Settling In To Summer

Anyone miss me last week?

Oh no, don't feel guilty if you didn't. I don't mind one bit. Although, I'll admit that I did miss you just a little.

Last week was the first week of summer vacation which meant a lot of settling in, readjusting and more freedom to roll with things around home.

Which was good since last week was a hum-dinger. You know how that is when you feel like the wheels fall off? When all is going well and then BAM! craziness abounds, certain little girls are off-kilter with their nap routines, the weeds are growing in all the gardens with no time to pull them and someone needs something every waking moment that daddy is gone at work.

And then Friday hits and it seems as though at least three out of four are suddenly sprouting new teeth! No, seriously, I think each child is in a different stage of either teeth on their way or poking through currently. Ouch.

Within all of this, I contemplated blogging and my enjoyment of blogging. But the time, the precious time, that doesn't seem to happen these days. And, as if on cue, sweet Tracy had this post that spoke to me and shared my feelings exactly. I realized that I was not alone and although I love my sweet little place here in the blogosphere, I need to BE here in my home where I am needed much more.

Even though I missed out on the homeschool conference on Saturday (missed seeing you Margaret!), I just wasn't ready. I'm not sure what direction/curriculum I want to go with for the next school year yet. I need some time to pause and just settle in to the now. Come July I will probably be ready to go and scouring the catalogs and websites again with eager anticipation, but not yet.

Spending the week settling into a less hurried, scurried and busy life allowed me to treasure some really good times with the kids too. And, with a toddler who is daily growing her little vocabulary and adding animal noises to the scene, it makes for some very fun times. I'm glad I didn't miss these days, even in the midst of some very chaotic moments.

As I thought about what I might be missing and not blogging about last week or the fact that I wasn't conjuring up posts in my head all day long, I found it timely that I read this quote last week (again, thank you Tracy!) as well:

Comparison is the death of contentment.

So true. The more I re-read that line, the more it rang true. And you know how contentment fits in with tranquility and peace. And how comparison can affect a mama's tranquility. Perhaps you recall that Tranquility is my word for this year?

It all came together as a short and sweet reminder.

No, I may not blog every day or blog with beautiful insight or blog with real words some days, but blogging is not my job. Motherhood is.

And I found that while settling in to summer, I'm also settling back in to the role of motherhood as I take a break from the official title of 'teacher'.

With that in mind, I think we're going to work on a Summer Bucket List (thanks, Patty) for our family.

For this week I'm looking  forward to the end of Lily's soccer season and to family that is coming to visit later this week.

And I'm going to enjoy a little more time settling in.