A Birthday Weekend

A birthday weekend

By Allan Olson

This long weekend went by in a flash. With no school Thursday and Friday because of conferences, the kids were at home driving mom nuts. They were supposed to be cleaning their rooms and making preparations for our youngest child’s fifth birthday.

Before I left for work on Friday, I informed the kids that if their rooms weren’t clean when I got back, their toys would go to a new home. Several hours later, I returned to find the rooms not cleaned – especially the girls’ room.

I delayed as long as I could before carrying out my threatened punishment. I gave them more chances than I probably should have, but even that didn’t matter. The girls room was still a mess, and the rule was that both rooms needed be cleaned.

While I might have been convinced to leave the boys’ toys in their room since they had their room mostly done, they let it be known that they were unhappy that I was taking anyone’s toys away, so I removed their toys as well. I hauled nearly all the toys in the house off to the garage. Four days later, the kids have all somehow survived that tortuous punishment, and their toys will remain in the garage – even their Legos – until they can learn to keep what few things they have left cleaned up – without complaining.

We had guests on Friday evening, and after a scrumptious meal of pork chops and rosemary potatoes, the visiting adults and my wife headed to town for a few needed items to finish the Scooby Doo cake for the birthday girl (made by her aunt). I gladly stayed home with all of the kids – seven of them ages 15-4.

On Saturday morning one of the invited families cancelled due to the rain/ice storm that struck the “Ice Box” of the nation at International Falls. Even with one family canceling, we still had plenty of family coming for the occasion, and a grand time was still had by all.

After a meal of homemade pizza (birthday girl’s request) along with a game of hide-and-seek in the house (it was wet and icky outside), we all enjoyed some birthday cake before the birthday girl opened all her nice presents.

That evening, all of our guests departed, and suddenly we found ourselves in a quiet house with some time to relax. We continued in that mode all the way into Sunday evening, and all did as little as possible. It was still too wet for the kids to play outside, so they terrorized the house and finished re-messing-up their rooms.

Not much is planned for this week except to try to get the house back in order for Thanksgiving, when we will once again host a house full of people – a scenario which for me is way better than having to travel somewhere.

My hunting plans are still tentative, since my party has filled all our tags and all the deer have been processed. I haven’t decided yet if I want to go stand in the cold to hunt with the other side of the family. As much as I enjoy hunting, the warmth and comfort of my home and bed is also very appealing.

Our geocaching adventures have been put on hold for the time being, and likely we won’t be doing much of those until the temps warm up in the spring. Although . . . there are still a few caches I would l like to find in Bemidji which wouldn’t be near any hunting grounds and I do have a few places in mind where I would like to hide some as well. Hmmm . . .

If you’re heading out in the woods to hunt, please remember this simple rule: “Be sure of your target – and beyond.” Always watch out for school buses on the roads, as they are carrying our children. Thanks for reading, and have a great and safe week.