Saturday morning started with one thing going wrong after another. I awoke in a foul mood and no matter how I tried to shake it, the little things kept building and building — Emil disappearing to make messes upstairs instead of getting dressed, coming downstairs with a t-shirt and completely naked otherwise while Oliver and Milo wrestled and squealed near the front door, seemingly deaf to my polite requests to get out the front door. The dog threw up on the floor while I packed apple slices and yogurt and cold pizza into the lunch bag and Emil returned downstairs with a t-shirt and one sock on, completely naked otherwise. Coffee helped, but the entire cup of hot chocolate dropped right outside the door onto the sidewalk did not. Nearly running out of gas and hoping we were heading in the right direction, hoping not to be stranded on the side of a country road at 8:30am with Andrew out of town while Oliver whined about how he wanted to go to the playground, not to the nature reserve… none of that helped.

But 40 minutes later, fresh cool air and warm sunshine, fields of golden grass and ponds of shining ice surrounded us and the entire morning took a pleasant turn for the better. Like magic.

We were the first people there, racing across fields to the iced-over pond, ice-skating on a puddle and trying to break the pond ice with larger and larger stones thrown high into the air across the pond. The sun grew warmer and warmer until we no longer had to continue moving to keep warm. 

We wandered and explored for hours, bird-watching and crossing logs and climbing, running, jumping, and building. 

We met a wild turkey and collected feathers. We ate snacks and headed back down to the ice, and I found a seat on a sun-warmed stone near the boys when they found their task: making an “ice factory” by breaking up the thick chunks of ice with a long strong stick, passing the chunk to the next brother by sliding it across the icy pond, then passing it on the the brother closest to shore, who would pick up the ice and carry each chunk to the collecting stone, where the pile grew and grew until the factory’s business was booming.

This was the point when I was very aware of the push to keep moving. There was a lot we had yet to see in the reserve, yet it was clear how engaged and happy the boys were to stay and continue their game. I kept my mouth closed and tried to blend into the background so they could stay and continue on, letting the sun warm my face and just enjoying the beauty of the day. It was so wonderful. And it wasn’t until two hours later, when Emil accidentally stepped right into the icy water up to his knee that we had to move on, but this time content and absolutely nature-high from our much-needed time outside. On the drive home, with windows cracked and country-air flowing into the van, from the back, “Mama, this was the best day of my life.”