Goodbye Summer, Hello School Year

The end of summer and beginning of school sort of blur together. It's a whirlwind skittering about tackling the must-dos. Before I knew it, my boys were well into their first days of school and I was back home in the quiet. Although we had no monumental moments this summer, it was filled with what we needed most, a perfect balance of activity and vegging out.
The new Waco Hawaiian Falls water park brought us plenty of entertainment this summer. It was just the right size, we went at just the right (uncrowded) times, it was clean, it was cool, and it gave us a great place to have some fun. What I loved about this summer is that the boys spent a lot of time playing together. They balanced electronic games with toys and reading, swimming, building, and imagining. Together. Sure, we had meltdowns and catastrophes, but those were a side note and not the theme of the summer. We had a lot of playing time together.
We have now ridden the wave of acquiring (another set of) new renters for the Houston house. That is a chore. After a houseful of new paint (thank you, Jeff!) and steam cleaned carpets (Oops--you are my new "go-to" company), the place looks like a million bucks. Well, not that much in rent, but I like that house and it is important to me that it looks nice. Before the revamp, the house was dingy, dingy. Sticky, yet oily, film on all the tile surfaces, crumbs and bits of trash on the floor from who knows when. I could go on and on about the icky details, but I'll save the rant. It was dirty. And they managed to do that in 7 months. Yikes! Now it is sparkling clean and ready for the new couple who are set to move in at any moment. We are really impressed with our realtor, Toke, who is just a real go-getter. She's prompt with communication, and seemed genuinely eager to help us move quickly with this. I'll use her again, definitely.
The boys are off to a nice start with school. Their teachers seem to love their jobs and interact well with the children. The school and church buildings went through a facelift and addition, and the facilities look great. It is a loving--and beautiful--environment for my children to spend their days at school.
My own schedule is crazy already! I'm juggling various projects and trying to remember to type them all into my phone calendar so I don't miss something...although I feel like I've forgotten one or two already. I still wonder how I did all of this AND worked full time...oh yeah, I didn't usually get to do the fun stuff! I must have been a raving lunatic...really.

So, here is the deep breath for the start of school. I'll blink and it'll be Christmas, I'll sigh and it'll be May. The time will pass quickly, despite my wishes to slow down. BUT, then I'll have my boys again--all to myself--and we'll just make more memories.