Life since May

Lots has happened over the past few months. The most memorable has been our annual holiday up to the beach for the first three weeks in September. Our family looks forward to the hustle and bustle of life being over for three glorious weeks as we settle in to the enjoyment of being together! We make so many precious memories together: lazy days by the water, brilliant sunsets that light up the sky, cozy fires inside, brisk campfires outside with roasted hotdogs and marsh mellows, walk out in the forest and best of all - all of us enjoying each others company! This holiday was no exception. We visited the family homestead, gathered firewood from it's forest, and toured the old farm house. At the farm house we discovered relatives who wrote their signatures and the dates of they wrote them on the bricks in the old covered porch. There was one dated from 1938. It was incredibly interesting. A few months ago I read through one of my relatives diary, who lived in that house once upon a time. It was neat to read about how day to day life unfolded for the people who lived in that house. The house was occupied by tenants for the past few years but this year it stood open and we were able to take a peek inside. I walked through each room and down to the cellar to see where my relatives white washed their walls, where the wood was taken and stored, and food preserves kept. I walked through the kitchen were life teemed throughout the day, the old wood stove kept busy with breads and meals. I was struck by how huge the kitchen was and how small the bedrooms were. Life was so different back then, people didn't spend time in their rooms holed away they experienced a sense of community, working in the kitchen together, in the fields. My Grandma entered into the world in the main bedroom upstairs and there she lived and breathed, working along side her siblings. A school teacher stayed with them and taught them, my Grandma ran through the rooms, played and worked, she had a life, she had thoughts, she LIVED. I've had some opportunity to do research about that side of the family in the past few months. They came from London, England and settled that land together as a family. They went through hardships, death, loss, they saw the work of their hands come together as the land grew and teemed with the work of their labour. They are not just names on the paper of my family tree, these were some amazing people who came to an unknown country, knew not what lay ahead but pushed forward to settle a land and make a life for themselves. It was neat to tell my children about this, to have them walk the land, play in it's fields, brush their fingers across the signatures of the generations that came before them. That was one of the best parts of my holiday this year. :)

We also had friends join us the second week of our holiday. It was an amazing time of togetherness and memories made. We toured some falls, played in the sand with little care for time, ate meals together and sat around a campfire at night laughing and joking.

This is one of the best years we have had up there and I am thankful for the moments that were found inside of each of those days!