is this summer?

It’s hard to know exactly what season we’re in right now.

It kind of feels like summer – because we wrapped up school and we’re staying up late and we’re sleeping in.

But also, the last two months we were kind of doing that anyway, just while simultaneously sort of finishing school.

And the weather hasn’t felt really summer-ish, although, let me add how grateful I am for that. I am not friends with heat and humidity and seeing it delay in its arrival makes me relieved.

Also – for the past four years, on this exact week we are usually trotting and loping all through the Pike National Forest in Colorado.

So, yeah, right now doesn’t exactly feel like summer but it doesn’t feel like regular either.

A couple of my kids have been diving deep into the world of coffee and specialty drinks. For his birthday, Bergen received a coffee grinder and a rather excessive stash of whole beans and other coffee paraphernalia – a cold brew maker and other stuff I know so little about. I’ve had to make a cut off time each day for their coffee consumption. Nobody needs that caffeine rushing through their teen bodies at all hours of the day – and night.

They’ve been googling fancy drinks and trying a new one each afternoon. Conn Panna (not even certain that’s the accurate name) and Hazelnut Latte and some whipped creation and so much more. Turns out, I’m also an enabler when it comes to their fun new pastimes. I ordered some shaker to aid their endeavors after we saw it featured in a video.

I cannot even begin to think about next year’s educational choices, even though they are literally being discussed ad nauseam everywhere all the time. I still need to turn in this year’s grades to all the official sources. Of course, I do have a plenty of opinions about next year, but it’s so much more complicated than I’d like it to be.

Some days I’m uber productive and some days I watch nine episodes of Married at First Sight. (You can judge me. I likely deserve it.)

I’d still rather be home than anywhere else (unless it’s on an epic adventure).

Speaking of epic adventures, London and I started “planning” her high school graduation gift – a trip to London, England. I’m excited because she is the homebodiest homebody that ever lived at home and when she requested a trip to London as her gift, I pretty much printed out the passport paperwork as she was finishing her sentence.

I do wonder how our future world will look for overseas travel by then but I’m cautiously optimistic that it will be possible. We’ve made a Google Doc of places to see and places to eat and we both keep adding to it – modern adventure planning. She’ll have to put up with my Charlotte Mason and JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis fangirling and I’ll take her to Abbey Road and feed her fish and chips and let her ride a double decker bus and see Big Ben a dozen times. We both want to visit the National Gallery so that’s a win.

Right now, however, we’re mostly just taking it slow. Wrapping up home projects, starting new messy ones. The boys are playing airsoft in the yard with the neighbors most every day. The rain feels relentless and I don’t know when we last took a hike. We’re eating pretty well although everyone here seems to have forgotten breakfast exists. I can’t rally myself to complain because they eat SO much otherwise and my grocery budget has skyrocketed and doesn’t seem to be coming down anytime soon.

That’s where things are in our house, this week, during Pretend Summer.

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