First off, a Happy Father's Day to my dad who is currently in Pond Inlet in Nunavet. He has the heart of an adventurer and I appreciate his `go for it' attitude. He is sleeping in his airplane tonight and trying to figure out a new route as his next planned stop will not have the fuel that he needs for another 2 weeks.
Onto our Father's Day celebrating Gary. When I first met him 13 years ago, there were 3 things that attracted me to him; he was a Christian who loved the outdoors and was great with kids. I knew early on that he would make an awesome father and that was just really...hot.
Gary truly is a great dad. He involves them with everything (therefore spending quality time and teaching skills), he wrestles with them, and he shows them how to love and respect those around him by example.
{Taken in front of Trisha's garage door pre-hike, I actually really love the colour of this door!}
To celebrate Father's Day this year, we went to church and then headed out to Abbotsford to my sister Trisha's house. We were going on a family hike but decided not to take Nya. This may have been the first family outing with her. I felt really bad but I know that Miss Independent would want to walk the whole thing and we did not have 10 hours of patience with us. She was thrilled to have some play time with cousin Hannah so I know she had a great time.
To be honest, it was so easy without her. The boys are great hikers and therefore I had my hands free to take photos and just relax. Poor Nya, we'll take you some time!
I just need to take a break from the talk of hiking to show you teenage Kai. Okay, so he's 7.5 years old, but still, when did he stretch out to become so thin and tall?
All right, back to the hike. We decided to hike McKee Peak as it's short, close, and still a bit of a challenge. In the past we have hiked the Grouse Grind and Lower Falls with the kids so this was a sort of `in between' hike for them. Before reaching the trail, Koen said over and over again, `I don't want to do a hike' and then 30 seconds into the hike he was saying `I love this! This is so fun!'. That kid.
It took about 45 minutes to get to the top. Kai is definitely the fastest of all of us. Koen said he felt close to giving up but never did. He also talked THE ENTIRE TIME. That kid.
There are a lot of mountain bikers heading up this trail but then they take the side trails down. It's just a nice steady incline.
Our boys do not sit still for a picture. This was as good as it got.
In the picture above, Koen was pretty sure he got stinging `medals'. Nope, he didn't.
And, the true motivator. Chocolate covered blueberries halfway up. Yum.
There's a beautiful meadow at the top. At this point we were about 1 minute from the end so they took off running pretending they were in Amazing Race. Gary and I placed second in case you were wondering.
By this time it was raining so we started heading back down. We stopped to have chicken salad wraps under the tree. Thank you Gary for making your own Father's Day lunch.
You can tell in the photo above that Kai has just a few chocolate covered blueberries in his mouth. He likes to savour things and will suck on them for as long as possible.
Had it not been raining, the view would've been pretty nice but this gives you an idea.
It took about 30 minutes to get down. At this point we were really wet but the boys were still having fun. I bet there are a ton of geocaches in the area but we didn't even think about it beforehand.
Then, it was off to get Miss Nya who had a fantastic time with Hannah. Thanks for watching her, Trish!
Our plan is to do a hike per week this summer. I need to figure out a way for Nya to stay in the Ergo or backpack without trying to fling herself out or screaming `I do it!' the whole time.
I hope you had a good weekend. If you have any local hikes that you'd recommend with kids, please let me know! I'll be keeping you posted on some throughout the summer. Yahoo, I said `summer'!!
Love, Louise
Exactly what Ali said! Would love to do a hike with you guys sometime this summer...it could be a competition between Koen and Adam for talking :)
ReplyDeleteYou look great Louise! Looks like a nice day.
ReplyDeleteSo funny, this post was about a hike and all three of you posted on how I look! I do like my Costco jean jacket :)
ReplyDeleteTerri-yes! Oh my goodness, I told Koen that he would have way more energy if he stopped talking and it seriously lasted 2 seconds.
I love the stripes of your dress! The colors are great!!!! You look great! (I know that's what the other comments are about...but I still wanted to post it!)
ReplyDeleteYou guys are funny. The skirt is from the Banana Republic outlet store. And I do dress decently most of the time, okay, some of the time.
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