well hello there, summer

Here we are nearly a week into Summer and I find myself without any real 'summer' pictures.  

We've been too busy having fun.  And keeping up with our 'Summer Goals' that we wrote out.  So far we're doing pretty good.  We've managed to have a spontaneous firefly catching evening, made it to the beach and the river, had a picnic lunch, petted/chased our favorite chickens around, picked blueberries, and climbed in a treehouse... but those are just the highlights.  We've spent far more of our time enjoying our 'unscheduled' mornings, lazing about watching cartoons and reading stories and having late breakfasts.  

In between all of the 'highlights' and after we're thoroughly exhausted from lazing around ;) there's been lots of pretending to be SkippyJon Jones and Jezebel, princesses and superheroes, and all sorts of other random things my two 'big' girls come up with now that they're home together.  All day.  Everyday.  And I say that with a smile.  Because they love it and so do I.  Last night they stayed awake (past lights out) for an hour and a half playing in their bed... after playing all day long.  And I find myself ever so very very extraordinarily grateful for the bond those 2 girls share.  They are different in temperament and there's quite an age gap... yet they just love giggling together.  They love being together.  They love having Summer to share together.

And you may have noticed the new little 'embrace the camera' button down on the right side of the blog.  Click on it and check out 'the anderson crew'.  This little pic of Ree and I is my contribution to a concept that rang true to me... Remembering to turn the camera around and put myself in pics with my girls, regardless of how I think I might look.  I love finding pics of my parents with my brothers and I, seeing what they looked like 'back then'.  Every so often, I will try and remember to continue to do this.