Where Did the Summer Go?

I cannot believe that it is September 8th!  And that my last post was in June!  Where did the summer go?  Actually, if I look at my calendar, I can tell you that it flew by because we were SOOO busy!  We literally had only a handful of free days here and there.  It was a wonderful summer, but I have to admit, I was a little bit giddy standing in line at the grocery store before the kids went back to school.  Watching the groceries for lunches and home cooked dinners made me very excited to get back to a routine after the busy summer we had! 

We did just about everything on the list I made in June - and then some!  Trips to NY - Upstate and Long Island - to visit our families.  Lots of visitors -- my mom came up from Florida, my dad came from Upstate NY, my sister-in-law and her family came from Long Island, my brother-in-law came for a whirlwind 12 hours to drop off my goddaughter for a few days!  We set up our "little" pool -- epic fail...  The pool was a disappointment!  BUT, for $43 we purchased a family pass to our town pool which was wonderful!  It is a huge, well-kept pool with a twisting water slide that the girls (and my sister-in-law!) thoroughly enjoyed, it also has a fun splash area with lots of fun things to run through and get drenched!  We had a number of sleepovers with friends and with cousins, the kids had a great time at Vacation Bible Camp - their first time!  We had a wonderful 4th of July "up country" at my aunt & uncle's house in the Lakes Region of NH.  My cousin and his family joined us, we swam in the pool, went to see the fireworks, and just enjoyed hanging out with the family.  We went swimming at our local lake a number of times and drove up to the Lakes Region two more times - once with my mom and once with my goddaughter to go swimming at our favorite, Newfound Lake!  We never got back to Hampton Beach, NH's oceanfront, but we did have spend a wonderful day at the ocean in NY.  The girls spent almost a week with their grandparents in NY while my husband and I went back to NH so that he could get back to work.  That was a first for us, being away from the girls for so long, but they had a great time and it was nice for us to have some time to spend together on our own. 

We ended the summer with a family BBQ here with a surprise birthday party for my aunts.  Now the girls are back in school - we've already had an open house for my 8th grader which included a potluck dinner fundraiser for her band - I made delicious tortellini meatball soup to donate - yum!  We have another open house for our 3rd grader next week!  Girl Scouts will be starting up October 1st and religion classes and youth ministry start at the end of this month.  I was volunteered ;) to be the 3rd grade religion teacher (my little peanut is in the class), also to help out with the youth group AND that involves helping with making a float for our town's big 275th anniversary celebration!  Fall is looking almost as busy as the summer!