Summer "Vacation"

...is bearing down on me like a freight train.

Is it just me? Where did the school year go? How the heck did it get to be May?

And whose brilliant idea was it to jam an entire year’s worth of activities into one month, then follow it with a desert of three school-less months where everything is closed?

I can’t be the only one walking around looking like a deer in the headlights at this time of year. Even WITH the twenty (rather expensive, alas) summer camps I signed the kids up for.

I have two children, which always used to seem manageable, if not exactly a walk in the park. But I’ve discovered that if you’re not hypervigilant, the activities kind of creep in there (basketweaving on Thursdays? Sure, honey!), and combined with school plays, doctor and dentist visits, and school events, all of a sudden you’re having to block out seventeen minutes to sit down and have dinner. Which you’ve bought pre-prepared, because who has time to cook?

Of course, all that will end in about three weeks. After which my children will be hanging off of me like ripe fruit. (Only more active, and vocal.)

So after nine months of ferrying children to mind-enriching activities and creating impromptu Abigail Adams caps out of cheesecloth and twine, I’ll be fending off requests to create to-scale replicas of the Taj Mahal in mixed media (drinking straws, egg cartons, and permanent marker, most of which will end up on my couches).

What are your summer plans?

Do they involve rum?

And if so, do you have a mojito recipe you’d like to share? ;)

(No more pink wine for me, thank you very much. At least not tonight...)