I feel like a bear. Not in the way that I’m snuffly and easily startled, although that actually sounds like me too, but for the fact that I would thrive in a hibernated state for several months out of the year. Can be cranky, eats berries, growls when provoked. I’m basically a bear.

It feels like winter is quickly coming to a close here if the 50* weather here is any indication. The school yard is sloppy and the snow on our roof is melting because I can hear it as I fall asleep at night, dripping it’s way through the gutters to the earth. It’s a nice spring sound. The grey days are also lessening and the sun is shining more which in turn has inspired me to keep a blanket and camp chair by the front door. At the slightest hint of sunlight I race like a madwoman to the front porch with my chair and blanket and sit in the sun enjoying the warmth on my face for as long as possible. It’s glorious. Then I reminisce about Italy last August when Dillon, Renae, Morgan, and I were sitting in the shade of a piddly little tree in Rome. We were sitting on an oven hot stone wall drinking warm water and thinking about how we might die of the heat and my heart breaks a little bit that winter is almost done and soon we will be back into hot weather. Boo. The trumpeter swans are starting to come back thru and we saw them sitting in the mucky fields today so spring is surely coming. Morgan saw 2 moose last week early in the morning crossing the school yard out his window and we saw one yesterday from our house window so even though moose are awake all winter, it still feels like the earth is waking up a little for spring and I think I should maybe read “The Secret Garden” again.

In the meantime, Christmas has come and gone and I haven’t written since then. Nathan + Madison and Dillon, Renae, Max + Brett were here for a week and Mom was here for two weeks and we loved it so much. Good food, fun invitations to friends houses, a thrift day with the girls. After they all left, we had Rosemary’s wedding to look forward to the 2nd weekend in January. We were lucky enough to keep Brycen + Kayla for nights and also Anthony + Laura for a night. We had lovely evening company over a couple times as well. So many dear people to catch up with and it’s never enough time at a wedding weekend!

February brought some fun things too. Morgan ran a half marathon in Kelowna while I drank coffee and thrifted; an evening in Kelowna taking a cooking course on Southern food that Morgan had received as a Christmas gift from a student- we can make fried chicken, baked mac&cheese, and pecan pie for you now ; a weekend spent with Jennifer in Bonners Ferry, taking in the views and meeting Ensz’s and just catching up with Jenn ; a day spent in Creston for Morgan’s in-service day- he spent it at school with Mr. Hiebert and I spent it having coffee with Ash:) ; a wedding of Ollie and Josh in Othello was so fun and also Dillon + Renae and Mom were there so a good chance to meet up for a couple days- we stayed at Curt + Rease’s house and it was very relaxing for us but maybe not them!

Then the most fun thing. Morgan and I got to be lightly involved with the 500th Boys Prep Class as part of the Courtesy Committee here in Enderby. The class was from February 18-28 with Mr. Milton Jantz as the instructor and it was such an awesome two weeks getting to know him and the boys. Since church and school are on the same yard here, Morgan was able to come grab coffee break in the morning and eat lunch there at noon. By afternoon break at 300, school would be out and Morgan would come over for break and then supper and the evening so it actually worked out very well. We made lots of iced maple lattes and bought lots of elderberry gummies and put up with a lot of big talk about Canada becoming the 51st state since all 19 boys were from the states. My favorite times were in the kitchen after meals when the day’s group of 4 boys were doing dishes and we could talk about all sorts of things in between their complaints about dishes. I lost a foosball game 10-0 to Coby which was the low point of class for me:) Morgan and I always tried to sit in and listen to the 5:00 singing and sat in on a couple classes as well so I told Morgan it was like a small revival for us as we listened in and listened to the boys talk about their battles. We kept 2 boys for 3 nights, then 3 boys for 4 nights, and the last night we kept 5 boys so our house was packed and we loved it. I doubt the smell of cologne will leave those bedrooms for a very long time. Obviously I am biased but we could not have gotten a better group of guys. I was very sad to see them go but hopefully we will run into them each again here and there. I would say more about how much we loved them all but I’d better not in case they read this and get a little proud about themselves.

Now March is beginning and it doesn’t seem like things will slow down that much before summer is here. Next week the school is having a Book Fair where there will be books in a box and students dressed as characters from books so Morgan will be busy there. He’s also been working on the ranch now that it’s calving season so he’s loving that. Spring break is the end of March and we are hoping to go to Dillon’s for the week. I have all sorts of big ideas about parties I want to have and things to do this spring but who knows if we will fit them all in. Sometime this month we are going to have another Book Club meeting I think. We’ve been reading the “Mark of the Lion” series by Francine Rivers. The last couple months I’ve worked on reading some new books, mostly nonfiction, some better than others:

• “The Stranger in the Woods-The Extraordinary Story of the Last True Hermit”-Michael Finkel
• “The Lotus Shoes”-Jane Yang
• “Nobody’s Son”-Cathy Glass
• “This Life I Live”-Rory Feek

Saturday morning the boys left for their Last Outing with the Youth day after class and Morgan was at the ranch working with calves so I thought I would enjoy a very quiet day in my pjs with a cup of coffee but of course life had other plans. Our vehicle quit driving as I was on the way home after dropping the guys off at school so I had to call for a tow truck. Let this be a reminder to always leave home with good clothes on and different shoes than moccasin slippers and also you should always have your purse with you. Unfortunately I am only six minutes from school and did not check all those boxes. Luckily my driver that I rode to Vernon with was named Andrew and very nice and he was from North Yorkshire, England, originally so we had good conversation and do you ever think that sometimes those kind of people are actually angels sent to you by God? I think Andrew was. Not that I needed encouragement or was depressed or anything. But he said partway through our conversation in his nice British accent, “You know love, life’s a funny thing. You think you know what you want and when you want it, but when you get it you aren’t happy with that either so you look to the next thing and pretty soon you’re right old and life’s gone.” Which I thought was wise even though I’ve heard the same thing before. It seemed like what I needed and we got to talk about Holdeman Mennonites for awhile too before he dropped my vehicle and I off at Nissan. So after awhile a courtesy car came back to the dealership and I got to drive home to my dishwasher that gave out this week and an espresso machine issue caused by the boys haha. So I did NOT, in fact, do any relaxing at all. This week I work 3 mornings and the rest of the week will be catch-up with laundry and floors and maybe meeting a friend for a good coffee. Probably Kaitlyn at Anvil Coffee:)

Wishing each of you a good week this lovely first week of March. My resolution for this month is to check in on friends I haven’t talked to in awhile so maybe I’ll be messaging you. xoxo cheyenne linn