1.  Bruises, scratches and other Minor Wounds: I was looking at my kids last night and saw signs of a good summer.  Looking at Gigi’s long, lean, brown legs, I saw scratches, bruises, dried juice and the underside of her feet?  Filthy!  It has been warm here, in the Pacific Northwest.  Warm weather finally came after spending weeks under the umbrella or damp sweatshirts.  As soon as the sun peeked her rays out from behind the clouds, my kids peeled their clothes off like bananas and hit the yard.  They hit it HARD too.  No shoes, short shorts (and in the case of Jude, nothing at all sometimes) and lots of digging in the dirt.


 

 

 

 

 

 

2.  Filth: Last night Gigi reported that Jude’s hair was dirty.  Really dirty.  We answered that we knew and carried on with our own activities – digging in the dirt for adults, also known as ‘gardening’.  When I did finally get Jude in for a bath his hair had several (and yes, I exaggerate) pounds of sand, dirt and grime in his hair that had somehow materialized in the day and a half  since we had last soaped and scrubbed him.  I know that kids plus dirt equals a dirty (and happy) child, but I had to lean him back over my knees with his hair in the water, rubbing his scalp and hoping that gravity would help to get all of it out.  I also had to SCRUB his body.  The dirt did not want to wash off.  When I washed his little face, there were actual water trails in the dirt, like tears, running through the dust and grime.  The water, post bath, was yellowish brown from all of the dirt that came off of that child.  Like I said, a good summer!

3.  Willingness to Spend Time With Your Sibling: Jude and Gigi have had enough summer that they are actually choosing to spend it together.  Every waking moment, pretty much anyhow, finds them side by side, imagining up wonderful stories and amazing worlds.  To her credit, Gigi does an excellent job of catering to Jude’s interests and changing the play to keep him interested and engaged – a hard task when working with a wily three year old brother.  But there has been enough summer that our kids found their rhythm together, they figured out a friendship that will last them their whole lives.  We always tell our kids that they are best friends, when all else fails, even when Mama and Daddy are gone, they will always be there for one another.  That was the point of having two.  This summer they realized that indeed, they are best friends.  (Granted, they still scream, fight and beat on one another, but the good side is prevailing most of the time.)


4.  Non-Stop Action!:  Our kids cannot sit still for more than a moment.  They are busy from the moment they rise (thankfully 7:30 these days, not 5:30) until the moment they lay their heads on their pillows and crash to sleep.   I was trying to photograph their dirty little legs last night, when Jude stated going silly on me and Gigi followed suit.  The next thing I knew their filthy little bodies were skipping off into the sunset, in pursuit of the next big summer adventure and one another…


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