Last place in the Quiet Game

Hello Everyone, 

The Quiet Game is the toupé of adult-invented kids’ games: you’re not fooling anyone. We all know what’s going on here. When you are five or younger, being quiet holds exactly zero appeal. Unless you are sneaking up on someone or hiding in a pillow fort, being quiet is as much fun as eating vegetables or brushing your teeth. Sure, the old folks in your life will try to make it fun and exciting, but kids intuitively know when the “fun and exciting game” happens to coincide with what they want you to do in the first place. Sound is fun and quiet is boring. That is an iron clad rule of childhood in the same way that chocolate cake is awesome and broccoli is not. The world is full of new sounds, you’re discovering your own ability to create these sounds, and if you happen to be at a cottage with your cousins, grandparents, aunts and uncles, siblings and dogs, the level of excitement makes trying to be quiet about as useful as trying to keep your yard clean in a hurricane. There is tsunami of fun and exciting things happening (swimming, wrestling, tractor rides, wrestling, dessert, wrestling, paddleboard rides, wrestling, etc.). Noise flows out like water at Niagra Falls. Sure, grab a cup and try to divert it if you want to. But you should just go ahead and label that cup The Quiet Game to be clear about how effective it will be. The cacophony is real. And it can be tiring. I don’t know how half a peanut butter sandwich and an apple slice can power six solid hours of volume, but I think NASA should investigate. However, just as the noise can get to be a bit much after awhile, knowing it comes from a good place goes a long way towards being able to live with it. Happy, healthy kids are rambunctious. Large families getting together in the same place create a lot of noise. A quiet weekend where you can read and swim at your leisure is great, but if that’s all you ever do with a cottage, you miss a great deal. I know, as I had a year where I could travel, read and bike at my own pace. And it was great in a lot of ways. But the things I missed most, by far, were the things I couldn’t do on my own: loud, crazy, exhausting weekends with family. Wes

Photos 

I thought I would highlight my nephews' mad photography skills this week. I lent out my DSLR camera over the weekend, and the produced some gems. I can't be sure who took which picture in most cases, so it's more like a group project. 

The first is a great shot of Ace, which is no easy task, given that he's vibrating with energy most of the time. 

The second is an artsy selfie of Harrison. 

The third is a nice, kid-level view of the dinner table.