Late summer lately

It has been a fantastic summer around here!  Here's what we've been up to this past month...

Lots of garden work - this one is my parents' garden in Zebulon.  They took a trip to Maine for a week in July, so we went out to check on the garden and the dogs.  And picked all.the.tomatoes...

Which magically got turned into tomato sauce!

Our own deck tomato plant was out of control... Jack and the Beanstalk pictured above.  This particular plant was the hugest plant with the highest yield this year, even above the ones planted in the rich soil in the raised beds.  I think the deck just gets SO much sun in the afternoon, that this plant couldn't help but be happy!

Our new church had a picnic at the farm owned by some of the members.  The boys had a blast!  James and Stuart explored the cool treehouse/play structure above.

It was SO HOT, so Sam spent all of his time in the pool.  Smart boy.

Before we left, the farmer took some kids over to feed the cows (bread?  I never knew cows liked to eat bread, but these ladies sure did!)

And the goats

And play with some leftover building materials for a barn that she (the farmer) is restoring.  We had such a blast!

It has been unbearable hot for the last few weeks, so one of the few times we spent outside was at our favorite Museum of Life and Science in the Hideaway Woods exhibit... in the creek!

Hot weather = lots more indoor activities.  Watercolors are the current favorite.

This photo demonstrates how hot and sweaty, but also how sweet, these brothers have been.

Several farmer's market breakfast picnics, of course.

Carrot harvest from our own garden - this is a compact variety of Danvers that grew really well this year.  They were big and fat, but most of them were not very long.  About the size of 3 or 4 baby carrots, so just the perfect size for James to eat.

The last Sunday in July was an all-age service at All Saints Church, so the children (except nursery) sat in the service - thankfully crayons were provided for spiritual entertainment!

The little boys spent the night with Mema in Zebulon while I worked one day, and we met to exchange the kiddos at Goodberry's.  YUM.

James took his tricycle on a walk to our playground and was able to ride it the whole way!  There and back is about 1.5 miles, so I am really impressed he was able to do it (though there was some complaining on the last little stretch of trail before home)!

We have implemented no screen time during the week to give us plenty of time to enjoy summer activities (and to just give our brains and spirits a rest), but that means when the weekend comes, there is movie night!  Above, the boys are lounging while watching Robinhood.

And more farmer's market breakfast picnics...

And homemade popsicles!

Indoor play (in the air conditioning)

And watching musicians at the farmer's market (can you see a pattern here?)

We took the boys bowling with my family (my parents, sister, brother and his kids).  It was a blast, and a little stressful.  Turns out there are lots of dangers that could hurt little fingers at a bowling alley!  But look at those little bowling shoes!

Lunch date at Foster's Market

We drove to Greensboro last week to meet my Aunt Val and her kids to play at the Children's Museum.  My people had so much fun!  It was hard to get good photos, because they were always on the move.

This picture doesn't look very exciting, but James set up this little house with those magnet tiles and played with his toy animals for AN HOUR.  He just narrated to himself what was going on, and I just thought it was so lovely to listen to him play.  Things like this I want to remember.

Stuart is comfortably settling into his role as a fellow... Here he is using the coffee mug that belongs to the division director, Dr. Paola Gehrig!

And most recently, this past Sunday at All Saints during communion with Casey (who is due with baby Pax in 6 days!) and our favorite friend, Ezra.