In Which I Recap The ENTIRE Summer

Hmmm.....I think that journaling is a spiritual discipline...which would explain why I am so freaking bad at it!! I also think that many things have fallen by the wayside for me as we've gotten closer to school, so hopefully now that some type of order is returning to our lives, I'll be a little better about leaving a legacy for my children. (Or, alternatively, leaving something for everyone to laugh at!!)

Yay!

So.  Summer. My last post was July 1stish.  So I will now recap our summer using my facebook statii as my guide :)

We played with friends.  Lots of friends.  At awesome places like Burke Lake Park and the Sprayground and the Pool and our house for BBQs and smores and fun.  We went to the Dale City 4th of July Parade and the P-Nats Game and Fireworks.  Savannah left early with Daddy and thinks fireworks may be the 8th level of Dante's Inferno.

I also tried to be reasonably brave and let Riley be a little more independent.  I try really hard not to be a helicopter parent, but so many bad things happen and I think especially as someone who worked for a church and got training in all the horrible people out there, it makes me nervous.  I let him walk down the street to talk to a friend and cross the street and play at Kendall's house without me.  It was kind of a huge deal with tears and hyperventilating.

For me.

He was fine.

So.  The week after 4th of July, my mom and I took the kids to Myrtle Beach thanks to my VERY generous bosslady and her VERY awesome sister who let us rent their awesome condo for next to nothing!!  We had a great time in the water and relaxing and visiting a local children's museum.  We also went out to lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe one day! It was very awesome :)

Then we did some VBS.  High Seas Adventure and Egypt (where we did makeup and Ema Anne came along for the ride!!) and a kind of neat one done by a local Episcopalian church where they just all met up in someone in the neighborhood's yard!!  Savannah helped.

We went with our friends the Lamonts to Williamsburg and did Busch Gardens and Water Country and a brief (and unpaid) tour of Colonial Williamsburg.  We also visited the Yankee Candle Flagship store and made our own candles and saw Santa (in Bermuda shorts!) It was awesome!

I went a little crazy for 2 weeks and did nothing but scrub my house and take the kids to the park.  And bake.  It was almost like I was nesting, but minus the pregnant part :)  We made foccacia and cookies and dinners galore! And I think we enjoyed every park on this end of the county!!  Then we were dirty and needed baths.  So we did that.

                                                         Multitaksin- Ur doin it Rite.
We went to the beach for our annual trip with my family, which was fun to do, but also a little bit of the stinky because there were millions of jellyfish and lots of stormy days.  We got to meet Uncle Kevin's new "friend" Miss Lauren- and we all think she's pretty awesome :)

Ema Anne came for a visit and not only helped with VBS (she hasn't converted yet that I know of....but we would love to have her on team Jesus- she does some mean VBS makeup!) but also helped me put up some peaches from the farmer's market into frozen sliced peaches and peach jam.  Yum-o!

I cleaned out the PTA closet and with the help of some awesome friends and fellow suckers, got the budget, audit, bylaws and calendar planned for this year.  We're doing some really fun stuff together and I hope it all works out!!

I was reminded I am not a United Methodist. And, that Table-Flipper Jesus is still my favorite Jesus.  He's the same one who likes Kids and Sick People and the Poor.

We went to the fair.  It smelled terrible and felt greasy.  The kids got to see their first ethnic rumble between two groups of teenagers.  That was unexpected and not fun.

We.Read.7,000.Books.  And enjoyed our county's fabulous summer quest program.  We went to Vienna and watched the Great Zucchini.  He needed more of a shirt, but the kids enjoyed him anyway.

Auntie Elaine moved to Texas and Everyone Cried.

(This picture is actually from High Tea at the Willard Intercontinental for my momma's birthday, but it's the picture of Elaine that I have right now....and high tea is FULLY AWESOME!)

We babysat.  A lot.  And Logan explained me:

 ‎"Some mommies are nice, and some mommies are mean. My mommy is mean, but her rules are fair and she has them because she loves us."

Nice Logan.  Thanks. 

I got to see my friend from college, Jess, who came down for DanceSport.  We went to LuckyStrike lanes for date night with the Meeks'.  We bought school supplies and baked more and had fun and fell into bed exhausted and woke up excited.  We watched Derelict Dog with friends in Occoquan...and subsequently spent hundreds of dollars on Belgian Beer with friends.  Multiple times.  It was great :)

It was a fun summer.  A tiring summer.

And then, I had a glass of Lambrusco.  And watched the days get shorter and my children get older and smarter.  And waited both excited and sad to see them go off to school again.

And had a little more of that Lambrusco.