a summer love

  
    If any of you read my blog posts from last summer, you read of my supreme love affair with not working (I am employed by a school district; yeah, it has its perks), being home with my three children of high school and college age, and having time to myself to pursue life and God and my own interests as well as the interests of others.

  I am blessed to say the same about this summer.  It's only July 6th and school has been out just shy of three weeks, but I feel like we've packed a boatload of memories into the days since the school doors closed behind me.

  June 20th found my husband and I winging our way across the country to spend 6 days in Ennis, Montana - a speck on the map before that date, and an astonishingly gorgeous piece of land forever etched on our hearts after that time.  I am not even sure how to blog about it, as we felt and saw and were surprised by so many things; almost too many to retell.  But I'm sure there will be a post about it on here somewhere pretty soon. And most of my 700 pictures will be up on Picasa once I get through them all - link to follow in another post.

   We had barely unpacked from that trip when our son's friend from St. Louis landed days later at Philly International and we inherited a sweet, loving houseguest for an extended 4th of July weekend.  We swam, laughed, ate, played, shopped, and s'mored late into the night.   A family picnic, nights of fireworks, and 100 degree temperatures made for a memorable trip.  We loved having her here with us.

  As she prepares to leave today, we celebrate my youngest's 16th birthday which means a trip to the driver licensing center for a permit test followed by a nutritionally packed dinner of pizza and chocolate birthday cake.  Followed by 5 boys descending on our finished garage complete with sleeping bags, soda, chips and various forms of electronic devices and music

  When they all go home tomorrow, I think things shall seem too quiet around here.....