Saying good-bye to summer (vacation, that is)

I shouldn't be blogging. I should be making lunches--peanut butter & honey sandwiches cut in dinosaur shapes was the request. Plus, Sweetie wants raspberries with sugar in her square container while Mister never deviates from the standard grapes. I need to write names on backpacks and fill out forms from meet-the-teacher night tonight. I need to be getting ready to kiss my kids good-bye and send them off to school in the morning.

I'm feeling emotional at the thought, though. Last year I expected to be emotional, with Mister going all day for the first time. But H was a newborn and life was busy and sleep was a rarity and I didn't have much time or energy for extra emotions. Plus I still had Sweetie at home. But tomorrow it will be just H and I. And, yes, there will be bonuses--naptime free to do what I want rather than play legos or mediate sibling arguments, a shower free of knocks on the door to tattle-tell, and only 1 child to cart around on errands--a child who still sits in the seat of the shopping cart so I know exactly where he'll be at all times. But I think I will be a little lonely. I think I will miss Mister telling me about Star Wars and Batman and Sweetie telling me jokes and singing and recapping the morning's adventures for me. I think I will miss playing "I Spy" while eating lunch. I will miss having someone prattling on about this or that. H only shrieks and says "Whoa!"

So I have tried to slow down this past week and enjoy having these two great little souls home with me. Because who knows if next summer they'll want to build forts in the basement or beg me to play Atlantis legos with them. Who knows if they'll still snuggle up next to me and share their caramel popcorn when we have a read-a-thon. I know that some day they won't and I will wonder why not and what happened.

Here are some pictures from this last week of summer vacation. We also visited the new children's museum downtown, which was a lot of fun. The kids climbed, pretended to shop and bake, painted the castle, and ran through the noodle forest (H and I joined them in some games of hide and seek before I got claustrophobic):