summer wrap up

 

Summer is over! the kids have gone back to school and september has begun. notice that i don't say autumn has begun because here in florida, september is just more of the summer heat and humidity. we won't get a break in the weather until the middle of october, at the earliest. 

We had a couple of fun things happen in August. The first thing was that friends from England visited and we took a day off work to spend at the water park with them. the weather was perfect and we all rented a cabana so that we could have lounge chairs and seats. The air was warm, the water was cooling and the food was pretty good. We spent all day there then headed off to Sea World where we got rained out almost immediately so we went to dinner at Mellow Mushroom, which I've always wanted to try because it was my older sister's favorite, and everybody loved it.

I've known these friends for almost 20 years now. They were Taz's first wedding couple in 2006 when they came over to Orlando to elope and he took their wedding photographs. Actually he planned their whole wedding. They were planning on just going to City Hall but he found them a beautiful park and an officiant and they had a real wedding. We lost touch for a few years but I found them again on Facebook and we all had a lovely reunion when they visited Orlando again in 2017 and 2018. They have remained close friends and a source of support for me since Taz's death and they got to meet Chris and the kids in 2022 so it all came full circle.

We got to spend quite a bit of time together this visit (they come for 3 weeks at a time) and the bond just keeps growing stronger.

Speaking of strong bonds, we got to spend a weekend with my sister and brother in law recently at their new house and it was such a special time for all of us. We've had so many plans to get together this summer and one thing after another has conspired to keep us apart from kids stuff and illness (on her end) to car repairs (on my end) so we were especially happy to have our plans finally work out.

We got to visit the beach near her house a couple of times and it was so beautiful. we ate some good food, had a lot of laughs and just enjoyed being together once again. I am blessed to have her only a few hours away from me for the first time in my life and we hope to see each other as often as possible.

Hopefully the next time we visit with my sister we will be kid free because having the kids along puts a whole different spin on our visit. Between endless "are we there yet" and "I'm bored" the whole focus of the visit is different than if it were just adults. My "favorite" (note the heavy sarcasm) part was when we spent the whole morning at the beach just for them and 15 minutes later in the car they are grumpy because they are bored without their electronic devices. I used to ride on cross country trips with my parents during the summer (for my dad's job) so I would spend 8-10 hours in the car by myself without an electronic device in sight and I wouldn't have dared complain about it. I learned to amuse myself by reading or napping or looking out the window and living in my imaginary world; my kids can't go 10 minutes without complaining that there isn't anything to do. I'm really not sure what to do about it - I don't want to reward bad behavior just to keep the peace but I'm not sure they have the capacity to use their imaginations the way I did because they have had no practice at it.

So, yeah, the next few trips are going to be adult only.

Not that we have any trips planned, finances have dictated that we stay pretty close to home for the next several months but that's ok because it's time to start decorating for spooky season!