We got out of school for the summer on May 21 (so EARLY!), and so our summer technically began on May 22- which happened to be my 35th birthday!
School starts next week, so this is officially the end of summer for us.
So, lets see what we were up to:
We had one week of summer in May, and this is always a “recovery week” for our family. May is FULL and we are always exhausted by the end of the school year. Actually, I don’t think we are just exhausted- we are totally burnt out and usually feel AWFUL for about 10 years after the school year ends.
Still, we managed to keep going and even attended a Dayton Dragons game, hosted a Farm Day, worked on harvesting mulberries, celebrated our 14th wedding anniversary, attended our nephew’s graduation & party, and had a prayer and praise night for my Dad who was set to start chemo on June 1st.
June brought chemotherapy for my Dad, a garage sale, lots of swimming time, the World Cup, VBS at our church, a visit from my in-laws for the weekend, a family vacation with my side of the family in Red River Gorge, and a down week full of summertime fun!
In July we celebrate the 4th of July, the two oldest ran their first 5k, the three big kids went to day camp at the YMCA, we watched more World Cup games, we went to Michigan for our Hines family reunion, my sunflowers began to bloom, we started to accomplish our back to school checklist, I got hired in a new role at school and we visited the Ohio State Fair.
August has been fully back to school mode as the teachers and students have started to fill the building back up! We also celebrated Tera’s 12th birthday and have dealt with crazy rain and thunderstorms for like a week!
We had a simple bucket list on our fridge, and we managed to complete most of it!
- Host a Garage Sale- CHECK
- DeValve Family Reunion- CHECK
- Hines Family Reunion- CHECK
- Backpacking with Daddy- did not happen. It was on the calendar twice, and thunderstorms were in the forecast both times. Not ideal backpacking weather!
- The Ohio State Fair- CHECK
- Night Swim- did not happen. Still might.
- VBS- CHECK
- Go Biking- CHECK
- Movie Theatre- CHECK- Theo took the kids to Moana live action
- Library Reading Program- CHECK
- Blind Taste Test- CHECK
- Run a Family 5k- CHECK
- Visit all county parks- did not visit a single one. Our family is quickly moving out of the park stage!
Of course, those are all the HIGHLIGHTS of the summer. There were some lowlights, too. It’s always a delicate balance on the blog of not oversharing or complaining, but also not just portraying this perfect life that we have. It’s not perfect, and in fact this season of our life has been a challenge. There is work stress, kid stress, financial stress, marriage stress, spiritual stress, personal stress, family stress and the list could go on. There has been some big prayers that we have praying that haven’t been answered on our timeline, and waiting can be hard! The unknown can be hard. It can be hard to celebrate wins (either our own or others) when the losses feel so big.
All in all, it was a great summer! It was not very restful, but I am sure that there will be many summers in our future that are a little more low-key.
Ready or not- here we come ’26-’27 school year- 7th, 4th, 2nd and 3 yo class!