Springtime Fun

I realize I have an on-again-off-again relationship with my blog. Part of it, I suppose, is that there are so many things that go on in life, that time just passes by in a blur sometimes, and you find yourself, months later, going "ohhhh yeaaahhhh....I have a BLOG!"
In any case....here I am once again.
Last month, Daughter and I once again ran the 5km I Love Regina Run. Or I suppose I should say, she ran it, I kind of chugged along behind. I figure she finished at least 5 minutes ahead of me, and I clocked in at about the same as last year....about 45 minutes, though I can't prove it because their timer was broken....I was just going by what my clock said, not knowing for sure exactly what moment the run began (9:00...9:05...8:55...). She did really well, considering we really didn't train at all this spring, with it being cold and snowy and rainy pretty much the whole time preceding the run. I, on the other hand, am proud of myself for finishing, and for never stopping my slow jog at all, except to retie a shoe. On the downside, I know full well that I jog r-e-a-l-l-y slowly...I was passed by a few walkers (as in, people who were walking....I am at least faster than people using the equipment by that name). Ah well. Next year we will attempt it once more, and hopefully I will be a good deal lighter and much more in shape, so will have less luggage to haul along with me, and be able to step things up a bit.
Now that spring is FINALLY in the air, and things are growing (such as my strawberry plants, raspberry bush, crabapples, and more dandelions than the mind can imagine), we have been able to get out and have some fun. For example, this weekend, we loaded up the van with a multitude of camping gear and the dog, and took the kids down to Carnduff for a geocaching event. It was raining on the drive down, so we were somewhat nervous about the weather we would be out in, but it turned out to probably be the best possible weather....cloudy, but not rainy, and not hot and sunny.
We set up our three tents, looking for all the world like a new version of Goldilocks and the Three Bears (we had a small tent, a medium tent, and a large tent) in the smallest campground I have ever seen. It actually worked out really well because there was a larger one down the road, which was therefore more appealing to others and which meant we more or less had the place to ourselves. There were 12 plots, and we took up about 1 1/4. There were two campers and one other tent the entire time we were there....and as far as I could figure, one camper and one tent belonged to the guys who were renovating the bathrooms (kudos to them for timing their work during the day so there was at least one toilet available and getting done before bedtime), and the other camper belonged to someone who worked at the convenience store on the other side of the trees. In that sense, it was a nice, quiet time on the campground. I must admit nighttime was not all THAT quiet, being close to the main road and having one night where some drunken revellers parked their truck just on the other side of the trees by the convenience store...but at dusk and dawn you could hear the birds singing and with so few campers it was a peaceful, non-crowded time. No frills, but didn't really need them.
Anyway...geocaching...it was a great weekend. We picked the kids up from school and headed straight out, with food that required no prep or refrigeration (except that night's supper, which had been removed from the fridge and was consumed very quickly during the drive....one of those Superstore chicken meals, split up into individual containers so I could just hand them out). I think it was about a 3 1/2 hour trip down there. We set up our tents around 8PM or so and just relaxed for the night.
Saturday morning, we were up early. About 6AM, though Son and I were up around 5. Breakfast was cinnamon buns and juice (and kibble for the dog). At 7:45AM, we met at someone's house for a Flash Mob, and to get the coordinates for all the caches that had been released that morning (I think there were 12). 8AM and we were off. We had also loaded the coordinates of all the old caches, since we had never been to Carnduff before. We raced all around the area, to farms, through fields, into parks, up the highways, and had a blast. Our first cache of the day, two other teams had beaten us there, but our second attempt netted us an FTF (First To Find), and we were thrilled. Our next two attempts at caches, we arrived at about the same time as another team (same team, both times). We searched and searched for the first of the two, with no success, until one of the other team almost accidentally shifted something....and found it. We were so close, but they got the FTF. The second one was hilarious...we took different dirt roads, and we got there moments before they did. They went roaring down their road about 100 metres too far, reversed and roared to the spot, while we parked, jumped out, and absolutely RACED through a grassy field (like, knee high grass), laughing so hard we could hardly breathe, squealing, trying to get there first. Both teams searched like mad, but in the end, they got that FTF as well...I must have touched it with my hand but not realized it because they found it in a spot I had checked. Oh well.
We found one cache where we ended up off-roading in a minivan, bumping through a field, next to a herd of cows (they were fenced separately), and through a section of grass later on in the off-roading that was up to the hood of the van. We had a blast!!!
Yes, we did end up with a few passengers during the day...I think I had the worst of it, with 4 or 5 ticks at last count..but we found them and evicted them before they really latched on.
We started caching, as I said, about 8AM. We took about an hour break for lunch (amazing what you can find to pack for meals that doesn't need refrigeration)...individual tuna and cracker packs, juice, strawberries...and had a bit of a rest, then headed out again, caching until about 4:30PM. We managed to log 20 caches for the day...a best for us, in terms of being out as a family unit. Hubby logged something like 25 once, when he was out all by himself in a fairly cache-dense area of Ontario.
At 5PM, all the cachers who came for the event returned to the location of the Flash Mob for a potluck BBQ. Prizes were handed out for FTFs (we got a new cache container), and lots of door prizes were given out. Caching stories were exchanged and suggestions for people to attend other caching events were given (there are some pretty cool places and events apparently in Manitoba and in the south (like Arizona) that would be interesting to attend one year).
We returned to our tents around 6:30PM and relaxed for the rest of the evening. Slept like the dead and then got up at 6 this morning, tore down our camp, ate muffins and juice, and left the campsite around 7:15AM. We arrived home at around 11AM. It was sunny when we woke up, so it was really nice for taking the tents down.

In other news, I did manage to get myself onto a School Board sub list....not the one where I live, but an outlying one, so although I have to drive 30-60 minutes each way to sub, at least in time it should give me enough experience to make my local board happy and get them to hire me...maybe by early 2011. I've only subbed a grand total of 1.5 days so far, (I need 2 months' worth, full time, to be considered by the local Board) but in the Fall, I will be able to sub full days, which will help not only increase the time I will be in the schools with each call, but increase the calls as well.

And my parents got a new dog. Her name is Polar. Isn't she cute? :)