June 14

After doing a few things at home, we went to the Summerfest Arts Festival.Eric didn't work until 3 or 4, so we drug him with us for this early afternoon adventure.

Lots of adventuring -

running

sunning

steering clear of clowns

paintingclimbingmore running and sunning

more paintingthen it was time for Daddy to go.

After bringing him back home we headed out for our next trip - the Venture Outdoors Festival.

This is a picture inside the Sheriff's Command Post trailer.
That they take out to Search and Rescue sites, forest fires, etc.

Maddie sat down and buckled herself in, and said "I'm ready for a ride in the bus!"
I had to make it very clear that Trev was not to turn on that megaphone!
He didn't, thank goodness.
He's been wanting a megaphone for a few months, now.
I have no idea why.

Trev really wants to try mountain-boarding after watching people race down the hills and over the ramps. (This isn't him.)
Dinner of pizza while we rested under the trees and listened to some friendly music.
A bit of dancin' and swayin', there.Then snowcones.
Of course.

And this is the point -while the children sat on the curb, and I sat on the ground facing them that Trev took off. Again. For the fourth time in two days. And the second time at this park today.
After about three minutes of looking for him, I started to get pretty pissed.

I went across the park to the inflatable bouncies, only to not find him.
Then I trekked back over to the other side, and on the way stopped to ask a Sheriff's Deputy if they had any reports of a lost little boy.
He said no, but that he'd report it, and by this time I had started to cry because I was mad and upset (not really frightened in a doom and gloom sort of way - I knew he was alright - which was why I was so mad at him) and another Deputy asked me if I was alright, and I said (by this time the other Deputy was reporting over the radios) that that boy was mine, that he was hearing about, then I got closer to the Trailer (the one we had visited earlier) to wait there for him, and a lady said, as I neared the trailer - "Are you Stephanie?" and I said yes, and she said "He's at the Sheriff's trailer," and I said "Thank you,", and then someone else passed me (guessing correctly) and said "he's at the trailer..." and I said "Thank you," and there he was sitting there in the trailer. I gave him The Look - you know the one - the raised single eyebrow with the Explain Yourself expression - and he came out then he hugged me tightly, and said "Oh, Mom, I was so worried about you," and promptly started to cry.
So I sighed and we sat down and I held him, and then of course Maddie had to be snuggled, too, so we sat outside The Trailer for fifteen minutes or so.

Eventually we were ready to move on, and went back over to the bouncies.

A few minutes later Madd started getting emotional - tired - and I thought it prudent to head home. Here comes Trev, crying, saying "I got kicked off the slide!"
"What?"
"For climbing up the slide and for butting in line!"

Sigh.

Definitely time to go.

I think there were a couple of life's important lessons learned yesterday.

One can hope.