Sunday, September 25, 2011

Spur-of-the-moment Day

Today I woke up with one goal in mind: Apple picking.

Our orchard has produced pitiful amount of apples over the last SEVERAL years and even the good ones are riddled with scabs.

This year though... Tons of large crisp apples that are virtually spot-free. My Opa said he hasn't seen apples like this since he stopped spraying the trees for bugs. Like 25 years ago.

So after needing to convince Toby that going outside was a good idea, we donned our rubber boots, sweaters, hats and gloves and went out to the orchard. Opa was already out there pulling the Cortlands from the trees.

After about 15 minutes outside it got hot. Hats and sweaters were removed and we went on scavenging for apples in the tall grass and pulling the ones we could reach from the trees.





So by now it's too hot to work in the orchard. We sat by the front door and Toby started 'fixing nails' in the front step as I peeled the sweaty winter socks from my feet.

"Hey Toby, we should go to the beach"
"OK"
"Ok lets grab towels"

And off we went.

I have a Park Pass, so we decided to go to Bass Lake because it's shallow and warm and there would be no one there.
Toby marched off into the water and declared "Oooh it's kind of warm!!"
I walked over and stepped in. No it wasn't. Quite the opposite in fact. So I left the water play to Toby while I walked after him on the completely deserted beach.





When we'd had our fill of the beach we packed up and got in the car and then decided to drive around the campgrounds. I've never actually camped at Bass Lake because it's 15 minutes from our house, and usually our camping excursions take us to much farther places. However lately I've been thinking that this would be a good place to expose Toby to camping without being hours from home.
As we were driving around Toby declared that he wanted to go camping.

Well, ok. It's an amazing day. Let's go  home and throw a tent and some food in the car and then come back.
So off we went.
Toby came with me up to the storage room to dig out a tent, sleeping bags, mattresses, cook stove, pots, pans and a water jug. Then Toby bounced down the stairs declaring he was going inside.
Well.......... ok...... I will pack some food them while Toby watched tv or packs some toys.
Toby immediately became preoccupied with playing truck on the floor.

"Toby do you still want to go camping today? It's ok if you don't, I just dont want to pack the car if you're going to change your mind."
"Nope. Stay here."
"Seriously? Cause soon it will be too late to go."
"Yeah go camping."
"Ok...no... Toby.....if you want to go we should get some stuff together... otherwise we can just stya here and play."
"Yeah stay home"

I see. Part of was was a bit releaved, but part of me really wanted to go.
My dad happened to be home and he came down and mentioned what a great day it was, and I told him what we had been up to and that we were now debating whether to camp or not. We made a few comments on the weather....Then dad said: "Why don't we go canoeing?"

We'd been wanting to take Toby all summer. He had been given a life jacket when he was a baby and we had yet to use it anywhere. We figured he'd finally be old enough to actually sit in a canoe and not try to climb out and start freaking out or something. This summer it was always too hot or we were too busy or Toby was in the wrong mood. But today, we decided to just go for it.

We went back to our 'canoe shed' and loaded the canoe on the car roof and threw a bunch of paddles and life jackets and snacks in the car.
Off we went to Bass Lake again.






A 20 minute paddle was about all we lasted, but the fact that it all went so smoothly was amazing.

I'm usually an obsessive plan-aheader, and I still am, but sometimes doing things spur-of-the-moment is the only way to do them..


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