Countdown

We have actually had a nice summer, the boys and I. We have had a few adventures. We have made art and music together. We saw wild turkey moms herding a big collective brood of chicks. A painted turtle with a leech on it's shell. An American Bluebird.

We made rubber stamps and printed notecards from them. We went on a couple of aborted attempts at fossil hunting.

Since the boys are getting old enough that they don't need my constant attention, I have even managed to read a couple of novels. One about a Caribbean woman living in Cape Town, South Africa, (dreary) and another, which I haven't finished yet, about the crazy abundance of summer in the Appalachian mountains. (Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver. LOVING it!)

I have been alternately working a lot and resenting working a lot. We haven't been camping yet. I think we will try for Labor Day, dry camping at our favorite primitive site.

End of summer can be a time of pressure. Back to school hype enticing us to go spend a fortune on clothes. WHY is this such a production? I informed the kids, in no uncertain terms, that they can go back on their first day of school wearing the sneakers they wore on the last day in June. They still fit. I'll get them new ones after the parental panic has died down. I did buy them some new pants and tee shirts, socks and underwear. And snacks for their lunches, which I forgot about last year.

Oh, and the dreaded lunch boxes. Maybe I'll make do with brown paper bags until the madness is over.

Emmett turns 7 on Tuesday. He is so used to hanging out with his big brothers friends he hasn't invited any of his own to the party. I might make him invite just one or two of his peers.

Two days later the boys go back to full time school and I go back to having 6 hours a day to myself. To grocery shop in solitude. To work uninterrupted. To run errands without packing up the kids and corralling them along. To read and play drums and walk and have lunch with friends who I haven't seen in months. To having a house that stays tidy for more than 8 seconds.

I am going to miss my kids.