Groves Family Blog: July 2018

Here is the post I write every summer around this time...
The school year seems 100 years away, and at the same time summer is flying by! It's been the usual mix of work and play, although having transitioned much of my job at CCEF NE has made a huge difference and this year has felt less frenetic. The kids being older helps too - there have been many beautiful hours of independent sibling play time. I am so thankful for both of those things! My goal this summer was to let the kids live at their pace, not rushing them around or forcing more social activities. Those are challenges for me, but overall have been going really well so far (despite a lot of rain and more bickering this week). I'm sure I'm missing things, but here's what I have pictures to remember! These are in reverse order because I don't feel like rearranging them. ;)

Hours of perler beads this week with a new friend - they were so happy to hang out this morning while Alden was at "school camp" (a couple free weeks of preschool offered by the district - sure!) and couldn't mess with the beads.

Annual family Hinman cabin overnight. The kids adore this. This year everyone's highlight was our early evening canoe all around the lake, and a morning paddle where we watched a loon dive and resurface so far away, over and over.

Alden was so tired out he fell asleep during bedtime reading.

They remembered everything about last year. So we had to have pasta and cookies for dinner and bacon for breakfast. This year we added cinnamon rolls.

Trying to build Alden a raft to float out and catch lilly pads.

Ice cream in Lyme where mommy & daddy used to live.

Norwich Farmers Market - munching on fresh carrots they bought with their kids tokens*, while listening to a college friend's bluegrass band. Summer perfection. (Amazing Upper Valley program this summer! Kids do an activity at any farmers market and earn 3 $1 tokens that they can spend on produce. They love doing this every week.)

Early morning Boston Lot swims, one of my favorite summer things. Bike to Boston Lot, run up the trail, and swim in the lake. At 6am, it's silent and peaceful.

Helping process CSA bounty.

Chilling at the farmers market.

The kids loved Summer Celebration Camp last week. And came home almost every day and played nicely together for hours until I coaxed them to the pool. ;) Friday we did pizza at the pool with friends - love staying late so the grownups can use the diving board and do swim races.