Our three boys spent their youngest years with us (my hubby and I, the authoress of this blog), our oldest child and only girl Rebekah, and my parents up near North Bay on nine acres in the bush. Heaven, I call it. I miss it everyday.
Hubby needing employment and my parents marriage disolving necessitated our move to a pretty three acre rent house three hours south. Okay, not too much of a change we were happy but missed my family. We adjusted.
Four years later life, finances, and employment needs moved us to a large three bedroom apartment in Scarborough. Oh. Um. Yeah. That was a HUGE change.
After the blush of newness wore off we started to realize the huge change we had chosen. Wow. I pouted on and off for about two years. Not mature. I promise to keep this blog real, bratty moments and all. We have all struggled with the lack of privacy, quiet, and familiar surroundings. Learning how to get along in the city has been something of a culture shock. I had thought moving from heaven to three hours south was an adjustment. unhuh. yeah. Not a day goes by that we don't talk about going home one day but we are learning to bloom where we are planted.
Two years in and we are starting to find our new normal, our balance. We have discovered several really neat parks, some more wild than others. Our boys are enjoying using their sling shots and BB guns at the less groomed parks. We love swimming in our local creeks. We REALLY love watching the city peoples faces when they see us swimming in the creeks.
Our boys rush through their school work (we homeschool) so they can go outside and fool around before the kids get out of school. Its no fun having helicopter parents freak out on you because you're "in that dirty creek, and stop chasing those ducks!" For the record my boys don't chase the ducks and would never hurt one (except one case of misunderstanding on appropriate sligshot usage) but there are a lot of over sensitive bunny huggers around here.
While running the parks and staying decidely off the pretty paved paths we have discovered alot of wildlife we didn't expect to see in the city. We've seen deer, muskrats, a beaver? (we're still debating exactly what that was), water snakes (oh that's a story I will tell), lots of skunks, racoons, a coyote or two, large salmon running this autumn, some brown tout, creek chub, sunfish, perch, and many, many squirrels.
In this blog I hope to encourage anyone who is looking to raise free range boys. I have no interest in attempting any form of political correctness so if that's what you're looking for, sorry, won't find it here. My boys are wild, they fight, get dirty, fish, shoot BB guns and slingshots, light camp fires, work and play hard. They wear out their shoes, tear holes in the knees of brand new jeans, lose pocket knives and jackets, and go through alot of marbles and BB. They run the trails here and are learning how to be men, real men who can get the job done, look after their women (my hubby is a great example of this ) and know to look after each other. They fight like crazy somedays but I pity any outsider who picks a fight, 'cause they'll have three to contend with. That's just how I want it.
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