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The summer is quickly feeling like a distant memory. It's hard to believe it was 84 degrees outside literally one week ago today and today the temperature never got above 62. Quite the shock to the system.

This summer was filled with fabulous memories and lots of family time. The first part of the summer felt like lazy hazy days at home. Filling the baby pool in the morning so by the time afternoon nap was over the water was warm enough to splash.

By mid July it was one thing after the other. Our fabulous trip to Lake Placid (stay tuned for pics) for Scott and Julie's wedding. Then Kelsey's birthday and a week down in S. Thomaston. Then my brother Jim passed away and I was gone for two weeks. Before I knew it, it was August and ta da... everyone is apple picking and putting pumpkins on their porches.

Our week in South Thomaston was fabulous and I can't wait to do it again next year. My mom rented a cottage owned by our friends the Shepler's. She and my Gram came to Maine on Thursday and stayed at my house until Saturday. We were supposed to head down to the cottage on Sunday, but my mom had the key and decided to head down. I had a weird feeling with them going down there on my Gram's last night and us staying home. So we literally packed up the kids and a night's worth of clothes in less than 10 minutes. We left the house in disarray after Kelsey's party and went. It was tight quarters and none of us really slept, but I am so glad we did it. Can you believe that moon on the first night? At first it was so low in the sky and we couldn't figure out what it was.. it was so cool.

Isn't it funny how the days seem so much longer and fulfilling when they aren't filled up with a) driving... I realized that everytime we drive 20 minutes to the store or an hour here and an hour there it just lessens the day and when you spend an entire day 14 or whatever hours just hanging out and walking the beach and cooking and looking for crabs the day just feels so fulfilling... b) no tv and barely any cell service it was nice! very slow dial up just to keep up with email and work stuff, but it was great. I loved it and could easily live like that.. but hey.. if I have Bravo I am going to DVR my shows. Julia had an absolute blast looking for crabs everyday and hanging out with the kids on the beach. The most amazing part of this is that it was 15 minutes from our house!

Actually.. a pretty funny story. So one of the days Mom, Paul (her fiance), Kelsey and I went to Augusta to go shopping. When we were at Target Paul bought Jeff and I an anniversary gift. Our 2nd anniversary was July 22nd, so we celebrated while we were there. To us it was like celebrating for the first time though, because we brought Kelsey home from the hospital on our anniversary the year before. So walking through Target I was complaining about Jeff's dedication to video games when they are in his presence (ladies is that a nice way of putting it?). Paul decided that we needed something we could play together, so he bought us Rock Band (Guitar hero.. with drums and a signer.. lalalala.. naturally that's me). So the next day Mom and Paul were babysitting and we were leaving around 4:30 to go on a date that Jeff had planned. Paul joked that he didn't buy it for us to put any tension in the marriage and that Jeff wasn't allowed to go home and play during our date. We went to Cafe Miranda's for the best dinner. Then we walked to Dairy Queen for ice cream. After that we had a "now what?" moment... so (I'm sure you guessed it) we decided to drive the 15 minutes home and play Rock Band. It was so cool... we had an empty house with no kids. We knew they were peacefully sleeping down at the beach and we sang and played our hearts out. It was so much fun. Then we got in the car. Closed up our house and drove back to the beach. It was awesome!

Family pic down at Pleasant Beach - summer 2008