Usually, spring clean-up at the cabin starts around Easter and we don’t actually start staying down there on the weekends until May. This year, however, we got an early start and the weather has got us feeling like it is summer already.

Last weekend, Chris invited his partners at work down for a day of golf (there is a golf course down there!) and then back to the cabin for a feast of smoked ribs. Everyone had a great time and it was nice to chat with people outside the office.

This weekend, we were down there again, but this time it was very quiet…just us and Valentina of course! It is great to have visitors, but it is also really nice just to chill out and enjoy the quiet and peacefulness (well, as much as it is quiet with 4 kids running around!) There is still a ton of clean-up to do, but since we were only down there for 24 hours, we didn’t get much done. Next weekend again!

A funny story, going back to April 1st….Bas was really determined to do some April fools pranks on his siblings. As he was describing his elaborate prank, he said that he wanted something to make Ineke go, “EEK!” When I discouraged the use of water that would dump on her head at 6am, he settled on filling a cup with trailmix and then ran a string across the door. Actually, he was also a bit concerned that there would be some hard feelings about being tricked, so he made sure to include some M&Ms in the mix!

The only problem was that Ineke decided to sleep in their room that night so he had to set it up on his own door. He stayed awake until Ineke and Willem fell asleep and then snuck downstairs to get the materials that he had hidden to set up the prank. Of course, in the middle of the night, I hear a crash of trailmix followed by scurries down the stairs and Willem shows up in our bed and crawls in. When I woke up in the morning, I felt a bit bad that Bas wouldn’t get the chance to scare Ineke, so I set up the prank again and replaced all the nuts back in the cup. About 10 minutes later, Ineke shows up in the kitchen. I asked her if she had been surprised by anything and she laughed and said, “No, I just stepped over the string. Bas told me that he was going to do it!!” I guess Bas missed the ‘surprise’ element of April fools jokes!