First day of school

Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage. – Lao Tzu

It took a lot of strength for my baby girl to walk into her pre-K classroom today. She wasn’t sure she wanted to go. She was nervous. So was I. But I put a kiss in her hand, and she squeezed it tight, and she walked in.

She was exhausted at the end of the day, but I think she had fun. I think in many ways we would both prefer it if she could stay home with me tomorrow . . . but it is time for both of us to move on now. This was the right thing to do – no matter how much strength or courage it may require of us.

And what of the first day of 1st grade? Piece of cake! Fletcher’s class is full of old friends and he couldn’t be more eager to get in there and learn. I think it is going to be a good year!

not ready

I’m not ready to see the summer end. Not even remotely ready. It has, as always, gone too fast . . . and yet it is so hard to remember ‘real’ life with schedules and deadlines; it seems like it has been summer forever. I wish it could go on forever. It has been a great one.

This was the summer the kids learned to swim . . .

the summer Fletcher lost his first tooth . . .

the summer we visited London and Italy . . .

and we can’t forget Foamhenge!

I’m going to do my best to let it go gracefully, and look forward to cooler temps and the approach of Halloween. I’ll do my best. But I can’t promise there won’t be a few more beach days calling us before summer is truly over . . .

Meeting Spiderman

Our sweet Fletcher, though he says he isn’t afraid of anything, sometimes shies away from costumed characters. Santa Claus is ok, but Gnate the Gnat at the Sand Gnats games? Forget it. So when friends invited him to join them at Party City to meet Spiderman, I wasn’t entirely sure how it was going to go.

I needn’t have worried! Fletcher was on top of the world. Totally star struck. He came home with an autograph card and kept saying “I just can’t believe I really met him!”

Fortunately Jessica and Anthony took plenty of photos and video to document the event. I couldn’t help but giggle when I saw them, and remember the time we took tiny 2 year old Fletcher to ride on Thomas the Tank Engine. When he saw Thomas, he had this sort of bewildered, stunned look on his face like he just couldn’t believe his eyes. Almost 5 years later, that expression hasn’t changed much. And I love that.

Dog Days

We are in the dog days of summer, folks. Make no mistake about it. I have forgotten what it feels like to drop below 90. The 60 degree temps we experienced in Italy at the beginning of the summer seem like a lifetime ago. And yet, I don’t want to see it end.

Our days have been a blur of swimming pools and make believe, staying up late and sleeping in.

We spent an amazing weekend on the river in Alabama with the whole Gaddy family – lots of fun on the boat, lots of good food. What more could you want from summer?

What happened to my blog????

OK. I don’t know exactly what happened, but things look different around here. Not in a good way. And frankly, it is driving me crazy. It has me sitting at the computer at 5:43am (and I’ve been here for a while now) and close to pulling my hair out. I don’t know where exactly things went wrong, but I’ll get it figured out. Perhaps someone was trying to tell me I’m in need of a redesign? Look for some changes coming soon . . .

NNO

It was bound to happen sooner or later – in the years I have been planning events for the Ardsley Park Chatham Crescent Neighborhood Association, we have had ridiculously good luck with the weather. Other than a slightly wet Oyster Roast one year, we have never been rained out. Of course, that almost changed last night!

Our neighborhood National Night Out picnic was set to begin at 6pm, but at 5pm the rain was unbelievable. Torrential downpours, flooded streets, little hope of a successful party. But did we give up??? Well . . . almost. But amazingly by a little after 6 the rain had stopped, the flood waters receded, and neighbors started showing up at the park for hotdogs and fun. Not our best turn out by a long shot, but a fun party none the less!

If you give a mouse a cookie . . .

What, oh what to do when it is 110 in the shade but you need a break from the pool? Bake cookies, of course! OK, that may seem a bit counter-intuitive – I’ve been avoiding turning on the over if possible, since it is so miserably hot here right now. But the kids found a cookbook Grandmama gave them a while back, and Fletcher read all the recipes aloud to me, and made a shopping list, and read If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, and I just couldn’t say no. We made mouse shaped sugar cookies and Jelly Jamborees and only melted a little bit from the heat of the oven.