The month of May is always jam-packed with the end-of-the-school-year festivities and obligations and occasions: talent shows and book fairs and last meetings and retirement parties. As it winds down, and the remaining school days go into the single digits, we finally start to believe that summer will get here and tentatively begin to make plans.
Thomas always wants to know what is next, whether that’s what is for dinner, what is tomorrow’s weather or when we are going to go to XYZ. He is a dreamer, too, and always has big, big ideas and a firm belief that they will come to pass. Last year I hit on the idea of having him write down the ideas he had for summer break, and he didn’t fail me. We had museums, restaurants, movies, sleepovers and holidays included, but he surprised me by coming up with the super cool goal of going to all the libraries in Sonoma County. (If I recall correctly, there are 14.) With the libraries as a base, we worked in the other items and combined a visit to a city with a stop at the local branch, possibly a museum and a meal out. We had Nona join us, and it was delightful.
This year the list is mostly restaurants, with the theme of chicken strips, french fries, onion rings or pizza figuring heavily. (I hope that’s not a pun.) I have been supplementing the list with a few items I’d like to do, or I’d like us to do, so we’ll do some bowling or mini golf, and visit some regional parks and beaches and such, as well, hopefully walking off some of the chicken strips and onion rings.
I sat down to look over the summer calendar and plugged in summer school first. Thomas’ class goes five days a week for four weeks, starting the second week of June. My class goes four days a week for five weeks, also starting the second week of June, so I have school the week after he gets out. Then I put in a training for work in early August, a make-up weekend trip to see my dad in mid-July (we had to reschedule a late May visit due to a winter storm warning, sheesh), and two dates that Matt and I are taking his parents to see plays at the Junior College.
As Burbank Theater is still under construction, we’re seeing “Mamma Mia!” in the round, in a pavilion on the tennis courts in June, and then “The 39 Steps” in Newman Hall in July. The tickets and dinner out are the Mother’s Day and Father’s Day presents, as they have all the doodads and tchotchkes they could possibly need.
The first weekend in June I will be in San Francisco, attending the California Democratic Convention, so that is another chunk of time I need to plug in the calendar.
On my personal bucket list, I had a great idea last year and read most – if not all – of the Agatha Christie books, one after another, choosing a new title or two or three at each library visit. This year I would love to do something similar, but I haven’t hit on the exact plan… maybe some classics like Little Women and Little Men, or maybe tackle the Alexander Hamilton tome and follow up with some other Founding Fathers?
I have too many quilt projects to definitively settle on one that I am chomping at the bit to work on. The moment school is out I will pull out the project box and see which one calls to me the loudest. I may have to work on a few to share the love. I justify working on more than one by rationalizing that some steps work better some days – like ironing fabrics and pinning fabrics while watching a Netflix marathon, or sewing everything in one long go-until-the-bobbin-runs-out sprint.
My plans are bringing me joy, but they also make me realize how quickly the summer has been consumed, even before it has begun. We’d better get busy, those chicken strips won’t eat themselves.
Juliana LeRoy wears many hats, including wife, mother, para-educator and writer. She can be spotted around Windsor gathering material, or reached at ml****@so***.net.
