Saturday was rainy, here in town.
Early in the afternoon, I packed an overnight bag and went south to Tyler and Megan’s place. We hitched the horse trailer up, loaded Harvey, buckled the kids into the pickup and drove to Russel, Minnesota for a rodeo.
We drove west until we’d left all the clouds behind. In Russel, it was a gorgeous, sunny, slightly breezy warm night. Perfect for spending a few hours sitting on a grassy hill, watching cowboys and girls compete in ropin’, ridin’ and cattle rastlin’ events.
As soon as we set up our camp on the hillside, I made a run to the biff. There was one young man in a hat waiting outside the two stalls and I asked him if he were in line. He said “Yes” and smiled.
Oh, I thought, what a shame Josie’s not here. Yeah, he was cute.
I have no idea if he was competing or not, I didn’t see him again.
Megan’s event, breakaway roping, was early. She rode her big gray, Harvey and wore a salmon pink shirt and was easy to pick out of the crowd of cowgirls waiting in the pasture behind the arena. She was one of only four women able to catch the calf but her time was slow so she didn’t finish in the money. Still, she had fun.
After her event, she put Harvey up in the grass near the trailer, changed into a t-shirt and joined us for a dinner of hotdogs, nachos and ice cream. We watched mutton busters, calf wrestlers, barrel riders and bull riders as the sun set over the gorgeous prairie of western Minnesota.
We got the kids in their jammies so we could shovel them asleep into bed when we got home.
Sunday morning, Ty and Megan reloaded the pickup and we switched the kids’ car seats to my van. We drove back to town as Ty and Megan went off to another rodeo.
Driving into town, I had the Beatles Red Album on. Babydoll didn’t care for the first song “Girl”, which is pretty slow and atmospheric but she loved what followed. She sang along to “Yellow Sublamine” with gusto.
After church, we met Katie P, MJ and all the kids + a friend of Nanners at the band stand. The clouds and humidity of Saturday were long gone. Sunday was a perfect early summer (okay, late spring) day. It was hot, sunny, clear, dry and breezy.
Our perfect day was nearly derailed at the beginning when I couldn’t find my stroller. I use a double that MJ found at a garage sale years ago. Its not a great stroller but the price was right. I have no idea how to fold or unfold it. We’ve had to clear out our garage this spring and I couldn’t find where the stroller had been stashed.
Jay called from the tournament he was scouting in the nick of time and told me he’d stashed it in the garage loft.
Only a man could think that springtime was the season to stash the stroller in the rafters. With my one good arm (the tendonitis in my right wrist is not getting better), I hauled out the step ladder and tossed the stroller to the floor. It didn’t break and we made it to the lake before MJ.
We all met up at the bandstand, which was appropriately crowded with happy people spending a wonderful day off in a beautiful spot in town. The mornings sailboat races were done but the lake was covered with sail boats, kayaks, canoes and paddle boarders. Walkers, bikers, skaters and strollers filled the paths but not to the point of congestion.
As usual, Babydoll, Nanners and Bean were delighted to see each other, as were Babalouie and Tatertot. Tot just got his summer hair cut: high and tight. Judging by the ear to ear grin he sported all day, I’d say he likes it that way.
First, we walked our little parade down to the rose gardens. Most of the roses aren’t blooming yet but the garden is already spectacular, with the iris, peonies and early bloomers shining like pennies in the sun. We ran through the gardens to the turtle fountain, where we sat and let the kids run circles around the fountain, lean over the edge and splash and finally abandon all decorum and jump in. The big girls splashed around the fountain and even got daring enough to stroll under the spray issued from the turtles’ mouths. The littler kids were content to lean in and splash their hands in the water.
Eventually, we headed back to the bandstand. There, we found the shortest line at the ice cream window. Katie couldn’t stay any longer: Adam was coming back home after a week-long fishing trip and even the lure of ice cream wasn’t enough to keep her with us any longer. That’s a good thing.
Babalouie, who still takes a nap around noon most days, had fallen asleep on the way back from the rose gardens. I made the tactical error of not ordering any ice cream for him. My foolish plan was to sit Babydoll (all the other kids got cups but she insisted on a cone)with MJ and the others while I pushed Babalouie around in the stroller to keep him asleep.
Ha.
Of course, he popped awake the second we got our ice cream and stepped out of line.
Fortunatley, MJ who is far wiser with little kids than I am right now, had a cup of chocolate for herself. She immediately gave up her ice cream to Babalouie and a crisis was averted. She shared the sorbet she’d bought for Tot. It was his first and he took to it like a natural.
Babydoll had all the expected troubles with her cone that come with a small mouth and a hot day. We had to return for more napkins three times and I helped her by biting off large chunks of ice cream. It was all worth it for the pictures I got of her with chocolate ice cream all over her face. She managed to get some on her forehead.
After that, what could we do but head up the hill for a trolley ride?
It was a nice way to spend a half an hour off our feet in the shade while all that ice cream settled in our bellies. Over at Lake Calhoun, the wind seemed much stronger than it had at Harriet. That lake was also covered with sailboats and windsurfers. You rarely see surfers on Harriet anymore: there’s nowhere on shore conducive to launching a board. Calhoun, on the other hand, has many nice, flat spaces on the shoreline.
After the trolley ride, we went up the hill to the play ground.
Like everywhere else, the playground was filled with Sunday picnickers and kids having a ball.
Its very hard for two adults to keep track of six little kids in a crowded playground, even if one of the kids can’t walk.
MJ and I spent an hour or so just trying to track them all. Fortunately, Babydoll and Bean stuck together most of the time. Babalouie wanted me to bring him up to the top of the giant play system so he could go down the slide. I told him if he was too little to get up, he was too little to go down. He found some smaller pieces to play on and he loves digging in the sand. Then his sister found another way to get to the top which didn’t include climbing up a giant spider web, so he was able to go down one of the long, high, twisty slides after all. He decided that he preferred digging in the sand.
Once everyone was good and dirty and showing signs of sunburn, despite the multiple applications of spray, we decided to call it a day. We’d been at the lake for four hours.
We walked the back way, through the woods to get back to where we’d parked our cars. I thought for sure the kids would fall asleep on the five minute ride back to my house but they didn’t. Filling them up with ice cream probably made that idea a pipe dream.
Jay got home right after we did. He’d stopped and bought flowers for the back yard on his way home. The kids were more than happy to help him plant them in the back yard.
The rest of the evening was spent watching Looney Toons on the porch, eating dinner on the deck and playing baseball in the grass.
Turns out the canned ravioli from Aldi was a hit with the kids.
Tyler and Megan got back from the rodeo around 8:00 and Jay threw the steaks he’d defrosted on the grill. By then, Zack had returned from his day on the lake with a crowd of friends.
Oh, and Megan posted a 2.6 second breakaway to finish in the money at her rodeo!
Babalouie had a little plastic bat and a real baseball that Jay pitched to him while the steaks were on the grill. When Coach had to stop playing, to tend to the meat, Babalouie got very teary and said, picking up the ball “I can’t do this by myself.”
No Grandma with a heart could have sat idly by.
I pitched to him until it got too dark to see.
He doesn’t really know if he’s left or right handed but he seems to prefer batting righty at the moment. I told him to keep his eye on the ball and he did. When he tried to throw the ball back to me, I told him to look at me while he threw and before long, he was throwing them straight at me!
Best of all, before the game was called on account of darkness, he actually connected for six hits!
The first time he hit the ball, everyone on the deck yelled at him to run! He immediately took off on a circuit of the back yard while they chanted “First…second…third…HOME!” Coach yelled “Slide!” and Babalouie hit the grass, sliding in for an inside the yard homer.
Six hits!
Rose garden, fountain swimming, ice cream, trolley ride, park, planting flowers, playing baseball and nearly a personal best at the rodeo.
Summer of ’16 is off to an awesome start!