Country Living Equals Dirt and Adventure!
This is the perfect time of year to move to the country. The kids and I are enjoying school work on the back porch and long afternoons in the front yard swinging and playing.
I’ve never been one to worry about bathing my kids on a regular schedule, but here there is no getting around it. In Charlotte the kids bathtub looked clean for two weeks after cleaning day, here it sports a black ring after just one bath!
We head outside in clean clothes, and with clean faces. 10 minutes later every face is dirt streaked, every pair of pants is full of grass stains, and their feet are black with dirt! If I manage to skip a day between baths, they must, at minimum, sit on the side of the tub and wash their feet, hands and faces or their sheets would be black!
All the kids love to ride on Mac-Mac’s golf cart. They all get turns to drive with the help of an adult, but Miriam is already capable of driving completely independently. I don’t even know how to turn the golf cart on, but she can do it all! When I need to head back to the house to change Jonathan’s diaper Miriam is my chauffeur.
Living creatures abound everywhere out here. We spend time gathering eggs from the neighbors chickens and playing with neighbor kitties. One night this week a skunk walked right by! Michael can’t wait for the frogs to come out, but he’s occupying himself searching for worms in the meantime. At anytime we can jump in the car to visit the farms of relatives and spend time with horses or cows. We also deal with other country life critters like ticks- yuck!
Other things are different here too. When Dad tore down part of an old shed to make a new one, instead of calling the city for a ‘bulk’ trash pickup we carried all the old materials to the burn pile. The kids thought that was the greatest adventure yet. They set the grass on fire several times while playing with long sticks and the open flames. Definitely not something their old ‘city-selves’ would have the opportunity to do.
There is a definite freedom here for the kids that didn’t exist when we lived in the city. It’s a new and different kind of adventuring. Between the rural area, living on a private road, and the fact that our neighbors are mostly extended family members the big kids have opportunity to roam and entertain themselves.
I spent part of my childhood living in the country–it’s definitely an awesome place to have the chance to explore and adventure as a kid!
Anytime one of your youngsters wants to wash a boat or car, send them over. Peyton and Michael look like they can handle a hose.
Looks like a wonderful place for the children. Such a beautiful post.
I grew up on a lake and found the best way to get my feet clean was heading down to the lake and take a quick stroll in the pea gravel along the shoreline.
Enjoy!!