Summer, day 11

I finally calculated that our summer will be a total of 73 days, which seems like a lot more than saying 10 weeks. I start my new job Aug. 23rd, Greyson starts 5th grade on the 24th, and Reece starts his kindergarten ease-in on the 26th, so I'm considering the 22nd to be our family's official last day of summer. Luckily, fall around here is usually warm and sunny and lovely, so we get more time after school starts to still cook-out and do other outdoor activities before the hunkering down phase begins.

But I'm not even going to mention that again until at least October - now it's all about hot and humid and sun and outdoors. I took no pictures yesterday, so you'll have to make do with ones from Sunday. These show some of the things I got done while the kids were blasting each other with water:

With Nat's help, I got the swingset assembled, although it still needs to be anchored into the ground before anyone over the age of 2 swings on it, and we can't put the slide on yet because our grass is still not ready for child useage. I'm now noticing that our backyard looks like a tribute to the Little Tikes/Step 2 companies, but I must say that ALL of the items shown here were obtained used. 

I finally got all the rosebushes removed from one area of the north part of the house (really, who would think to plant them there?!) and put in 5 hostas (thanks, Aunt Colleen, for the suggestion!). Eventually I'll put a few more shade-loving plants in there as well, and I'm up for suggestions. Definitely would like some color in there, like reds and/or blues.