A family weekend

We had a busy weekend, even though the weather was a bit dreary - more rain mixed with snow! Today is gorgeous and sunny and it has inspired me to share our weekend with you. My husband was off work this weekend so we had a surprise weekend together! We rarely get weekends off together, and very infrequently when we are just staying home, so it was a real treat to spend the entire weekend spending time with our daughter and each other.

Saturday we went across to visit the Home Depot, the local garden show, and the nursery over there. We saw some spring flowers, ran into some friends, and even wound up heading up to Duck Camp. My husband's family owns 40 acres up on the reservation in the highlands, where they gather in the fall to hunt ducks. His family has been going up to that area since his father was young, so its a fond family tradition for him.

Because we live so close (45 minutes vs. the rest of his family at 3-5 hours away), we get to go there more regularly, and really like it up there in the spring. Little M loved playing in the dirt and twigs, and my husband cleared a tree that had fallen down over the road into camp. We saw some ducks and other wildlife, but I'll let my husband share those over on his outdoors blog. We're hoping to get across to camp over at Duck Camp for one or two nights in the near future, but I'm trying to hold off until its a bit warmer at night, and until Little M is sleeping better during the night! (nothing like waking up every 2 hours in a small enclosed tent, even to this bundle of cuteness...)

Sunday we had a lazy morning and then in the afternoon we finally finished pruning the fruit trees, and started clearing up all the cut branches. We scouted out some trees to cut down by the creek, to keep my husband busy today for firewood for next winter as well as to thin the area for fire protection. We live in a fire-based ecosystem after all! I remember the week we moved in there was a day where there were about 6 small wildfires burning around the house - none closer than a 1.5 mile, but all in our creek drainage or just over the rise into the next canyon. We were pretty quick in making sure we had insurance on the place, that's for sure!

I also got some more painting done in the kitchen (hopefully we will finish that project soon and I can share the bright new color we chose for in there, it looks so bold!). I meant to work more on the trim around the doorways (yup, still working on that project...) but I just didn't have time. I also meant to start some more seeds, but that didn't happen either! I guess it was just a 'working on ongoing projects' sort of weekend.