Grasping What We Can of Summer

Last week, we were reading silently, lounging around on chairs and sofas.  It was quiet except for Mark's periodic, "Can I be done?"  "How about now?"

(Silent reading time may be Mark's favorite time of the day.)

I looked up from my book and saw Braeden and Emma bent over their books and felt a little sigh bubble up inside.  Summer was almost over and they'd be at school.  I want to keep my children with me all the time.  Is that too much to ask?

Later that afternoon, we went to Cascade Park.  There was a time a few years ago that we went there several times a summer.  That was Before.  Before mutual activities and scout campouts and all the other summer busy-ness that seems to dominate our lives.

Adam grew up swimming in the Stillaguamish and he taught our children the secrets of using the currents to help them, not wash them away.  He also influenced them, perhaps genetically, to withstand cold cold water.

I sat in my usual spot, in a chair on the riverside.  But that day I had a sweatshirt on because it was that cold.

Emma's friend Hannah came with us.  She was heroic and got in the cold water along with my nutty children.  I was impressed with her.  Then she got out.  Her petite body was shivering and shaking and she was freezing cold (See what I did there?  My z key still doesn't work but I figured out a way around it!!!).

Mark, who's perhaps the most sane of our children when it comes to temperature, left for awhile to play at the playground and warm up.  Braeden and Emma continued to dive and float and splash and assured Hannah that they were used to it and the water was fine.   Adam came from work and I retrieved a wool blanket from his car and wrapped Hannah in it and tucked her into a chair.  I wanted to avoid explaining to Jill how her daughter got hypothermia on my watch.

Mark rejoined the group and Adam and our children swam and swam in cold water on a cloudy day when the temperature didn't top 70 degrees.  There is little more pathetic than this "summer".

I'm not sure what Emma's doing...she must have scraped her arm on a rock.  Mark is sporting his neoprene shirt which I bought for the express purpose of allowing him to stay in the water as long as his never cold siblings.

They dove in the water off of A Hippo Rock (which Mark is standing on above...it looks like maybe he's levitating but it's just A Hippo Rock) which they named back when Emma was 3 and Braeden was 5.  I cautioned them like I've done every year to dive a shallow dive.  They chorused, "We will," like they've done every year.

I also enjoyed the lovely surroundings.

Later we (and by we I mean Adam and Braeden) built a snappy warm little fire.  We had dinner and roasted marshmallows for s'mores.

It turned out Hannah had some real skill at toasting perfect marshmallows even though she prefers them black and molten.

It turned out Emma had some real skill at sliding into pictures and posing for the camera.

Emma also lost the new "kid cell phone" that we'd acquired the day before.  You know, the one I told her not to take to Cascade Park.  We walked around looking for it and calling it with my phone.

Then we called Jill and had her "break and enter" into our house and listen for the phone while we called it.

No luck.

When we got home, Emma found the phone in the van, under the seat!  I think the little phone didn't get an adequate signal at Cascade Park to make its presence known.

We were all relieved.  Most of all Emma.

(Because she was sort of in the doghouse.)




Today we're going to Cascade Park again for our ward's annual Labor Day Salmon BBQ.  Today the forecast is in the upper 70s!  (heatwave!)  We'll be packing swimsuits (for them) and a book to read (for me).

I'm putting dinner in the slow cooker or otherwise I'll never be able to convince my family to get out of the water.  (We've got to GO, dinner is READY.)