While Jeff and I were in Puerto Rico we talked a lot about what we want our family to be like. We had all these really exciting, total head in the clouds, discussions about all the cool, unconventional things we want to do with our kids: go sail around the world and home school for a year, go and live in a small village in the jungle of Guatemala where Jeff served his mission and run a small “finca” (farm), buy an island in southeast Asia and live off of tropical fruit and coconut milk, go and camp on my dad’s wilderness land for a whole summer and build a log cabin on our own (we did this growing up….yep, with 9 kids in tow….my parents were UNCONVENTIONAL). Then we woke up from our dream and remembered that we have a job and a mortgage and no trust fund. So, we decided that we’d have to find cheaper, more doable (given our current constraints) ways to satisfy our craving for family adventure. We decided that at least once a month we’d have a Shumway Family Adventure Saturday. We’re lucky because our kids are all at the ages where almost anything we call an “adventure” is one. And somehow, just calling something an adventure makes it much more fun for us as well. 
Our first “adventure” was to Wingersheek Beach up in Glouster. Jeff almost always misses out on our beach days and it was so great to be there all together. Jeff get’s almost as excited about finding cool things in tide pools and low tides as the kids do, so it’s great to have him around. We stayed all the way through sunset. It was lovely. 
And Hazel loved it. She is a beach girl ---- she can never get enough of looking for treasures at low tide. 
And I love her because she is a total poser. She can’t get enough of the camera, and neither can I (obviously). 
hooray for family adventure!
Please post ideas for any future adventures in the Boston area….and please join us if you’re local!
I started an email list that I use to send out fun things to do in Boston/New England: bostonfamilyfun@yahoogroups.com. Send me an email and I'll add you (patton_ellen@hotmail.com).
ReplyDeleteI love that idea Saydi! I think you shouldn't give up the dream of sailing around the world with kids in tow...that's my dream, too. I wish we lived closer so we could have more adventures together. Thanks for your kind words today. Love you!!
ReplyDeleteWhat a grand adventure. Wish I'd had your camera and your eye when we were adventuring with our fam! What I wouldn't give for some fabulous photos of those first adventures before we got a decent camera. Still, there's now way I can get your Eye!
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