Hanging out with family


Hanging out with family
By Allan Olson
As always – time flies when you’re having fun – as was the case this weekend. We headed north to International Falls on Saturday about noon for what turned out as we had hoped – a fun filled weekend with family.
We arrived at our destination at my cousin’s home, somewhere around the 2 p.m. mark, the kids piled out the door and their two kids were looking for us out the window when we arrived and soon the younger three kids disappeared into the depths of the house – often making their presence known by their noise.
The adults sat around visiting and then my cousin and I decided to head out in search of a couple caches with our boys– one I didn’t find last time I attempted to find a cache in that area and the other was one he hadn’t found before.  The girls chose to stay at home and Nikolai went to another cousin’s house and we only saw him for a few minutes until the next morning when he was dropped off – the arrangement was perfect for everyone.
 We went 50/50 on those two – I quickly found the one I couldn’t before – how I missed it the first time, I’m not sure and the other was an extensive search on a pile of granite rocks and we just couldn’t locate it, even after some help from a friend who had previously located the cache. We then stopped by my cousin’s parent’s camper and visited with them for a few minutes before setting off for just one more cache. We watched a beaver on the shore sitting so still it looked like it was a statue before it decided to go for a swim in the murky Rat Root River. After watching it for a few minutes and capturing a few photos we set out in search of the cache and we were soon rewarded with the find.
Our next stop – some food for the grill and some “beverages” for the adults, we proceeded to the store picked out some food for the grill to fill our hungry spot and some liquid to quench our thirst, with our items bought we headed to the house to eat, drink and be merry.
We visited and enjoyed some food and then another cousin (our host’s sister) dropped by for a visit. The time continued to fly by as we sat around the table talking and laughing and soon it was well after 11 p.m. and sometime around midnight we all finally decided to get some sleep.
The next morning we enjoyed a nice breakfast by the host family and started packing our bags and the vehicle. We ventured towards home sometime around the noon hour – about 24 hours after we left the day prior, finally reaching our front doors around 2:30 p.m. The kids unpacked the vehicle, fed the pets and after supervising those jobs I worked on my boat for a little while – using a grinding wheel to get some of the many years of paint and grime off it in my hopes to get it re-painted in the next week or two and hopefully even in the water this month.
Next in line for the afternoon’s activities – was a nap. I admit it, I’m not too old for a nap, if this thing called work didn’t interfere on a daily basis I think I might nap every afternoon, anyway I closed my eyes hoping to just rest for only an hour or maybe just a little more, sometime two plus hours later – I woke up and crawled my way out of bed – not feeling refreshed – just tired, perhaps caffeine would’ve been the better choice.
The weekend was truly a lot of fun visiting with my cousin and family and we look forward to hosting the next get together.
No real plans have been put into motion this weekend as of yet – aside from dad and kids doing the cooking, baking – etc on Sunday for Mother’s Day.
Thanks to everyone for reading, and as always, please be safe while enjoying your favorite outdoor recreational activity and on the lakes, and remember to take pictures to preserve a lifetime of memories. Remember to drive safely, and watch out for those buses carrying our children. Thanks for reading, and have a great week! For more of my columns visit: http://allan-crazykids.blogspot.com.



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