Back to School

School started today.  I can’t believe summer is over already.  I could swear that last week we were doing all of the last day of school activities.  How can summer be over if it is 113 degrees?  I should knock on wood, quickly, since we haven't had a lot of 11* days so far but they are coming this week.  Brady's school added a third class for his group so class size will go from 28 to 21.  We're looking forward to that.

On the very first day of summer, we started an 11 day vacation driving all over AZ, UT, and NV.  It was meant to be my birthday trip but it ended up as a family list of destinations.  That’s ok by me. 

We returned from vacation to  sports camps, two ongoing basketball leagues and prep for fall baseball tryouts.  A couple more weeks went by and we scrambled to make another trip a success.  There were so many hurdles and changes of plans but we were able to take Brady to an 8 day “camp” with his aunt, uncle and cousins.  He had the time of his life.  Camp was mostly Brady and his 8 year old cousin from CA, Keira.  To watch these two play acting and making up voices and stories was hilarious.  We even managed to talk them into a brief goodbye hug. 

Mike and I got to enjoy those days, just the two of us.  We managed to survive after Mike optimistically took us to a rough area of town late one night, in search of Portland’s signature donut shop.  See Mike's voodoo doll donut with pretzel stick below.  Luckily, my info was correct, and not Mike’s (that the trains weren’t running again until 4 a.m.).  I ended up shopping at three quilt shops.  Two were unexpected and the planned shopping trip was a disaster.  New rule:  don’t shop at unfamiliar places when they’re having a sale (40% off most fabric and the place was bigger than the Door Mouse).  They had two cutting lines and one must have been 40 people long.  The traffic and terrain getting there were no fun either.  I left with nothing and was happy just to get out of there without derailing our trip any further.  We are usually lucky with minimal travel delays but, on this trip, we got delayed in PHX with the first monsoon of the season and delayed in Seattle with a plane issue.  We didn’t get home until 4 a.m. and … I was supposed to get up for work at 5:30.  That didn’t work.  What’s one more vacation day?

 

I was certainly awake a few hours later when I noticed a live scorpion in our bedroom.  Why am I always the one to discover these things?  We had done a sweep of the yard and house when we got home from vacation but saw nothing.  We have decided (rationalized?) that it came in with our luggage or with Sherman’s stuff from the pet sitter.  We continue to sweep for them after dark but …. Grrrrr.  Two live scorpions in the house in two years is two too many.

With all of these activities, sewing has been sidelined again.  I’ve been busy trying to keep my sewing room organized and the guild’s charity sewing fueled with the right supplies when needed.  We ended up being out of town for the meeting when my Jinny Beyer was “due” so that made it easy to miss that deadline.  Sigh.  It’s together but needs the pieced border.  I’ve been a bit stymied on the best way to do it without distracting seams.

I need to find the energy for some retreat planning and prepping.  I’ve made a list so that’s a reasonable start.  It will probably include putting together a couple of sets of blocks into tops, a couple of pillowcases, a simple modern top to comprise the back of a quilt that already has a front, and maybe even something NEW for a change.  I tend to get a lot done in these pre-retreat weeks but I will have to be creative with my time.  Fingers crossed!