Gardens, Friends, and Canoes

     Did you have a beautiful weekend? A weekend full of laughter, friendship, sweet babies, and sunshine? I hope that you did. My weekend was just such a combination of goodness.
     On Saturday, Luke spent 12+ hours in Alexandria. He is a state delegate so he was being all political and getting the job done. We get to go to Duluth later this month for the next step of the convention. I must say I'm looking forward to that.
   Anyway, on Saturday, the Lovely Keren Ruth and I hung out. We decided to work on getting our garden ready for planting. Luke had tilled it up for us, so we headed out to the farm for a load of home grown fertilizer(of the goat variety). Luke's dad and brother loaded the truck with a huge pile of manure and after lunch we headed back to the house with our niece Mara. We brought her in case Mr. Ephraim decided he wasn't into gardening. But he ended up sleeping almost the entire time, so we put Mara to work.

Jonathan was being anti-picture. Mr. Ephraim didn't mind the spotlight though. 

    Then Saturday evening, we had a get together with a group of friends. My sweet friend Emily hosted and she planned a "Great Race" for us. Each couple worked as a team to solve clues, get to destinations and complete tasks. It was a lot of fun. Of course, since Luke was being Mr. Delegate for the day, he missed out. So I partnered up with Emily's daughter Sunita. She is 5 and we had an awesome time. One of the tasks was to spend $10 dollars on something for supper. Sunita decided we should get macaroni and cheese and ice cream sandwiches and I picked strawberries. 

     On Sunday, we celebrated my sweet mother-in-law's birthday at the Cobb's(My sister and brother-n-law and their kids) house. They live on the Mighty Mississippi River, so after lunch we spent some time playing outside. My good friend Katy and her kiddos were there as well so Nettie and I enjoyed a lazy canoe ride. Lazy for us anyway. We made Benjamin do all the rowing. (Below Photo credits to Katy)

 Apparently Luke and Ax share a love of cars. 

     All in all, it was one of those simply lovely weekends that you feel completely satisfied with by the end of it. Happy Monday. 

"Busy is a choice. Stress is a choice. Joy is a choice. Choose well." ~Unknown