The Wilkins: July 2020

Wednesday, July 22, 2020

New Wasaga Beach

We took a trip with some family friends to a (somewhat) local beach. We left early so we could get there by nine (I wasn't sure what the parking would be like especially since its at half capacity right now due to COVID, plus the younger kids do better earlier in the day). It was pretty empty for the first few hours, so that was really nice. Of course, the kids had to start eating their lunch as soon as we got everything set up, but we had enough lunch and snacks to last throughout our time there. It was really windy, which made the waves pretty big. The kids loved playing in them and we got to see a bunch of kite surfing. My favorite part of the day was playing a game of running away from the waves and they washed in with Natalie in my arms. She was delighted by this game and after our third time of playing it, she wanted to get in the water herself. She wanted to just run right in, so I had to hold on to her and keep her up far enough not to get drowned when the big waves hit. The kids also enjoyed digging in the sand and Trevor especially loved getting buried in the sand and making sand angels. One of my friends has teenage daughters and another doesn't have any kids, so with everyone helping, I hardly had to watch the kids, except Natalie who doesn't like to be away from mom for too long. We were only planning to stay for the morning, but ended up staying about 6 hours. Everyone had a bit of a sunburn when we got home (except Asher who never let me put sunscreen on his face on got a big sunburn) and everyone was exhausted from all the fun. We plan to go again at least once more this summer.

Here's Heidi running in big circles, racing the waves. She did this solo several times for 15-20 minutes at a time

Here's the best I could get of the kite surfers

Here's one of Trevor's spontaneous, blissful sand-angels

Monday, July 20, 2020

Raspberry Picking

One of our summer traditions since we've been in Canada is to pick raspberries. They are ripe right around Asher's birthday, so its always easy for me to remember when we should go. This year, we went on the perfect day, first thing in the morning. With all the older kids picking (Natalie had to stay in her stroller so she wouldn't wander into trouble) we had three full baskets in less than 20 minutes. We used them to make raspberry shakes that evening, made a raspberry pie the next night, the kids each ate several large handfuls each, then we finished them off with Asher's birthday waffles. They went so fast, but they were so good. I almost want to go pick some more to make another raspberry pie!

Sunday, July 19, 2020

Asher is NINE!

Our sweet Asher is nine years old! He's so big physically and also very mature (most of the time) so he already seems at least nine if not older. He is one of the friendliest kids I've ever seen- he will happily play with ANY kid around (from one year olds up to teenagers) and has a strong need for social interaction. He likes to direct the play, but he'll also go along with whatever someone else wants to do. He is an avid reader, has a major sweet tooth, loves to help me cook and especially bake, loves all things science, can't sit still for long unless he is very engaged in a book or activity, and is extremely interested in farming (the big machines seem to be his biggest attraction, but he's also interested in the actual farming). We started his big day with the traditional chocolate waffles, he opened his presents, then spent the rest of the day playing with the coding robot kit from his grandparents. Asher asked for a cookie cake (something I've never made before and we just kind of winged it, adding ice cream) and wanted pot pie for dinner. We had a family game night in the evening, which was kind of like a party for him. We didn't do a big friend party, mostly because he had one last year and because of the social distancing stuff, but he did have one friend over the day before his birthday for popsicles and playing a card game (they play together all day long anyway most days, so it was just a little different than usual). Asher is a fantastic big brother, is so loving (he gives me a big bear hug at least once a day), and is a pleasure to be around. We are so happy to have him in our family!

Austin and Asher have been working on a scroll saw that Asher used all his saved money (plus a little extra we gave him for his birthday present) to buy. It is old and needs cleaning and refurbishing, so they are using it as a fun project to do together. Asher is excited to get it done so he can start doing some woodworking like his dad!