s’more summer

Divinely coordinated plans sent four boys out the door at 7:30 this morning: Ben to a double-shift at the MTC, Gabriel to Scout Camp, Hans and Xander to a three-day church Youth Conference. With a crazy last minute scramble of peanut butter sandwiches, sleeping bags, signing yet one more permission slip and ‘will you run home and get my water bottle?’– I was home by 7:46 to a much quieter house and only little Mary slumbering in my bed.

The kitchen and family room are an absolute wreck– basic sanitation (no cleaning the microwave or mopping the mottled floor) will take at least two hours. So I’ve done the only sensible thing: snagged the newspaper, my laptop, three peaches, shut the door and gone back to bed.

Not gonna’ lie. Our unplugged summer hasn’t been wholly successful. Certain people turn on the TV and cue up Netflix every time I go on a errand or to a doctor’s appointment. But June requires a certain amount of latitude. And some technology is WONDERFUL.

We just discovered an AMAZING app called Duolingo where you can learn Spanish, German, French, Portuguese and Italian. It’s free, better than Rosetta Stone and completely addictive. I downloaded it to learn a bit of French and Italian, but the kids take over my phone and computer at every opportunity. I’ve loved listening to them explain bits of grammar and vocabulary to each other, “La is feminine because girls sing, ‘la la la.'” Kids soak up language so quickly– they’ve all outpaced me.

And nothing beats a laptop for outside movies. Ben recruited everyone to set up our Lake Powell shade shelter (no trip to Lake Powell this year– Ben had finals and it was too sad to go without him, but we have plenty of excitement planned) and it’s become the favorite respite for picnics and reading during the day, movies at night.

My back issues aren’t pretty– six bulging discs, arthropathy, stenosis, blah blah blah– I’m thoroughly sick of relating my diagnosis (so you just got your update, let’s not talk about it anymore, well, unless you know of a miracle cure not involving voodoo witchcraft, then tell me all about it). The drugs and spinal cortisone shot didn’t even touch the pain, but I’m confident physical therapy will eventually get me running again (though probably not six days a week– which was kind of stupid anyway). I’m completely optimistic and don’t feel the slightest bit bad for myself.