Summer!

Today I ate a perfect plum - the first plum of the season. Plums signify summer to me. When I was growing up, my friends had a plum tree next to their pool. Wearing our matching Snoopy bathing suits, all four of us, 2 sets of sisters, would eat plums while in the pool, the juice trickling down our tan arms and ending up in the pool. No need for napkins. Plums are my favorite fruit probably due to those memories!

Although it is actually drizzling in Los Angeles today, my students are finishing finals and my children are anticipating the last day of elementary school tomorrow. I am wondering how I will spend my free time this summer. What will be the plums of this summer?

I am hoping to read some great books from Yalsa's Teens Top Ten nominees, but also I want to read books for adults. I want to spruce up this site and the one I have for my students. I am thinking of starting another blog too! I want to get better at using Jing, Skype, WebNotes and a few other tools I probably haven't even heard of yet!

But I also want to exercise, ponder, cook, garden, organize my closets, and that is just in my free time, while my kids are at day-camp! I am always excited to be a stay-at-home mom for the summer. In June the summer seems so long, but my mid July (when this year I will be in the Outer Banks with my husband and children) I realize I have to whittle down my expectations of what I will accomplish. And I wonder, will feeling that I accomplished something or learned a new gadget be like those plums I ate in the pool? I don't think so.

What will be the plum, the sweetest memory, of this summer? And how can I make time to relax and just let it happen? How do you get away during those fabulous months off from work and make time to discover the plums?

Have a wonderful summer everyone! Take time for yourself and your family. And enjoy the plums!