The Sweet Memories of Summertime

 

There's something so nostalgic about summer mornings. Maybe they take me to that first summer day, after the last day of school, and the feeling of freedom that was suddenly in the air. The long, lazy days when getting a tan (which I never did) was priority, finding a summer job was somewhere on the agenda, and spending weekends at the lake was always the goal. 

When I was younger, there were trips to the lake with my family, homemade ice cream on the back porch at night and fireworks in the driveway, yelling at my dad to be careful as he lit the fuses on the roman candles. 

There were visits to my aunt's, where we spent our days riding bikes, playing with friends and eating what we could afford at the local Bonanza. 

Summer has always held such fun memories for me and even now, when I get in my car early on a summer day, I find myself feeling that special feeling that only a summer morning can bring. It's a feeling of hope and excitement mixed with a feeling of memories and good times.

Lately summer has consisted of packing boxes for our move, spending time with my kids and grandkids for Mother's Day and Father's Day and taking my girls to see Lilo and Stitch at the movie theater. That brought back sweet memories of the summers with my own boys, taking them to the Tuesday Dollar Day at the theater, buying little snack boxes of popcorn and drinks and going home afterwards to happy boys and lazy afternoons.

Going back even further, when my boys were little bitty, we had a baby pool in the backyard and we would head outside every morning, with towels, toys and always snacks and they would splash in the pool for a good while and I would sit and read right next to them in my lawn chair. Sometimes we would invite a friend over and that would add one more kid to the tiny pool and they still had so much fun. 

One summer I signed Ted up for tennis lessons at the local country club. Always the good sport, he enjoyed learning a new thing. Me...I spent the hour chasing his little brother (an active toddler) around and wondering why this was a good idea. But it was fun and it added to the fun of summer. 

In June, for many years, the boys took swimming lessons and we would spend two weeks wondering if the summer thunderstorms were going to keep them out of the pool each day. Some days they did. 

Just after swimming was over each June, we would embark on Vacation Bible School, which was a full week of being at the church early in the morning and going home happy and tired by noon. 

Still to this day, when summer rolls around and the VBS signs go up around the church, it brings back sweet memories and feelings of those years of having young kids in the house.

Summers have changed over the years. My boys are grown, married, working hard in their business, their wives creating beautiful homes and memories for my grand babies, and I have a job for the first time in a million years. 

But I still open the front door every morning, look out at the moist grass, the sun shining on the yard and it takes me back to all the life we've lived and all the good memories we've made and I fall in love with summer all over again.

Until Next Time...

Blessings!