End of vacation

Although according to the calendar there is still a lot of summer left, for us summer vacation is almost over. I have been telling (preparing) Grace for the last few days by reminding her that on Monday she will be going back to school every day. The other night she told me, "I like vacation better." Yeah, I am pretty sure everyone feels that way.

I read an article the other day about a woman who makes a "summer jar" sometime in the spring. She fills the jar with ideas of things to do on those lazy summer days when her kids declare that they are bored. They choose something from the jar in the morning and set out on an adventure that day based on what the card says - visit a new park, play miniature golf, take a nature walk...

I can honestly say, our summer has been full and I don't think there was a day any of us felt bored. We all wish we had more lazy summer days to do whatever we want without worrying about work, alarm clocks, meeting deadlines, answering calls and email....

So far this summer we:

• explored San Francisco for 5 days,
• swam in the pool too many times to count,
• participated in 3 weeks of swimming lessons where Grace learned to float, flutter kick, and use her arms in a front crawl,
• saw the elephants at the Cleveland Zoo,
• rode the train and the carousel at the Akron Zoo,
• saw Cars 2 and Winnie the Pooh movies,
• listened to the orchestra at an outdoor concert,
• watched fireworks,
• went to an Indians game,
• rode our bikes on the bike and hike trail,
• went to birthday parties for Dawson and Elijah,
• learned cheers at gymnastics camp,
• touched an alligator, snake, and chinchilla with Jungle Terry,
• played in the pool and playhouse on our deck,
• cooked dinner outside on the grill,
• made smoothies with fresh fruit from the farmers' market, and a bunch of other things I can't remember right now.

It has been a lot of fun but we are not done yet.....we may be going back to school and work, but we are going to squeeze every bit of warm sunshine out of this summer because this kind of weather is just around the corner!