The stuff of summer . . .

So, my youngest kids had some friends spend the night last night . . . and with the power of youth (and the flexibility of summer) on their side, they set out to "pull an all-nighter".  Around 5 am, since they were still awake, they set off on an adventure (at Anna's urging, because she wanted to see the sunrise).  They mostly roamed around the campground, visited the dog park, posed for silly pictures and laughed a lot. They apparently spent 45 minutes trying to take the first picture below (using a timer rather than asking the guest who was out walking her dogs to help them out).  That's a lot of commitment for one picture, but isn't it a COOL picture?!  They're going to be tired later (especially since they just scarfed down plenty of sugar as part of their ‘mini donut making extravaganza’) . . . but I can’t help but think they are going to remember this night for a very long time J   

THIS is the ‘stuff’ of childhood . . . the sweetness, the wonder, the silliness and (hopefully) the memories.

Now, before you walk away thinking that I'm one of those cool, idyllic parents who was out there making those fun memories with them - I definitely wasn't.  In fact, I was in bed (having a fitful night's sleep to start with - because of some chronic pain lately), worrying about whether they were being too rowdy and disturbing the campers, even texting them reminding them to try to be very, very quiet!  Then, when they burst back into the house, giggling and raided the kitchen for breakfast, I proceeded to bark at them about the huge mess they'd made during their 'night watch' (because, well . . . "small house + big mess = lots of stress").  I did however marvel at the fun pictures they got and told them what fun memories they had just made (while agonizing and aching over the child who was asleep on the couch and had missed out on the sunrise adventure and consequently wasn’t included in the fun “45 minutes in the making - picture”).  Then we made them clean up their mess!! 

I DID agree to being drug into the donut making fiasco - mostly so no one burned their appendages (or the house to the ground), but sadly I wasn’t a part of nearly as much of the fun as I would like to have been.  Nevertheless . . . memories and messes were made and summer is very much alive (even as the clock is ticking and ‘back to school’ looms on the horizon).  Life is good.    

And, yes, one obvious take away from this is “send your kids to my house . . . so I can allow them to follow up their utter lack of sleep with an exorbitant amount of sugar – and then send them back to you!”  Responsible parenting at it's finest!  (that donut picture below is only about half of all the donuts they made!)

neglected again!

Since this is the closest I get to scrapbooking anymore . . . I hate it when this blog is dreadfully out of date.  I'm going to attempt to fill in some of the gaps of the recent months . . . soon! Check back!