Verano

Nate just finished MSCR tennis lessons.  He LOVED them.

We've now finished Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone and are about half done reading The Chamber of Secrets.  The kids play Harry Potter for at least an hour every day--riding brooms (literally), playing Quidditch, and stupifying each other (and me).  Here's Nate (I think) under the invisibility cloak.

Nate has taken up the classic summer pastime of childhood, climbing trees.  I love that he's so adventurous now.  Before he went to kindergarten, he wouldn't even go down the big slide at the park by our house. :)

Now that the kids are content to play together for some sort of extended periods of time, I am taking advantage of that time to clean and organize... Oh wait.  No, I'm reading and sitting in the sun.

Nate and Abbie like to pretend that the hammock is a battleship.  They then use the apples from our apple tree as cannon balls.  It's all fun and games until I become the enemy pirate ship.

Abbie has found a new love in dress-up.  Our garage sale princess dress finds have rewarded us well.  She comes up from the basement in a new outfit at least five times a day.  We then spend a lot of time dancing, mostly to see how well each skirt/dress bells when she spins.

For the first time in my life, I have kept the flowers in my yard alive.  All of them!  Then when we came home from swimming lessons last week, we pulled into the driveway to see a frickin' squirrel IN our flowerbox, under our bedroom window.  It dug up almost all of my impatients.  Unbelievable.  I have since replanted them all and I think that they are going to make it.

No, I did not hire a hypnotist.  The kids were just watching HSM 3.  Entrancing, I know.  We had a friend from high school and her daughter over the other night for dinner and a movie, while Alan was gone all night on call at the hospital.  It was a lovely evening.

Overall, we have been having a wonderful summer.  Second year of Residency is leaps and bounds better than first.  Aside from call, Alan is doing all outpatient care this year.  That means clinic hours!  That means that WE SEE HIM IN THE MORNING!  I honestly can't remember the last time that Alan was home when we got up in the morning.  He was always at work before we woke up.  That's just how it's been for the last year, I mean years.  So now that he doesn't have to be anywhere until like 7:45, it's like the weekend every day!  The kids and I don't know what to do with ourselves.  I can shower with another adult at home with the kids.  WHAT?!  So even if every evening ends up blowing and call is still overnight, at least we have a husband and daddy back for the mornings.  That's our literal Christmas in July.  Hallelujah.