Making the Best of Things

J is in DC again this week.  It has been a tough time for me.  I guess I haven’t felt completely “right” ever since the Mother’s Day program at my son’s school.  The whole quick march of time, kids growing up, me growing old thing.  Ugh!  It’s overwhelming to think that I pretty much have a first grader and another son who will be entering his last year of preschool. J taking off for a week just compounded my crumminess.  Pile on loneliness and I feel even lower.

On Wednesday Cutie Pie refused to take a nap at his normal nap time.  I figured he could probably hang until bed time but I was wrong.  I found him soundly slumbering in our living room when I emerged from my shower after teaching Zumba.  I had big plans to keep really busy so I would not dwell on the fact that I missed J so much.  I wanted to take the boys for pizza at our favorite little spot on the beach.  When I couldn’t rouse Cutie Pie from his nap, Wildman and I chose to order a pizza instead.

Wildman and I went out front to enjoy the unusually cool temperatures we’ve recently experienced while we waited for the delivery guy to bring dinner.  I used the stop watch app on my iphone to time his bike ride down to the corner and back.  I also timed his sprint from our front yard to our neighbor’s tree and back.  We played a bit of hopscotch on the sidewalk too.  He wanted me to draw the game squares up to number 20.  I told him I’d number squares until my chalk ran out.  I got up to number 14.  He did the rest up to 20.  Cutie Pie continued to saw logs…

Our pizza finally arrived after half an hour or so.  Wildman suggested eating on  his playground clubhouse platform which I thought was a terrific idea.  The cool breeze, setting sun and sweet little boy company made for a perfect dining experience.  Cutie Pie would not budge from his place of rest on the leather chair…

We even brought out some peanuts to put on the fence for the squirrels.

Eventually Cutie Pie woke up, the sun sank low and we retreated indoors for baths, books and bed time.  I admit that I’m still in a kind of funk, an emotional mess, if you will, but those precious moments with Wildman made me realize just how wonderful life is.  The simple pleasures of a shared hopscotch game and a slice of pizza in the spring breeze are what life is all about.

I am blessed.

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Family BBQ

Wildman’s elementary school hosted a family BBQ a couple of weekends ago.  The PTO held a poster contest to advertise the event.  The photo above is the winning design.  It will be put on next year’s family BBQ t-shirts.

Fun contests and entertainment filled the afternoon from noon to 4 PM.  When we arrived we bought our tickets and headed to the food pavilion to have lunch!

After we had sufficiently stuffed ourselves with everything from hot dogs and pizza to cookies and watermelon, we decided to check out the raffle baskets and silent auction items.  Each grade collected money and put together a themed basket to raffle off.  Tickets were $1 apiece and you could put as many tickets as you wanted into the drawing for the baskets.  Kindergarten did a Lego theme.  It was adorable!  Sadly, we did not win a single thing…

J took the kids to the playground while I went to photograph the watermelon-eating and jump rope contests.  My boys were hot and tired from their morning t-ball game and refused to participate in any of the contests…  Oh, well.  I understand that.

I joined everyone back at the playground after I’d taken a bunch of pictures.  The kids were even more hot and tired by that point so we decided to call it a day.  We ended up taking the boat out for what ended up being one of the most pleasant island trips we’ve ever had.  I so wish I had brought my camera…

Super Moon

Our friends got a beach bonfire permit from our town’s fire station for Saturday evening.  It was a treat to watch the largest full moon in more than 18 years rise up out of the ocean.  It rose orangey-red out of the haze on the horizon at 7:49 pm.

Even with the flash on, my camera picked up how spectacular the color was.  Gorgeous!

We met our friends at the beach about 5:30 pm to enjoy the last hours of daylight.  So many families were able to join us.  People brought everything from margaritas to chocolate chip cookies to oysters.  It was awesome!

This guy even delivered pizza to us on the beach!  I had no idea they would do that!  I’ll have to keep that idea in my back pocket for future reference 🙂

The twenty or so children busied themselves body surfing with J, playing what looked like Lord of the Flies in a big hole, making sand angels, driving toy dump trucks, finding fire wood, playing tag, wrestling- you name it!  At the end of the evening they were exhausted.

The bonfire helped to warm the children after their games had been played out.  It lured parents and children alike into a drowsy trance.  It was a lovely evening full of fun memories and good conversation.

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend too!