A Farewell to Summer

We are doing very best to give summer a proper sending off. This, today, Tuesday, August 15, is my last real day of summer. Tomorrow I head to professional development days and teacher work days ahead of next Tuesday's start of the school year! So today was the last week day I had home with the kids, unstructured, free. I am trying to savor it.

We even fit in one more visit, yesterday, in a day trip to Denver to see my aunt (known as Amma) and my cousin's boys (nephews, in my view). Eileen/Amma fed us a lovely lunch on her porch and we spent the afternoon at one of their fabulous neighborhood pools. Isaac and Eli swim like fishes, but this time, Miles and Adele were not far behind. They made progress even in this couple of hours! Adele ended up jumping in, unaided by a pool noodle, and swam to the surface on her own. And both are swimming, dog paddle style, all over the place! As a result, I got to enjoy some good conversation with Eileen while kicking leisurely as I like to do.

We saw four separate rainbows on the drive home!

Today I spent some of the afternoon doing something I wish I'd done more this summer: played with my kids outside. Not supervised them, not cleaned while they played, but really got into it and hula-hooped, jumped rope, chalked, and played a board game on the sidewalk. We blared oldies and drew some of our favorite summer images.

A map of our travels.

Adele's drawing of our house.

Adele's mountains, my pets, and Miles' hopscotch board.

Miles says pools and waterslides were his favorite part of the summer! For real!

My sketch of the kids hitting the gong.

I'm trying to remind myself that at the end of the school year, I did not want it to end. I remember thinking I would happily start a new school year after maybe a two week break, I was so keen on what the next year would bring. But now? I'm dragging my feet. I assume it's just a little regret at the door closing on something, no matter how complete it feels.

I'm gonna need a good solid meditation session tomorrow. I'm grateful I'll be walking to work in the Colorado sunshine, though. Here we go!