The Craftiest Workshop

We drove to Edmonton last weekend to attend the wedding of my nephew. Our two sons living in Fort McMurray drove down and our other son, Thomas, flew in from Ottawa. We were seated at different tables during the reception so we didn’t do much visiting at the actual wedding. The music was pretty loud during the dance so conversation was limited. We did have the chance to visit a bit at the hotel as we did stay two nights. There were conversations with Matthew about his new girlfriend, work and his quest to buy a new car. Jonathan talked about work, his gardening and how things are going with the house there. After the wedding, the two boys headed back to Fort McMurray and Thomas drove with us to a Grande Prairie.

Aside from a few trips into town for groceries, we pretty much just stayed out at our acreage. I asked Thomas if he was interested in touring around but he chose to stay and hang out at our place. He said our house is much bigger than his apartment and he could walk outside to wander about whenever he wanted.

He got to feed the chickadees and watched a moose trot past. When I think of the two things I love the most about living out of town, those would top my list; hand feeding the birds and watching wildlife. He began mimicking us, checking out the window a few times daily with the binoculars.

We got his help with a few manual labour things outside. He helped me move some fallen trees closer to the house so I can cut them down to make some more garden beds in the spring. One he had to pull with a rope as it was so heavy. He also helped Chris move the heavier patio furniture under the deck for the winter. He also managed to untangle and pull some old Christmas lights that were hung around the pond from about ten years ago. Most of the days this past week were rainy or blustery so much of the time was spent indoors.

We chatted about his friends, money, health issues, his job and have a better understanding of his day to day when he is at home.

We share the love of learning a new board game. We had temporarily kept many games that we had tried while having the board game café in the basement in anticipation of Thomas’ visit. On Monday, we started making our way through those games. A few of them just Thomas and I played but, for the majority, it was the three of us. My only claim, after playing all these games, is that I did not lose every game…just most of them.

It is nice to slow down your own life and just spend time with your kids. There is a certain comfort sharing the same space and, because you know so much about each other, there are no awkward pauses or forbidden subjects of conversation.