We've had such a cool and rainy spring that we're still heading outside to cool evenings on the front porch, even this late in June.  Don't tell but there are some kids hiding from a game of Man Hunt in the back of that truck.

I love the light at this time of night.  The rudibeckia that Neel planted look more orange than yellow.

And the sweet potato vine becomes even more chartreuse, is that even possible?

Neel put a timer on the light under the golden rain tree, and he was tickled beyond belief when it turned on right at 8:30.

We stayed out until bedtime, listening to the kids laugh and getting gnawed on by skeeters.  Summer is settling in.

SOBO seemed to be going their separate ways this weekend, so our little family had dinner on our own in the backyard last night.  It had been, in my mind, a perfect Sunday.  Brunch with some friends ($4 Eggs Benedict!), a trip to the Farmer's Market and our local garden store.  Our Farmer's Market is really coming along, and by next week Callum and will be back in our rhythm of weekly visits.  I'll take some pictures then.

Neel planted, and I supervised.  I'm so excited.  He's putting in a corkscrew willow.  I've wanted one for ages.

Cool.

Hot.

Last night was the third day this week that I've had a version of that first salad.  Thursday, at our end of the year school picnic, someone put crab salad in Sweet Hawaiian Rolls, man I love potlucks!  A friend of mine recreated it Saturday night with crab, dried shallots, roasted red pepper and some chili sauce.  My version last night combined the crab with avocado, celery and super sweet corn.  All different, all delicious. 

That second salad may be my new fave.  Isralaei couscous with roasted beets, quickly sauteed zucchini and squash, bound together with a pomegranate molasses - honey - vinegar dressing.  I just love Isralaei couscous, and beets are a new thing for me.  I thank Neel.  He thanks me for mayonaise, which he didn't used to eat.

Here's the crab salad, all dressed up.  We have leftovers too!

Neel's started to lose his battle with gardening fatigue (note dirty knee), and Callum graced us with his presence long enough to eat, clear and head right back outside.

See that look?  That's the face of the first Sunday of Summer Vacation.  No where to go, no where to be.  Nothing but days of sun and play ahead of him.

What can I say?  I've been busy.  My allergies have been killing me this spring, making me want to scratch my eyeballs out, and making me less than interested in spending more than my working hours at my computer.  My dad came to visit and that was fun.  Lacrosse has been great and it's almost over.  I've been cooking and knitting. I've been trying not to think about our kitchen constantly.   Neel's writing a grant.  Some days have been wonderful this spring, and let's face it some have been really hard and sad.  We muster on.

I'm stocked up on flip flops now, so summer can come.

summer time is coming  
and the trees are sweetly blooming
and the wild mountain thyme
grows around the purple heather

That's how our weekend was this past weekend.   Trees sweetly blooming and that feeling that summer time was finally coming.

We started Saturday with lacrosse.  I'd missed the last game, so it was a great treat for me to sit in the sun and watch these boys.  That's Callum on the left, making a shot on goal.  One of them will make it in one of these days.

Here he is looking over the shoulder of the statistician, checking on his ground balls.

 We're starting a little project on the little gray house (note the fridge in the middle of the room), and I know I've promised to talk about it.  I will.  My head is full to bursting. 

Callum's such a help.  At one point he walked in and said, very accusingly, "Mama, Papa's painting!"  Neel's not allowed to paint.

All weekend, men cooked for me.  That's our neighbor David. He got a yen to grill some steaks and told his wife Diana to figure out someone to ask over.

We got lucky.  This family is another reason why Callum has no problem being an only child.  Their oldest is on his lacrosse team and has been a great mentor and friend to our boy.  Next down in their pack is one of Callum's good buds on the block.  He's been absorbed in the loveliest way.  It was fun to sit in their kitchen and watch him run in and out with the pack.  These guys are moving this summer, and we're all heartbroken.

We ate outside, grilled veggies, a wonderful cucumber salad and garlic mashed potatoes to go with our lovely grilled steaks.  David even asked (worried) if we had a problem with garlic.  After dinner the kids played more lacrosse, and we sat around the fire pit and ate dark chocolate and drank port.  By then I was too warm with wine and friendship to pick up my camera.  Summer time is coming.

This stack of lovelies had me refreshing the "Where's My Order" tab under my account on Amazon.com yesterday.  No wonder my dad calls it "damazon."  I love the whole process from shopping to ordering to watching my order's process across the country until I pull up in my driveway and see it on the porch.  I'm looking forward to all these reads, even though Joker One is probably not appropriate nightstand reading (for me at least).  I was so impressed with the author when I heard him interviewed on Fresh Air a few weeks back, I couldn't wait to read the book.  Nothing more needs to be said about A Homemade Life.  Heck, I'm even thrilled with my copy of The Chicago Manual of Style, although it might be more fun if it really were what my boss thought when I told him I wanted it - which was something more along the lines of my Tim Gunn page-a-day calendar!

Let's bring those guys in for their close-up, shall we?

The kids hunted for eggs, here's Callum, finding his special Chick.  It was hidden particularly high. After that there was some corn hole and burning of leaves with magnifying glasses (an Easter tradition in some parts, I'm told.)

There were cheese and crackers, asparagus wrapped with prosciutto, rum and tonics, oh and then we ate.

I love the look of a newly laid table, waiting for dinner. 

But any holiday is about the food, and this was no exception.  Honey-baked ham, of course, pineapple casserole, potato and leek gratin, sweet potato souffle (did not fall) and carrot bake (must. have. recipe.).  Let's face it, aside from the ham, all pureed.  Nursing home food.  Not much more satisfying than that.

After dinner we had to take a walk, but chairs and quiet corners beckoned.  More conversation over yet more wine and a little bit of cake.  Sometimes family comes from who is around you, and here, this day, is where I found mine.

Earth Hour, third year running.

a nine year old says, "All my dreams have come true!" when he wakes up and sees this:

That was last Monday.  Pretty pathetic, huh?  With temps in the low 20s and 30 mph winds, the kids couldn't even play outside and attempt to make snowballs out of this little dusting.  I know I was, "Rah, Rah, We Want Snow!" before, but after a weekend of blue skies and warm air, right now I'm all, "BRING ON SPRING."

Every year I get one.  A quasi-significant cold, this year new! and improved! for 2009 with raging fever!  I'm signing off for a day or so, but when I get back I hope have pictures of something that starts with a "s" and ends with a "w" and rhymes with "go."

Although, I'm pretty sure the only thing I really accomplished was number eight.  Taking a lesson may qualify for number nine, but I don't think I ever actually skied.  And I can tell you for sure that number seven was a near thing.  I certainly didn't feel very brave.  Still, it was Friday the 13th, so maybe...

Neel was thrilled to get a chance to clean out our shed this weekend (go ahead and ask if I'm kidding), and he stumbled across this rare treat mixed in with a pack of asters.  It's a letter from my dad to his parents, written when he was at work (a-hem, I never waste time at work, so clearly that genetic defect jumped a generation) when I was a whopping five months old.  He writes about the house they just moved into (the first house I remember), my five-month doctor's appointment (I'm getting ready to crawl) and a recent illness of my granddad's. 

Nearly forty years old, that letter is (but not quite) and it's so quintessentially my dad.  I can picture that house so well, and my grandparents, and my mom.  A little bit of our history, encapsulated.

Neel had a late meeting and I had a migraine, so hot cocoa seemed to be the order of the evening last night.  We don't usually do sprinkles, but it was clear that everybody needed some cheering up. Nearly worked too until I got so excited I burned my tongue.

Praise song for the day.

Each day we go about our business, walking past each other, catching each others' eyes or not, about to speak or speaking. All about us is noise. All about us is noise and bramble, thorn and din, each one of our ancestors on our tongues. Someone is stitching up a hem, darning a hole in a uniform, patching a tire, repairing the things in need of repair.

Someone is trying to make music somewhere with a pair of wooden spoons on an oil drum with cello, boom box, harmonica, voice.

A woman and her son wait for the bus.

A farmer considers the changing sky; A teacher says, "Take out your pencils. Begin."

We encounter each other in words, words spiny or smooth, whispered or declaimed; words to consider, reconsider.

We cross dirt roads and highways that mark the will of someone and then others who said, "I need to see what's on the other side; I know there's something better down the road."

We need to find a place where we are safe; We walk into that which we cannot yet see.

Say it plain, that many have died for this day. Sing the names of the dead who brought us here, who laid the train tracks, raised the bridges, picked the cotton and the lettuce, built brick by brick the glittering edifices they would then keep clean and work inside of.

Praise song for struggle; praise song for the day. Praise song for every hand-lettered sign; The figuring it out at kitchen tables.

Some live by "Love thy neighbor as thy self."

Others by first do no harm, or take no more than you need.

What if the mightiest word is love, love beyond marital, filial, national. Love that casts a widening pool of light. Love with no need to preempt grievance.

In today's sharp sparkle, this winter air, anything can be made, any sentence begun.

On the brink, on the brim, on the cusp -- praise song for walking forward in that light.

Elizabeth Alexander, at the Inauguration of President Barak Obama.