Memories, but fewer photos

This was another big full summer weekend — but unlike the last one, I don’t have a million photos of peaches and beaches to show for it. Only pictures of flowers from the last few hours.

We had extended family visiting, and cousins always kick up the fun levels. They came late Friday, so we had make-your-own-pizza night before then, and I made progress on my next puzzle (a hot air balloon festival scene from White Mountain) while we waited. There was much rejoicing and bouncing on air mattresses when they showed up around 10:30 p.m.

I got up Saturday morning and went for a run with my friend Jane. Since I’m signed up for a half marathon in September, I wanted to aim for 10 miles (also, it’s on my Summer Fun List!). The day dawned cool, so we went for it. We maintained a pace of 10:36, and finished in approximately 1:47. I have to say, I was glad I was not running another 3 miles after that, but if I can run 10, I can probably run 13.1, so hopefully the next few weeks of training will make me feel more confident.

Then it was home to the house full of relatives and home-made cinnamon rolls! I took the toddler to his care arrangement and then the rest of us headed north to Easton, PA to go tubing on the Delaware River. I had never done this before, but it’s a great activity for big kids (minimum age 6). All of our crew, ages 6-15, enjoyed it. We took a bus up the river a few miles, and then paddled out to the current, all tethered together. Due to recent rains, the current was swift, which was a net plus in my book. I enjoyed tubing but probably would not have liked 4 hours of lazing on the river. A little less than 90 minutes of floating seemed just about perfect for our crew. We drifted back to Easton where they fished us out of the river and took us back to the parking garage.

Tubing down a pretty river with lots of cute kids is the sort of thing I might take a lot of photos of, but we were strongly advised to leave our phones in the car. I suspect the tubing company has gotten a lot of complaints from people who drop their phones in the Delaware and wonder if anything can be done to retrieve them (nope). So the memories are all in my mind (and just as well — as we were exiting the river we passed a couple hunting around in the murky water for a dropped phone…)

The big kids all went over to the new house to play in the yard and do a bonfire but I stayed home with the toddler. He went to bed pretty easily, though, so I was able to do some work on the back porch — getting a little ahead for the week while enjoying the summer sunset. And then more puzzle! I am making progress, slowly but surely.

After the cousins left early on Sunday, we relaxed at the house — even a full weekend has some downtime, a point I find often gets missed in any discussion of the virtues of doing “nothing” — and then went to Chanticleer Gardens.

Despite this establishment being a mere 15 minutes from my house, I had never been before. It seemed like a good “little adventure” — and a nice option for the post nap slot.

And mostly it was, although 5 minutes after we arrived, it began raining. The drizzle continued for most of our time there. So we just saw a lot of pretty flowers and woods…in the rain. There was a fair amount of complaining about the weather, but there were koi in the ponds, and that partly made up for it. I’d like to go back when it’s nicer. A fun side note: As I was paying our admission fee, someone asked “hey, are you Laura Vanderkam?” Turns out she recognized me from Instagram* — maybe I’ll post the Chanticleer photos there if I don’t have tubing ones…

*@lvanderkam. Almost at 10k followers, so would appreciate a few more to put me over.