Sorry for almost two months of radio silence, but wow it has been a busy summer!

Since I’ve last checked in there have been a few blog worthy occurrences. My dad visited from Arizona (and yes, we watched Breakfast at Tiffany’s together), we caught up with some of my mom’s family on Cape Cod, took a 10-day trip to Washington, D.C. for some volunteer work and sightseeing and we added a new member to our family.

We had a wonderful visit with my dad, he’s a low maintenance house guest. He’s been a desert dweller for the past 5 years so he really enjoyed the lush green of the Northeast. We visited some places nearby and took a day trip to the lake. Towards the end of the weekend, we met his sister for lunch and a little coastal fun.

After Dad left, we had two extra girls for a few days. We brought them home, picked up my mom and headed to Cape Cod for the annual family gathering at my Aunt’s house. It was a short trip, but a great time was had by all. The highlight for my daughter was winning the egg toss with my cousin T. We returned home for a scant 16 hours. Just enough time to do the laundry, finish packing for our trip to D.C. and catch a few hours of sleep. Thankfully, we were already 90% packed for D.C. so, we threw in a few last items and took to the skies.

I’ve been looking forward to this trip to Washington, for at least 4 years and the trip did not disappoint. The main purpose was to attend the NOAH conference. NOAH is an organization I co-founded that supports people with albinism and their families. I was 14 at the first conference and there were 70 people in attendance. There were over 900 attendees in Washington, D.C. NOAH Conferences are always fun, but as a former National Conference Chair, I volunteered to be the utility infielder and assist with any challenges that arose on site, so I didn’t get to any of the sessions. The kids had an awesome time. Each was in their own group. Among other things, Mim’s group had an introduction to Judo, and talked with doctors about what it meant to have albinism. Fish’s group had a lesson on how to travel safely on the Metro and then they were off on small group adventures throughout D.C.

Speaking of the Metro, I think Mim could have stayed in the hotel and ridden the trains throughout the system and been as happy as a clam. He enjoyed reading the maps to tell us what stop we were at and how many stops we had left until we reached our destination.

After the conference we did some sight seeing in Washington. Our stops included, several Smithsonian museums, The Spy Museum and Mount Vernon. I hope to do some more detailed blog entries on trip in the near future. Let me summarize by saying that Washington, D.C. is on of my favorite destinations. I highly recommend a visit, just not in July.

We lost our beloved dog Daisy in February. All of our hearts needed some time to mourn, but by June, we were all talking about wanting another dog. While summer is the best time to get a dog, we knew we had a lot of travel at the beginning of the summer, so, we decided to wait until we returned from D.C. to seriously entertain the idea. Dory, joined us the Sunday after we returned. The story of her arrival and immersion into our family is a blog entry for another time. She is a very sweet dog and has made herself right at home.

The kids are squeezing in a few last summer activities, Mim is at the town’s theater camp and Fish is rock climbing at Girl Scout Camp. They head back to school in just about two weeks time. I knew we had a jammed summer, but it flew by even faster than I expected.

Even though I have not been blogging here my fingers haven’t been completely idle, I’ve had a few posts over at Live to Write, Write to Live, the blog of the New Hampshire Writer’s connection a group a co-founded with other local writers. Stop by and check us out if you have a minute.

Our adventures have given me lots of fodder for this blog. I promise once the kids get back to school, I’ll be on a more regular posting schedule here. I miss it.

So, what have you be doing this summer?