What I read on my summer vacation

We spent yesterday afternoon corralling school supplies for each boy, as the first day of school looms large next week. So, in the spirit of back-to-school writing assignments, I thought I'd share this list of some selected summer reading highlights:

A Rush of Wings and Secrets, by Kristen Heitzmann - I had actually read A Rush of Wings before, and forgotten it. These are suspenseful Christian romances. I would put them in the same category with Dee Henderson and Terri Blackstock's writing - a bit better than Blackstock, not quite as good as Henderson. The characters are multi-faceted and feel like real people. The plot is condensed a bit too much in places, but great summer reading. I've put in a wish on PaperBackSwap for the sequel to Secrets, so I liked it enough to want to spend a precious credit on the sequel.

Robin Paige's Victorian/Edwardian mysteries - this is a series of 12 mysteries, beginning with Death at Bishop's Keep and ending with Death on the Lizard. I was looking for a series that I would enjoy as much as Elizabeth Peters' Amelia Peabody Emerson books or Laurie King's Mary Russell Holmes series, and this one has definitely held my interest. The basic premise of the series is to take fictional characters and intersperse them with real historical personages, intertwining a mystery in the process. I've read all but the last one, and they were entertaining and filled with period details.

Tasha Alexander's A Fatal Waltz - third in a series. I enjoyed the first two so much that I ordered the hardcover of this book, which puts her in the Elizabeth Peters category for me. I like the character and the suspenseful plots, and I enjoy novels set in this period - obviously, as I have read a lot of them!

The last is one I'm eagerly awaiting - Elizabeth Peters' new book in the Vicky Bliss series is released in August, and I have it on preorder.

What have you read this summer? Anything less 'fluffy' than my list?

Small joys for a cloudy day

Sounds to make a mom's heart glad:

--overheard discussions from the boys' room: today this involves each of them constructing and fortifying a base, making lots of noises and sound effects, and working together happily;

--sweet offerings from a son's heart: "Mom, can I help you?" is heard pretty frequently around here lately, and oh, it's a sweet sound indeed;

--giggling. Just giggling over nothing, their usual brand of general silliness, but it makes me happy that their hearts are carefree.

Bright additions to any day:

--two boys happily sharing the tire swing, sitting side by side and swinging lazily;

--hugs. They still hug me freely, without self-consciousness or embarrassment, and I'm so grateful.

--happy faces, grinning completely from ear to ear, smiling at each other, at me, at the world.

Today is a good day.

The Sounds of Summer

I heard my first cicada of the summer a week ago. It’s such a distinct summer sound, especially since they call in the daytime, usually in the heat of the day. I don't hear them nearly as much in Tennessee as I did growing up in Georgia, so this was a treat.

That sound screams ‘summer’ to me. It is forever wrapped up with long, lazy, hot Georgia days spent mostly in the shade of deep woods, climbing trees or swinging from them, building trails or playing made-up games. I remember what a drink of water tasted like before water bottles, when it was right out of somebody’s hose. I smell freshly crushed pine needles from climbing saplings. I see the deep, almost black purple juice that comes from poke salad berries when you crush them (it’s really purple on your clothes, though. And it doesn’t come off, either). I remember the smell of scorching hot pavement, wet from a summer thunderstorm, and playing in the garage with the door open, listening to rumbling thunder and pounding rain hit the driveway outside.

Cicadas are for bike-riding days, when we raced up and down the street, putting our feet on the handlebars as we flew down the hill, the wind cooling us when nothing else would. They’re for days of playing on the slip-n-slide until it was a puddle of red mud at the bottom and we all had swimmer’s ear by that evening. Evenings of catching lightning bugs and imprisoning them in a mayonnaise jar with holes poked in the top, just for an excuse to run around in the dark.

Cicadas are childhood to me, I guess. I hope someday they mean the same to my boys, wherever they end up, but somehow I think their memories will be different. Tennessee doesn’t have pine, it has cedar. We don’t live in a subdivision, but in the country. Their friends are mostly each other. I can’t let them roam nearly as freely or as far as I did. But the games of childhood haven’t changed - they enjoy riding their bikes and swinging from trees. They run and chase one another in the gathering dusk, and lightning bugs are still fascinating. Long, carefree days can still be magical. I do love summer, and its short duration reminds me: this is a season of life to hold on to with both hands.

The Summer of Extreme Traveling (TM) is now over

. . . . and we are officially tired. I tend to be a terrible traveler, and get cranky and sore, and I'm not sure that I ever want to travel that much, that closely packed together, ever again.

However. I have to say that we had wonderful, sweet visits with family. The kind where everybody is laughing, kidding around, and just enjoying each other's company. The ones that make you wish family vacations or something like them were an option more often, because we love our families a lot, and we just don't see them enough.

The boys had a ball playing with all of their cousins, doing silly kid things that they will remember fondly someday. Things that involved lots of giggling and running around and noise. The kinds of fun things I still remember from my childhood.

There was also some swimming in hotel pools (because as far as they are concerned, that is why we travel), and spending quality time with the travel DVD players. Because when it comes to traveling, I am a wimp, and let them watch more TV in a week's time than they watched in the previous six months. Which might leave them a smidgen, tiny bit, overstimulated and cranky. (Note to self: come up with some better TV rules before the next road trip, which better not be any time soon).

So, summer is now winding down for us. We finish Vacation Bible School tonight, and then there's about two weeks until school starts. What a summer!

Ten is uncharted territory here

Oh, the big boy in our house. Ten has already flung down the gauntlet, making it clear that we are in for some massive changes. His body is changing -- not puberty, not yet, God is good -- but how he is put together. He's getting more muscular, heavier, more capable. He brings in groceries now without much trouble (misslisslee hums the Hallelujah chorus). He's developing a sense of humor that is more grown-up (happily bidding good-bye to the knock-knock jokes that make no sense at all).

He's getting glasses today. He's reading big, thick books (he remarked a couple of days ago that 300-400 pages seemed about the ideal book size to him). His little brother is really driving him nuts (isn't that why little brothers exist?), but he's trying to be patient. At least when mom and dad are around.

He's thinking differently. He told me yesterday that, when he and dad were driving to church Sunday morning, they listened to part of a sermon on the radio, and he liked it. It was from the book of Romans and was talking about the law, and he remembered seemingly everything he heard. He seems like a sponge more than ever lately, soaking up everything that comes his way.

So, ten is good. We're going to be wrestling with it a bit, I think, but it's good. I'm so thankful for this boy, who is tiptoeing toward that path that will turn him into a man. I'm so scared that I'm not mothering him like I should, and so grateful for grace. For the Lord who decreed that I am the mother this child needs loves him so much more than I can. He is the God who sees, as he told Hagar, and he sees us today. He knows that I will fall short, and I believe that He will make up the difference.

My job is to keep His word as a lamp for my feet and a light for my path, and hopefully to show ten the path to eleven, and then twelve, and I justcan'tthinkanyfartherthanthatrightnow. And to remind my heart that mothering is a job that changes every day, and eventually involves letting go. So today, I'm picking up that gauntlet and meeting the challenge. Ten, let's see what you've got!

Your Regularly Scheduled Blog Post Has Been Interrupted . . .

By The Summer of Extreme TravelingTM. Since last we met, various members of the intrepid Hawkeye family have suffered the indignities of: Cub Scout Day Camp; a 7-day cruise (suffering horribly, as you can imagine); a six-hour layover in Logan airport before a puddle-jumper flight from Boston via Washington, DC to Nashville (why, oh WHY did we not check out what plane was flying this route?); and Scout Camp (involving actual camping in an un-air-conditioned tent). This is just the beginning. We also are making two other trips this summer to see family, and a 16-hour day trip with the church to go and see a museum.

These serious indignities are aggravated by the threatening malady summerus curtailedus, because the kids go back to school on August 8th. Wow, that is only a month away! Mom is also going to be going back to work full-time, so let the changes begin!