Thinking of Summer

I took Snapper out on a date a few evenings ago. We took a piece of paper and a pen and made a list of things to do this summer. After all, the last day of school is only a month away! This afternoon Pepper and I sat down and and talked about his hopes for summer. Matt and I added a few things, too. Here's our family list of things to do this summer.

• Read lots of books! Harry Potter series for Snapper. Magic Treehouse series for Pepper. I am looking for recommendations for good reads. I have spent the last year absorbed in adoption, foster care, and mental health books. I need some good fiction reading!
• Continue our evening family read-alouds. We're currently reading Redwall, by Brian Jacques. The kids are completely enthralled!
• Spend lots of time at the pool. Snapper will continue swim team throughout the summer. Pepper starts Level 2 swim lessons on Tuesday. His swim goal for the summer is to work his way through the lesson levels so he can start swim team in the fall. We also are getting a summer pool membership so we can enjoy lots of play time at the water park pool at our neighborhood aquatic facility.
• Have play dates with friends. This includes family play dates with families we love. Because I know you'll be reading this blog, Kathy, Pepper specifically wants to spend some time with Keller. =)
• Play our new piano! A fellow Cru staff family was giving away their old piano, so we picked it up! It is a small Stroud upright that needs tuning. We are thrilled to have a piano again! I am looking forward to brushing up on my musical skills, and Matt and I are going to give both kids lessons. They plan to do a lot of practicing.
• Play games! We have a whole shelf in our hall closet that is full of games. Pepper is old enough to enjoy board games now. I anticipate many sessions of Sequence, Life, Battleship, etc.
• Do art projects. This will include painting, drawing, building with clay, working with decoupage, and making collages. I also just bought a huge tub of new sidewalk chalk. We have an awesome driveway, so I expect to see lots of chalk masterpieces this summer.
• Cook together. We have a beautiful garden that will keep our veggie drawer well stocked this summer. Both kids want to cook with me. We'll also be trying our hand at canning and pickling.
• Craft. Snapper wants to make a quilt for her baby cousin Leah. Pepper wants to learn how to make good paper airplanes and do origami. I need to finish the quilt I've been making for Snapper. I also need to get our scrapbooks updated before we bring home new family members. Fortunately, I'm only a year behind in the family album, 18 months behind in Snapper's album, and a year behind in Pepper's album. I'm sure there will be lots of other fun craft projects this summer, courtesy of Pinterest.
• Correspond with cousins. Both kids plan to write letters and draw pictures to mail to their cousins in Washington.
• Play at home. Snapper and Pepper love each other and play really well together. They are already planning the games of dress-up, building with legos, making forts, and having sleepovers in each other's bedrooms.
• Ride bikes. Pepper has set the goal of learning to ride a 2-wheeler before his birthday in July.
• Go on fun outings. Our list of places to visit includes: SeaWorld (hooray for our season passes!), the beach (lots of evening cookouts in store for us!), fishing in the ocean and the many lakes in our area, the park, and roller skating.

Matt and I also plan to get the house ready for additional family members. This means rearranging bedrooms, painting two bedrooms, stripping wallpaper and painting the bathroom, buying and building two new bunk beds, and shopping garage sales to find a couple of dressers and two more chairs for our kitchen table.

We also are hoping to make a couple of trips up to Little Rock. It is looking more like we'll be selected as the adoptive family for the three little girls we've been pursuing for the last month. We are hoping to get the final decision this week. Then we can move forward with our preparations. We're not sure yet if we'll have to make an initial visit trip to see the girls, and then another trip to bring them home, or if they'll have us just come once. We'll have to wait and see.

It is shaping up to be a great summer! I'm really happy that we don't have any big trips planned. We had hoped to get out to Spokane this summer to visit Matt's family, but that isn't going to happen. This will be the first summer in 7 years that we haven't had to make a major trip. It will be good just to be home.