Good Ole' Summertime

It is mid July now, boy time flies. Our summer has dare I say, been really good. We are all tan and sunkissed and spending a lot of time outside. Our friends have a pool so many a day we find ourselves moseying over there. The kids, she has 5, I have 3, all find something to do be it swim, play a game, do a scavenger hunt and my friend and I pull up some lawn chair and get some sun. We read. We talk. I knit. Life is good. I told her I could definately get used to this lifestyle. Too bad work gets in the way. I do still need to get my hours in. Thankfully I can do them early in the morning or late at night if I want to. Got to love a flexible, work at home job.

Summer reading is moving along and all 3 kids are in fine shape. J has been reading up a storm, he is carrying around chapter books and reading whenever he can. It is a welcome sight but when he was trying to read as we walked through the grocery store I thought for sure we were headed to a "Spill on Aisle 8" moment. I finally had to tell him to put the book away and watch where he was going. I have never had to say that in a grocery store before.

Speaking of grocery stores, ouch on some of the prices. It is just all going up. Our good friends slept over last weekend so I picked up a few breakfast items. I never buy Entenmenn's pastries, well only for special occasions. So this was special so I grabbed a Raspberry Cheese Danish thing and never looked at the price. I figured maybe $3.75? I looked at my receipt at home, $5.49! OUCH! Insane really, very tasty sure, but insane. And I bought Edy's Ice Cream today and I swear the container is smaller. Did they downsize?

What I worry about is winter. And we are in a unique situation for which we are supremely thankful but I worry about friends and family. Oil prices to heat homes here are going to be through the roof and winter's here are cold. It is like a dark cloud hanging over the future for a lot of people in the Northeast, what will winter heating prices do their already stretched budgets?


Tomorrow my boy turns 6. Mr. Manny as I call him, no idea why, is growing up before my eyes. He is sooooo a mini me of his Dad, it becomes more and more evident as time goes by. He looks like him, has his mannerisms and sense of humor. A friend we see only sporadically even commented the other day that he even walks like R, the same stride and motion. He's a hoot, still passionate, either happy to the extreme or frustrated to the extreme, loves his video games and as I mentioned reading is his new thing. He swims like a fish, dances like no one is watching and loves to do experiments with various items around my house. It is not unusual to go in the freezer and find some bowl, of something, in there as he is seeing what it will be like if it freezes. He is also every bug's friend as he will find them in the house and gently take them and release them outside. Unlike his Mom who will usually scream and squish them. J is their hero.

He's something. That is usually all we can say, he is something. :)