Saying Goodbye to Summer

We can turn anything into a hands-on lesson.  This week we are reading Aesop's Fables.  One of our favorite stories is The Ant and the Grasshopper.  Today, while preparing for the upcoming week of rain, Mark had the kids play "ants" and bring in firewood and clear the yard.

The orb weavers are out in full force, a clear sign summer is over.  One spider on the house is so close to laying her eggs, I didn't have the heart to move her so I painted around her.

We've had less than one inch of rain since July.  According to NOAA, August was the driest August on record for our state with no precipitation recorded!  Only 0.03 inches was measured for September!  We have never seen the pond so low.  The branch you see in the mud above is the same one Jack is swimming by in this post.  We call it The Deep Water Branch and non-swimmers cannot pass it without a life jacket.

The firewood that doesn't fit in the woodshed is securely covered (doesn't the paint job look nice?) and I'm sure we'll have our first fire soon.  I've started wearing my fuzzy robe and slippers all day and started shouting, "Shut the door! You're letting the cold in!" (instead of, "You're letting the flies in!").  We made it to October 20th without fire last year, but it is already only 61 degrees inside and we have poor Lula to think about!

This little sweetheart sleeps alone in her crib at night, so she gets really cold!  Last night I made her come and sleep with me for the second half of the night because her little hands felt like ice cubes!  The rest of her was nice and warm because she sleeps in an awesome baby-sized sleeping bag that my friend crocheted for her.  If only Lula would keep her hands inside!

 Mark was seriously focused on making sure everything is ready for the rain tomorrow.  He was painting ("Now I know why this was a $5000 painting job.") covering wood ("If that wood gets wet, it will soak up the water like a sponge and be worthless") making sure the left-behind boots, shoes, clothing, and jackets were brought back in the house ("It looks like the Rapture took place out there.") checking the power line ("It looks like a rat has been chewing on it-that must have been shocking.") AND trying to come up with what he was going to do for Cub Scouts tonight ("Could you make 24 flashcards for me and 6-foot lengths of rope for knot-tying?")  I know better than to get in his way when he gets like this.  I use it as a way to show my daughters what God meant when he created a helpmeet for Adam.

Jack helped by tearing a life jacket into tiny pieces.  I guess I've had it since IJ was a toddler, so I got my money's worth out of it.  But still! I do have other toddlers that could have used it!  It isn't like life jackets expire like car seats.  I just moved Lula up to the car seat I bought when IJ was a baby.  It expired a good four years ago!  Jack's other favorite job is being the chipper/shredder of sticks and other large chunks of wood.

I felt a little sad as I walked around this evening, taking pictures of autumn.  I know summer has been over for awhile, but the weather has been so nice it was easy to forget.  I normally don't like summer.  But this summer has been the best summer of my whole life (so far) so I'm sad to see it go.