3 years ago we did a hike that was the hardest and longest our kids had done at the time.

They were 11, 13 and 15 and the hike was 12 miles of technical hiking that took us 9 hours. It was the Chesler Park Loop in Canyonlands.

It was really hard for them and I thought they’d never hike again.

But, there were enough moments of absolute joy, peace and enjoyment of the scenery that it compensated for the physical and mental difficulties. Plus, they were just so incredibly proud of themselves. They had major bragging rights now. Climbing through skinny slot canyons, scaling up steep climbs, or across the sand and sage, they could do it all.

There was a time in the middle of the hike that our youngest was completely done and we weren’t sure what to do as she sat there in a pile of tears.

We had gotten half way in she was really too big to carry out, so we had to rely on treats and mental strategies. It took a lot of patience and creativity to figure out what would keep her going.

The Scoreboard song became our Theme song, “You’re gonna battle, You’re gonna fight, win or lose, you’re gonna be alright. . . You can do anything that you work for. do it fo us, do it for one another!”

Because it was such a challenge we were surprised when 3 years later they requested to do it again. But, they really had remembered the beauty and the satisfaction and they wanted to see if they were stronger.

And they were SO much stronger!

This spring we did it in 2 hours less and without any drama. We hiked all day and had really sore feet that we laughed about, but we relished in the quiet moments of being some of the very few people there.

We connected as a family, strengthened our individual stamina and talked about really important things. As parents we loved having a captive audience for 7 hours.

We were SO happy at the end, the opposite of the sheer exhaustion of last time. We even jumped in the air for heel clicks!

What does your family do to stay connected? What do you do to unplug and reset? It doesn’t have to be what we do. Whatever it is, its worth the effort.

I’m doing free sessions for missionaries and parents. Schedule a time for a FREE session. Have a quick question? Shoot me an email at info@jillfreestone.com. I’d love to hear from you.