The Height of Summer

July 2024

To celebrate the fourth of July the kids helped me make an American flag treats, we had the sisters over for burgers, and the kids tossed candy while they rode their bikes up and down our street. I also found some sparkler type things that turned out to be surprisingly exciting.

During fritids one week, the kids went over to the medieval festival going on in town, but they didn't get to see the jousting. The next day we all went and watched the jousting plus got to walk around and see some of the tents people had set up and chat with them about various things.

He said this was super heavy!

Family day at the square- giant bubbles, bouncy houses, and playing a giant version of a game that is basically sorry.

Collecting snails while out on a walk.

I love this project that Matthew came home with. It says,

Things that I like:

The sound of birds when I wake up.

Playing with my brother.

The thought that space goes on forever.

Relaxing.

A good book to read on the weekends.

A warm but not too hot day.

This was the season of constantly stopping to snap photos while out for a run. (and then hurrying off because the mosquitos were swarming)

We explored the bike park at Vitberget

I love watching him ride his bike to school. He is getting so old which blows my mind, but it's also fun to watch him because he is completely in his own world whistling, riding one handed, talking to himself...he's so fun.

Lots of berry picking! This is smultron and I picked these berries at our house (not many survived the birds, sadly). We also picked a lot of rasberries and wild blueberries. During the fritids the kids walked to a park a few times and picked blueberries and then baked muffins and such. With how often they said they went, I thought it would be picked clean. We all went over there one day and at first I didn't see anything, it looked like a regular park. But then the kids taught me what to look for and I slowly realized that it would be impossible for all the berries to be picked. After that, I started noticing them everywhere. After that, my runs got interrupted by berry picking/snacking more than picture taking.

Raspberries behind our house

Smultron on the way home from school

Blueberries galore

It's so peaceful to just sit in one spot and pick blueberries for a while. The kids would pick some, snack, play on the playground for a bit, and then pick some more. We took them home and made treats afterwards.

Ahh okay, so this next picture doesn't look like much, but I remember exactly the moment I was trying to capture. We quickly figured out that every Tuesday evening in July there were concerts right across the river from us. With our windows open, or hanging out outside, we could enjoy the music. One night Andrew and I were outside playing kub after putting the kids to bed and the concert for the night happened to be country music - old school, Alan Jackson type stuff. It felt like magical combination of a touch of home combined with the magical summers that we have here. I loved it.

I walked down closer because I was enjoying the music so much. You can kind of see the people gathered and dancing and such. I really wanted to walk over and start some line dancing, but figured it'd soon be over. I should have gone because this year we will be missing all the July concerts while we're in the states.

Getting delicious gelato with our neighby

Adaline sent some of her friends postcards, and I thought the stamps we got were so pretty.

I happened to run through some forest and discovered lots of blueberries (at this point I was starting to realize that you can't take a single step in any forest around here without finding blueberries). I stopped to pick a little snack and soon had an interesting encounter. I heard something coming up behind me, but couldn't figure out what it was from the sound. I turned around and saw horses so I quickly jumped off the path. I couldn't see the riders until they were passing me. I think they were practicing harness racing where they are sitting in a little two-wheel cart with the horse pulling them. There is a track near where I was and I think they must race there. They passed me a few more times and it made my heart jump out of my chest a bit every time they were coming up.