Vacation Wrap-Up

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One of our days in Maine, we bought breakfast at a fast food place and found a place by the ocean to eat. It was raining so we ate in the car. The first family of ducks we saw had 4 parents and at least 2 dozen or more ducklings. There seemed to be such an unusually high number of ducklings that I said to Steve those adults must be running an orphanage.

Then we saw one lone duckling swim by. I couldn't look! I was afraid he was a straggler from the first group and they didn't know he was missing. Steve kept talking about him until I got him to understand, I was serious - I don't want to know about the duckling, stop giving me a play-by-play!

Then this second group swam by - with newborns! Turns out the straggler was more likely a scout for this second group. (It's hard to tell their size in the ocean unless there's another duck for reference.) That's my story and I'm sticking to it. Can you imagine how hard these little dudes have to paddle to get anywhere in the ocean current? I was so afraid the waves would wash them ashore and bash their little heads on the rocks but they were in control somehow. (I know, I'm hot & cold with visuals. Sorry.)

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We ended up coming home from Maine a couple of days early. We felt we'd had all the fun we wanted to in Maine and Boston and the idea of a 4-day weekend at home was very appealing. It was definitely the right thing to do - it's been fantastic. It's days like these that always heighten my desire to retire. Now. But alas.

Simon's girlfriend is on vacation with her family for a week. He's been so bored he's hanging out with me, I guess. He went grocery shopping with me the other day and managed to help me keep things within budget for a change. (His going with me usually has the opposite effect, as other parents can attest to, I'm sure.) We saw prepared chicken kabobs but he noted they were pretty expensive, "I bet we could make those ourselves." I assured him we could. He's a pretty good cook in the kitchen and loves to grill. He cut up the chicken and marinated it. I cut the veggies and we assembled them together and he manned the grill. We had to buy skewers because I didn't have enough left for some reason from back in the day - that's how long it's been since I made these.

I'll have to find other ways to capitalize on Simon's boredom this week. He already installed a new flag pole for me on the front of the house. Now, where's my list . . .

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