Lovin' Summer, Had Me A Blast

I had the best weekend! This summer has felt lie a bit of a wash. After this school year (my first year teaching) I thought, how awesome summer will be now that I have it off -- really off. Yeah right! Between fencing, painting, hanging out in E-town with the family and planning for next year (teaching six -- count em SIX -- new courses this year!), I kind of feel like summer is ending and I have yet to do summery stuff!
But this weekend I went to Regina to visit my sisters (former foster) who I haven't seen in seven years! That's way too long! I drove down Saturday morning and visited with them that afternoon, and Sunday all day, and we had such a good time. Stephanie, the older of the two, has a young son, and it made me really proud to see how she was raising him, and working so hard to bring him up "peacefully" (as she said). She's read all the books and taken a half dozen parenting classes to avoid becoming her mother (a wise move), and both girls have grown into beautiful, amiable adults. It was a great reunion, and we parted with promises to visit at least yearly -- surely an attainable goal.
I also took Jonah camping on the way home. Oh, we need to do that more, because apparently, I've raised myself a chicken! Scared of the flies, the spider webs, trees (because they are shadowy), dark, animals, tent and so on! Really? Scared of the tent? Honestly! My sister's 4-year-old mistakes pinecones for ants, and my boy fears treed areas! An unfortunate family trait? I hope not! We made it through and he did just fine, but it is clear that we really do need to do it more often. I bought him a fancy kid sleeping bag this month from MEC so we have no excuses! Maybe we will camp out another night this weekend, before it gets too cold.
This afternoon, we visited my neighbor's parents' farm south of Saskatoon. I'm trying to figure out the appropriate revenge for my neighbor's husband, who gave me directions that took me on a scenic hour-long drive through the Saskatchewan back roads. Yeah. After a frustrating detour, tears, a ghost town (not even kidding!), and finally a payphone, I was on the right track. We had a great afternoon with the family, checked out the harvesting... stuff (my technical knowledge of farming is limited and doesn't include proper vocabulary), got two bags of apples to can, jellycized and sauceify, and spent some time visiting -- I really like the family.
We stayed later than I had planned, so I ended up driving through twilight and into darkness which I always try to avoid, and saw a dozen or so Pronghorn deer. I've only seen them two times, both times near the AB-SK border along hwy 13/14. Very cool-looking deer. Got home safely (what else could I ask for?) and exhausted. A busy weekend -- time well spent -- that made be feel like I actually was part of something summery. On an aside (as a proud mama) my boy passed both his swimming levels this summer -- sea turtles and salamanders. Okay, it's preschool swimming, but he is only three and can glide with his head down, and then roll on his back to keep gliding... an impressive skill I think. Wednesday, I'll be back to work, but I'm now going back a little more satisfied with the holidays.