2016 Week 23: Summer Joys

So, I've succumbed to the adult coloring trend! Yes, I whiled away an hour while listening to former colleague Win Corduan's gig on streetjelly.com (Thursdays 9-10 pm).

Last weekend we attended several graduation open houses. One home was in a park-like setting. A friend and I walked the grounds admiring the beauty of the landscape. We were curious about this lovely plant. What is it?

 Monday morning this sleeping beauty was dropped off  while mom went to her first summer dance classes.

After her long nap, Rebecca made up for lost time and made sure I got plenty of exercise.

We had a nice group at Monday dinner, great food, and lots of fun sharing stories.
On the way home, this time of year, we enjoy gorgeous sunsets.

 Messi Elijah spent three days with us to attend the Fun in the Sun program at our church.
One evening he played ping pong with Grandpa and Tuesday, when Mike was at robotics, he and I played Hand and Foot and ate thin mints!

Michael lives a very full life. He is still working on the design for the new space the PhyXTGears team hopes to move to late summer. There are always the regular chores: mowing; feeding the birds; checking on the bees; trying to catch the coons that visit and vandalize almost every night. (Notice the $1 contraption to coon-proof the bird feeders.)

Even so, he is never too busy to enjoy a bicycle ride. The longest so far was almost 40 miles.

This was an intense week for Matt and Kayla both working and settling into their new home.

We went over Friday evening to celebrate Matt's birthday and by then they had made unbelievable progress.

We remembered that exactly five years ago was the day of our house-fire which totally preempted Matt's birthday celebration.

Today, Saturday, was the Upland Strawberry Festival. I volunteered for a couple hours in the strawberry shortcake line, responsible for serving the unsweetened/natural/no sugar/healthy berries. Try as I may, using every possible sales pitch, most customers preferred the sweetened ones.

Look who showed up for a strawberry dessert! But, alas, they too, chose the sweetened variety. (sigh)

We had a beautiful sunny day for this popular community event, enjoyed meeting and talking to many friends and acquaintances, and listened to great music.