well, hello there...

it's been a while...

I can't believe that summer vacation is over in two weeks.  We have had a good summer and still have a long weekend at the beach to squeeze every last drop from this summer.  But we are trying to wrap our minds around the fact that we will have to be on a strict schedule again soon.  And by we I mean me, I am trying to come to grips with reality.  We have had a good balance this summer between activities, plans and just plain old hanging out at home.  We have also had some ill health here at our home and I have suffered somethings that have made it difficult for me to get going (hopefully, I am on the path to wellness).  Since the boys are less than 2 years apart they play really well together, so I haven't had to coordinate a lot of play dates (are they still called play dates at this age?) and that has given us time to just be a family. 

I plan on going back and posting what we have done so far this summer but for now I am just going to post some pictures from yesterday.  The weather was beautiful, we have (so far) been spared the high heat typical of August weather and were able to get outside and play during the day.

I got out the sidewalk chalk and Grace sat right down and grabbed a piece and started drawing on the driveway.  Pay no attention to her hair and old clothes, she has been sick with a cold for over a week and has been a mess the whole time.  She finally got her appetite back yesterday and was able to avoid having to go in for fluids due to dehydration (Thank God!).  She loved coloring and was able to get the chalk all over her face, clothes and hair.

John was so impressed that she was coloring that he said 'mom go get your phone and text a video to dad, he's going to love this!'  When I told him that my phone was charging he went and  got his camera, deleted a bunch of photos so he had room and took a video of her himself.  He took video from several angles, zoomed in to get a better view of her hands, and got up real close to show that she was coloring in a different spot.  He was so serious the whole time.  I smell a future career!

I traced the boys body outlines on the driveway.  Which is still one of their favorite things to do with chalk and always reminds me of a really terrible crime scene from C$I or something.  Luke colored his outline as spiderman, of course. He was quite perturbed that there was no black and he had to make his webs and spider by using gray.

Sidewalk chalk never gets old...