Around Here Lately

The last few weeks have been incredibly sweet.  Bitter, also (specifically Dad’s 75th birthday and our first Father’s Day without our dads), but mostly just very sweet.  Grace and Whit have both been at home and though the early weeks of summer, after school but before camp, are always a particular logistical challenge, they are also surpassingly lovely.  I used to share posts regularly with photographs of small moments, and I want to revisit that habit.  I often share these observations on Instagram these days, and if you’re on there, please come find me!

I do the New York Times crossword on my phone every day (not really Friday or Saturday).  I was happy to see my POD in it recently (this the larger-then-mini Saturday “mini,” which I like best of all).

Grace and I tried aerial yoga one evening.  I think I’m too old to be upside down that much, but it was an adventure!

My sister-in-law invited us over to come pick some of her glorious, blooming peonies as she was about to leave the country for a week.  They are just my favorite.

When Grace snaps things like this, it makes me incredibly happy.  Nothing better.  They were fighting an hour later, but still, I love this, and love that they had dinner in the garden together.

We had family dinner at a fried chicken restaurant that both children wanted to try.  Not sure we loved the restaurant, but I loved the rainbow wall, the buttermilk biscuits, and the laughter.

One night Grace, Whit, and I went for a walk after dinner to the park.  We all like to swing, still.  This sunset greeted us. Another evening we had a picnic dinner in the park. The neighborhood park where both children toddled many years ago, where they played Micro Soccer at three, where so many memories of their childhoods crowd my vision.  I love it there, and love that they still want to go.

Grace and Whit gave me this card with a very thoughtful note (including how much they love having the whale pod under one roof, to which I say, me too) and a wooden spoon with a smiley face in it.  One of the best gifts I’ve received!

Whit and I went for a jaunt to Philadelphia (to see two of my dearest friends from college and their families) and to Baltimore for the bar mitzvah of one of his best friends from camp.  I’m not sure the two of us have been on an airplane alone before.  It was just absolutely great.  He makes me laugh so hard, this kid does.

He also remains sweet.  We had an awkwardly long interval between bar mitzvah and flight, and so we walked around the Baltimore inner harbor for a bit before heading to the airport early.  We had a relaxed dinner in the terminal and then, as we wandered around the airport bookstore, he said, without really realizing it, I think, “Mum, I just really like being with you.”  Oh, me too, Whit.  Me too.  One of my top ten parenting moments.

Father’s Day has always been, much like Mother’s Day, just a regular day in my world.  This year I was really cranky and about halfway through the day I realized it was sadness hiding as irritation.  Of course, that’s not fair since Matt, too, is in the exact same place.  The only downside of doing this together, that.  Still, all four of us went to see my father’s grave and talked to both of our mothers and took this photo and let’s face it, we are supremely fortunate.  We all know it.

Yesterday camps began and the regular rhythm of summer began.  I’m already nostalgic for the first two weeks of June.