A Bit More of Summer to Brighten your Day

So, when I came back to the blog the other day, I wasn't going to write a thing about summer. The problem with taking a 3 month break is that when you finally get back to writing, you have this immense pressure to write a really good post. And, you want to share with the world EVERYTHING you've been doing for 3 months. And, that's way too overwhelming, so you just check your e-mail, click on facebook, and promise yourself you'll get around to it next week. At the time I was eating a lovely piece of apple pie that Flannery had baked with apples we had picked a mere hours ago. So, I decided to skip the summer and write about apple picking. But, I hadn't taken any photos while apple picking, so I decided to just post a few photos from the summer. And, then suddenly I had a folder of 24 photos I wanted to post from the summer. But, blogger only lets you post 5 photos in one post. So, I felt I should write a bit about the photos since I wasn't posting all 24. And, now I've decided that 5 is not enough. So, here's 5 more. Enjoy!

(By the way, these are all in backwards order and I'm too lazy to fix it.)

Here we are at our annual trek up to MapleGrove. Flannery's family has been going to the same place up-North for some 30 odd years. Cousins + soap suds = piles of fun! Photo credits to Peter, Flannery brother, who shot 100 excellent photos while I kept the kids supplied with soap and food coloring and other stuff.

More Maple Grove. This is one of our favorite places. It's lovely pine forest. The ground is covered with piles of soft pine needles (zzzzzzzzz) and blue berries bushes. It's deserted. We found a pretend campfire that the kids had built last year with sticks still intact. There is a long stair case to a little stream. In theory we love playing in the that stream, but in practice it's cold as #$!@#$!@$ and after jumping in and out a few times we head back up to the pine trees.

So, the plan was that the kids would help their Aunt Pen make a surprise wedding cake for S and C who got married last spring. However, wedding cakes unlike bubbly art projects require a bit of precision. In the end, the older kids did help mix. The younger kids ate graham crackers spread with extra frosting and I learned how to make a buttercream rose:)

Boating!

The first of our many camping trips this summer. This was at a site near our house where I did a triathlon with K and her mom (gasp, pant, glug, . . . ).