Off season

I think I'm mystified by all this "ode to summer" hoopla going around the internet because summer is not exactly my favorite season. My kids aren't in school yet, granted, so the calendar and schedule is the same for us year-round. Work is, if anything, busier for me in the summer. Grants are due, budgets ending, trainees are new and require additional supervision, and all our conferences happen to occur in May and June.

I grew up in the south and pretty much spent my whole life in climates that hit 80 degrees in March and didn't let up until November. "Hot" is not a novelty to me, nor something to get excited about. It is to be tolerated and avoided as much as possible. Oddly, all that living in the heat never really got me acclimated to it, I tend to wilt in the heat, feeling lethargic and headachey. When the temperature gets above 90, I want to be in indoors, lounging somewhere with cold air blowing on my face. I like going to the pool, but its not exactly relaxing or exhilarating to get us all dressed and sun-screened up and trudge over to the pool only for the boys to be tired & hungry 30 minutes later. The mosquitos invade the backyard, and no amount of "reminding" the boys to CLOSE THE DOOR when they go in and out can keep all the flies out of the kitchen.  I wear my cute summer clothes, sweat right through them, and then cover them up when I walk into our frigid building at work.

Its certainly not all bad. I like the late sunsets, I am still delighted as a child over fireflies, thoughts of ice cream & geleto keep me going. I am very much looking forward to our beach trip with my family at the end of summer...I would live at the beach if I could, but so far haven't been able to make that happen (and G is not keen, so its not really in our long-term plan).  A glass of chilled white wine & some fresh grilled vegetables make a perfect summer dinner. 

I'm sure I'll be more positive tomorrow. I'm exhausted today. L started crawling out of his crib a couple of weeks ago so we took the side off and every. single. night. he marches himself into our room at some ungodly hour and pokes & paws at me until he can get himself back to sleep. Last night was one of the worst.

On the cuteness front, B told us that he woke up in the middle of the night and saw that L wasn't in his crib and got really sad that he was gone away forever. So he  went to sleep again, and had a dream that he and L were together again, playing, and he was happy. Then he woke up in the morning, saw L playing with his crayons, and hit him because "I was happy he was there but he's not supposed to touch my things".