Erie Bay Christmas - boring is the new black

napping

We spent the majority of our Erie Bay holiday doing things that my kids might consider "boring" if we were at home.

It is always surprising to me how much a unique place can alter the nature of an otherwise boring task. Open windows, fresh air, new sounds and smells...   

We couldn't go anywhere (since our house was only accessible by boat) and we didn't have any technology to distract us... I must admit, I spent the first 15 hours wondering if we had made a catastrophic mistake.

But as we slowly recovered from our travel and started to settle into our temporary home, we hit a nice stride and were actually able to relax (a miraculous occurrence in this particular season of life.) 

coloring

swimming

Whenever we travel with our family (whether it be for one night or two weeks) I always spend a bit of time thinking about how I can make our place more "user-friendly" - for example - on this trip I moved all of the books off a bookshelf that was in our kitchen so that there was a place to put the things we used on a daily basis (crayons, sunblock, matchbox cars, goggles, etc). It took a little of time and effort, but made things run a tad bit more smoothly for the rest of the week.

I love this quote from Edith Schaeffer on the topic of homemaking "I am sure that there is no place in the world where your message would not be enhanced by your making the place (whether tiny or large, a hut or a palace) orderly, artistic and beautiful with some form of creativity, some form of art"

bathing (in a really cool outdoor tub)

painting

fishing