The first week of summer...

We're wrapping up our first full week of summer. It's been a good week. The end of the school year is so crazy-busy, that I don't think any of us fully realize how tired we are until we finally stop. I deliberately kept our calendar clear this week so that we could all catch up on some much needed rest. It was wonderful to sleep in every morning, eat a leisurely breakfast and have absolutely nowhere to go/be.

I like to start summer with a clean house, and since I didn't get much "spring" cleaning done, I hit it full force this week--cleaning closets and drawers, purging junk, and scrubbing baseboards and blinds. And I don't know about you, but my kids bring home SO much stuff at the end of the school year. It took an entire morning to sort/save/toss it all!

Thank you, thank you, thank you for the birthday wishes on Thursday. I had a very good day! I spent the day doing lots of things I love including reading and sitting outside in the sun. It was very chilly here the first part of the week (not at all summer-like) so when the sun reappeared on Thursday, I headed straight ouside.

The girls made this cute birthday sign for me on their chalkboard.


That's a creative way to add all thirty-eight candles, huh?

John and the kids took me out for dinner that night (Texas Roadhouse, mmmmm!).

Afterwards, I talked John into a trip to Target. I wanted to spend the gift card that I won on Deidre's blog a couple of weeks ago. This is what I spent it on.

It's a salad spinner, and I am LOVING it! I went grocery shopping this morning and came home and washed/dried my lettuce, cilantro, blueberries and strawberries in it. I've wanted one forever, but I just never wanted to spend $30 extra dollars (on myself) at Target. Thank you, Deidre!!! I was thrilled to purchase it guilt-free.

John had to go to Glen Eyrie this afternoon to meet with an author who's in town for a conference. (He gets to hang out with some cool people!) Glen Eyrie is right next to Garden of the Gods, so the kids and I dropped him off and went on a little hike. Beautiful, huh?






After hiking, we strolled around the Glen Eyrie bookstore while waiting for John to finish his meeting and I took the picture that I wished I had taken last time I was there. John wrote the LIVING THE LETTERS Bible studies a couple of summers ago. So fun to see his stuff on display!

Glen Eyrie is a beautiful, beautiful place and it is the only place I've ever seen bighorn sheep. A couple of years when my mom was here visiting, I took her to Glen Eyrie and as we were leaving, we saw this herd of sheep wander up to the castle. OH my gosh!!! You cannot believe how excited I was. She took these pics for me (would you believe I didn't have my camera?) We tried again to see some today, but no such luck.



After a quick stop at Sonic (happy hour--woohoo!) we headed home. Grilled burgers for dinner (our summer Saturday night tradition), and now we're getting ready to start a movie and eat some dessert (ice cream and cherry pie!). Hope you've had a lovely weekend!