rest before their second game. They had already played several hours in the heat and were pretty tired. It was obvious about halfway through the second game when they started to slow down. Spencer was especially tired since he had been camping the night before and got very little sleep. We could tell how worn-out he was as we watched him play, but he didn't give up. He still played as hard as he could. Because everyone was so hot and tired, their coach decided to switch the team's strategy to concentrate on defense rather than offense. They were already ahead 4 -1 so he thought it'd be better for them if they concentrated their efforts on keeping the other team from scoring instead of trying to score themselves. The plan worked and the other team didn't score again. I was the "Snack Mom" that week so after the game was over, I passed out snacks and drinks to all the players. I'm glad I had plenty of drinks on hand. They were thirsty!

We spent the remainder of our Saturday afternoon getting our deck furniture out and putting up our new gazebo and wicker furniture. It looks so nice and is very comfortable. I also put lights on the inside of the gazebo so we can enjoy our backyard in the evening as well. On Sunday after church and also after going to a friend's house for lunch, we spent a lot of our afternoon outside enjoying the weather and our new furniture.

(click on any picture to see it enlarged)

Our wicker furniture and fire pit under our new gazebo.

The outside of the gazebo

Our deck

We've had this table for several years.
It's on the other side of the deck now.

When not in use, we cover up the furniture to protect it.

Jessica's new spring Sunday dress she wore to church.

On Monday morning, Spencer left from school to go to fifth grade camp. He's there now until Friday and I'm sure he's having tons of fun. He'll be staying in a cabin with 4 other boys from his class. It'll be the longest time he's been away from the family on his own. Joshua gave him a blessing on Sunday night before bed and we had extensive talks on how to keep himself safe. I've had a calm feeling about him being gone so I'm sure everything is fine. This is a good experience for him. I'm sure he'll come home with amazing stories. I sent a disposable camera with him. We'll see what pictures come home....

Spencer on the bus before heading to camp!