Ending Summer

Last week, in addition to Jetty Island, we had a friend of Gareth's over a couple of times. The first day we decided to do some neighborhood exploration and went to a local park we'd heard good things about. It looks like a nice park - an area where you can run/walk/bike, a soccer field area, a butterfly garden, and a nice playground. Unfortunately for the big kids, the zip line was broken. Nevertheless, they had fun playing with the other equipment for a good hour or so. Then we stopped at a local toy store on the way home to check out what they offer. Seemed like a decent store and a good place to buy puzzles. Perhaps a little pricier than our previous toy store, but not by too much.

The next day we headed over to his friend's house and hung out there for a little bit before heading to Golden Gardens. The boys decided to wear wet suits. Getting those on was a workout! But I think they were glad to have them because it enabled them to play in the chilly water for hours. Malcolm wasn't as willing to touch the water here because the waves were a little more raucous. He had fun digging in the sand and building sand castles, along with an occasional trip to the water to check out the seaweed.

They spent most of the day trying to topple one another over into the water

Fascinated with what the big kids are doing

Mal needing to use the toilet multiple times meant many trips across the scorching sand for me. Ouch! Next year I'll be sure to have some water shoes or something, both for protecting my feet from the sand and for enabling walking on the rocky beaches around here.

Over the weekend we got some much needed rain - and some not-needed wind. We've got one somewhat large branch down in our backyard and lots of little twigs. Lots of people lost power, but our block never did. Saturday afternoon we debated, but then braved the weather and went to a barbecue with a couple of our friends. Gareth was in tears when he thought we might not go, and I was pretty disappointed as well. It's been hit or miss getting together with friends this summer between us moving and their various summer activities, so I was really looking forward to this gathering. I'm glad we went - the winds calmed down and the rain even stopped for a while. And we all had a great time.

We've still got a week and a half before school starts, but I'm taking the GRE this coming weekend, we've got some things to get together before school starts, and it's supposed to be rainy all next week. So while summer isn't quite over, it definitely feels like things are winding down. I think this past week was a good way to bring summer to a close.