Eye Candy Friday.....

THE LAST DAY OF SUMMER VACATION EDITION

Today finds the last day of summer vacation. Oh, I know you are saying, "But you don't go back to work until Monday." You are correct, but Saturday and Sunday are days off already, so technically today is the last day. The only plans I have for today, are to mow the lawn after lunch. Oh sure, I have a bunch of things I "should" do, but really... I probably won't.

There are so many things I wanted to do this summer, that I just didn't get to. Back in the late spring when we realized how crazy this summer was going to be, we crossed "paint the front room" off our list. Funny how it never got painted last year either. Next year this room and Mr. Man's bedroom are going to get done, come hell or high water. We didn't go blueberry picking, but as I still have frozen blueberries from last year, that is quite OK. My friend gave me a canning jar full of blueberries she had picked for my birthday and they were fantastic. Never made it to the beach, which is really not fault of our own. We had lots of opportunity, the damn weather just didn't cooperate. We didn't go to the lake for the same reason. I didn't knit my sweater, my stack of photos is just as high as it was at the start of the summer, if not bigger and that one project I promise myself I'll do every summer.. still isn't done either. But it was a good summer.

We went strawberry picking for the first time, and I have a pantry full of jam. We had an anniversary party for my grandparents and spend a lovely afternoon with all my cousins and extended family. We've gotten together with The Boy's family a bunch to celebrate things and get ready for his sisters wedding next month. We went camping and enjoyed the great outdoors and had a much needed break. I've played a bunch of gigs with my steel drum group. Ms. Thang had a lovely 2 weeks at camp, despite cracking her tooth on a chicken bone. I went to a wedding and celebrated with my friends the union of 2 more of our friends.. at which I danced. In heels. I've logged 85.5 miles on the pavement since July 1st when I started keeping track. 3 miles of that include running (well, jogging) that I've just recently started with my "couch to 5K" training that you can read about here. There are no more pine trees in my back yard, which means no more pine needles to rake in the fall. We have grilled a lot of dinners on our new grill. We have enjoyed sitting out at the table we got back in the spring. Lots of books have been read. Movies have been watched. We have added a new kitten to the family (who needed to be de-flead and litter box trained). Ms. Thang has really gotten the hang of knitting (even if she does it that "other way") and on Monday she'll go for her Ham Radio license, and the boys will take the test to upgrade their license's to the next level. All in all, not too shabby.