Ah, the long summer hiatus. Think of me as a TV show returning to my regularly scheduled night and time. (Hopefully.)
I had such big plans for my late summer, but the big kitchen re-do never materialized. Todd is still in search of wood to make new doors, and we had a flood of company in August that made a torn-up kitchen undesirable anyway.
My brother and his family came down the first weekend in August and we headed to the "real" beach, the ocean beach. In previous years, we've taken them to the "river" beach in Yorktown, which is much better for small children, but the girls are big kids now and they loved the ocean.
Here Marissa pretends to be a sea turtle. She was so covered with sand she looked like a breaded cutlet:
My brother and I and the girls, waiting for the next big wave:
Todd's sister Lisa and her family also stopped by for a night/morning on their way to the Outer Banks, but it was such a quick trip I didn't get any pictures. It was fun to get to see them, though.
The second weekend in August, we made a quick trip home to Ohio for a family reunion. Here's me and my sister, she must have just said something funny:
I helped my cousin Janine's son Isaac take a little stroll. He turned one year old a couple weeks after this and I believe is walking on his own now:
Some of us were eating and chatting...my dad and my cousin Alan:
Me and my mom and my aunt Carol:
...and others were kayaking and fishing in the small lake my aunt and uncle have on their property. My nephew Tanner:
My cousin-in-law Rich (Isaac's dad):
These two little cuties, Isaac and my cousin David's son Lucas, are the youngest members of the family, at one year old and two years old, respectively.
The oldest member of the family is Grandma, at 90, who was able to put in a brief appearance thanks to the terrific shuttle service her nursing home provides. Todd (my official photographer) was eating and fishing most of the time she was there, so he didn't get a good picture of her; I hope someone else did.
There are a lot of us when we all get together--and this wasn't nearly the whole family!
Missing were my cousins Jarrod and Mike (away in the Air Force and Coast Guard); my cousins Darrel and Dennis and their families; my brother and his family; my cousin Pam and her husband; and my cousins Dan and Derek, who had just gone back to college after the summer. You can imagine what a crowd it would be if we were ever all able to be together in one spot. I love my big family, they are all very special to me.
When we came home from Ohio, we brought my nine-year-old niece Kylie back with us. She stayed for five days and then flew home--her first time on a plane. We had a great week with her, going to the beach:
Todd took her crabbing several times, which she loved:
Todd also showed her how to kayak:
She and I took a dolphin cruise, too:
Then she hopped on a plane and flew
away and I collapsed for a couple of days! I am not used to having a kid around full time! We had such a great time, though.
In the three weeks since Kylie left, I've been laying pretty low. I worked on a stitchery project that I'll share later...I read a bunch of not-so-great books (seriously, I'm really in a slump!)...I watched all ten episodes of Ken Burns' Jazz...I got back into my walking and diet routine that was sadly neglected during the first two weeks of August. Plus all the boring day-to-day stuff, of course.Hurricane Earl was all set to plow into us here on the East Coast, but decided to just stroll on past and leave us mostly alone, which was just fine with me. We had a windy, rainy morning on Friday and that was it. And in his wake some slightly cooler, drier weather has come along, which is a blessing. I have the windows open tonight--I couldn't tell you the last time it's been cool and dry enough for that!This fall we are looking forward to having some company and doing a little traveling here and there. We're also really hoping to get some exterior work done on the house. The kitchen re-do is still on the table, but won't get going until Todd finds some poplar for the doors and we get a nice big chunk of time to work on it. And I am just looking forward to (please God!) some cooler weather. This summer has been pretty bad and I am ready to wear jeans and long-sleeves again, although that won't be happening any time soon.That's all from here!
On our last day at home, I got to spend a gorgeous day outside with Tanner and Kylie, and my brother Jeremy, and Todd. Jeremy and the kids and I looked for a few geocaches at the lake where Todd's folks live.
It's hard to explain how a small man-made lake in southern Ohio could have such a hold on my heart, but it is one of my very favorite places in the world.
Then in the afternoon we headed to Beaver Creek State Park, which is a gorgeous hilly spot along Little Beaver Creek. You can canoe, hike, fish, and also see remnants of the old Sandy and Beaver Canal from pioneer days. I hadn't been there since high school, and we didn't have a whole lot of time, but it was really idyllic.
Kylie has a dragonfly captured in her hands here.
We practiced skipping stones.
It wasn't super hot, but it still felt great to take off the shoes and socks and do a little wading in the cool water.
Wish I'd had time to get a few more pictures, but no photo can capture a perfect summer day, the wind blowing in the trees, the sound of the creek flowing, the sight of puffed white clouds floating past in the blue sky...aaah. I want to go back!
The kids in Todd's family are all growing up fast...which is a little sad, but also great fun. This year they are five, six, seven, and eight years old--perfect ages to play card games, have interesting conversations, do jigsaw puzzles, and make very funny jokes. I adore the baby and toddler stages, but there's something even more satisfying about seeing them grow into very interesting people.
My niece Gianna, the seven-year-old, asked to borrow my camera one afternoon, and I let her take it. I'm definitely going to have to remember that trick--she got more interesting pictures than I ever would have and all I had to do was sit back and relax!
And grown-ups give much better smiles when it's a cute kid pointing the camera at them.
Of course she had to get a shot of herself in there, too.
The neighbors gave my mother-in-law some bubbles for the kids, and that was not only fun for the kids, but also for Roscoe the dog, who apparently loves to chase--and eat--bubbles.
Anna, being the smallest, often gets left out of the older three's plans and schemes, but she's good at finding a willing adult to play with her.
I don't seem to have any pictures of the endless games I played with the kids--Big Fish, Little Fish, Go Fish, Uno, Slamwich, Twister...I was too busy playing to run my camera, I guess. But we had a really great time together. And the grown-ups played cornhole, and took out the kayaks, and fished. I played a couple of cornhole games, but spent most of my time hanging out with the kids.
At night we had fireworks, which I never bother trying to get pictures of--but I almost wish I had tried, because it was by far the best fireworks display we've ever seen at the lake. We take our chairs down to the water and see various people setting them off all around the lake, and this year, five or six groups really outdid themselves. We had fireworks of our own for the first time, too, courtesy of Andrew, Julie's boyfriend, who brough a nice stash to set off. My family never bought fireworks when I was a kid, not even sparklers or bottle rockets, so I was thrilled to have some of our own to light.
So it was just about a perfect Fourth. Great weather (maybe a little too cold at night, but I'm not complaining!), great company, lots of laughs.
I'll share the other things we did later on.
I just went back through my memory card for the first time since we got home and wow! I'm so happy I got some good shots this year.
We spend every Fourth of July weekend at Guilford Lake State Park at Todd's parents' house, with all the family. This Fourth of July was about as perfect as it gets.
The residents have a boat parade every year, where they decorate their pontoon boats. The entries were pretty good this year.
Since the parade always comes to our side of the lake last, we let the kids swim while we wait. The highlight is the pirate boat, with "real" pirates who throw candy to all the kids along shore. This is very highly anticipated by the four kids in our family.
There go the pirates!
One of them told me later that they've been doing the pirate thing for eight years. I hope they never stop...we've enjoyed it every year since we started our Fourth of July get-togethers.
I thought it would be fun to do a little holiday activity with the kids, so I baked a big sheet cake the day before, and we decorated it like a flag with berries.
I gave a tub of frosting to each pair, and a knife for each and let them go to it. (I smoothed it out a little after they were done.)
Angelo and Anna's job was the blueberries in the corner; Evelyn and Gianna took care of the raspberry stripes.
When we got it all done, I squeezed fifty "stars" onto the blueberries with a tube of white icing, while everybody counted to make sure we had the right amount (and nibbled on extra blueberries--the raspberries were deemed "too sour.")
I used a Barefoot Contessa recipe for the flag cake and it made more batter than I needed (my sheet pan was smaller than hers), so I used the leftover batter to make some cupcakes, and let each kid decorate two, with the leftover berries and some red, white, and blue sprinkles. The cake recipe was quite good--sturdy enough to hold up to all the knife-poking as the kids frosted it, but tasty as well. I cheated and used canned Betty Crocker icing--my Contessa-hood only goes so far, especially on vacation.
What a bunch of fun that was! And the clean-up wasn't bad at all.
More later.
Here Marissa pretends to be a sea turtle. She was so covered with sand she looked like a breaded cutlet:
My brother and I and the girls, waiting for the next big wave:
Todd's sister Lisa and her family also stopped by for a night/morning on their way to the Outer Banks, but it was such a quick trip I didn't get any pictures. It was fun to get to see them, though.
I helped my cousin Janine's son Isaac take a little stroll. He turned one year old a couple weeks after this and I believe is walking on his own now:
Some of us were eating and chatting...my dad and my cousin Alan:
Me and my mom and my aunt Carol:
...and others were kayaking and fishing in the small lake my aunt and uncle have on their property. My nephew Tanner:
My cousin-in-law Rich (Isaac's dad):
These two little cuties, Isaac and my cousin David's son Lucas, are the youngest members of the family, at one year old and two years old, respectively.
The oldest member of the family is Grandma, at 90, who was able to put in a brief appearance thanks to the terrific shuttle service her nursing home provides. Todd (my official photographer) was eating and fishing most of the time she was there, so he didn't get a good picture of her; I hope someone else did.
Missing were my cousins Jarrod and Mike (away in the Air Force and Coast Guard); my cousins Darrel and Dennis and their families; my brother and his family; my cousin Pam and her husband; and my cousins Dan and Derek, who had just gone back to college after the summer. You can imagine what a crowd it would be if we were ever all able to be together in one spot. I love my big family, they are all very special to me.
Todd took her crabbing several times, which she loved:
Todd also showed her how to kayak:
She and I took a dolphin cruise, too:
Then she hopped on a plane and flew away and I collapsed for a couple of days! I am not used to having a kid around full time! We had such a great time, though.
In the three weeks since Kylie left, I've been laying pretty low. I worked on a stitchery project that I'll share later...I read a bunch of not-so-great books (seriously, I'm really in a slump!)...I watched all ten episodes of Ken Burns' Jazz...I got back into my walking and diet routine that was sadly neglected during the first two weeks of August. Plus all the boring day-to-day stuff, of course.
