There are some traditions from your childhood that are really hard to share with new friends later in life. When you try to conjure them back into reality it just isn't quite the same. I've been going to the Winnipeg Folk Festival since I was born but I stopped going when I was an older teenager. It's a giant outdoor music festival in the middle of our prairie fields, and this year when Leigh-Ann heard that Tegan and Sara were playing she immediately bought tickets. I couldn't wait to join in and put my years of festival experience to good use, and to see what had changed since my last memories of it.

Jill relaxing before we went foraging for food & band merch

Amazing art was posted everywhere

Leigh-Ann looking through her photos at our spot by the main stage

The festival wasn't quite as I remembered it, but it had the same friendly, community feeling that I grew up with. The food was fabulous, the day was hot without being oppressive, and there were beautiful fey children skipping around in packs through fields of wild grasses, popping bubbles and making up their own worlds.

It was the first evening in a long time when I had no agenda other than to be in the moment along side good people. I need to have more of those peaceful, quiet times in my daily life- even if it's just laying on the deck in my backyard while dragonflies patrol the sky. I think I feel a new summer ritual coming on…

{images: Matt Pearson, Zuluadams, my own, my own, my own, Leahl00}