Summer playdates are the best. The big girls are out of school, and we can send everyone outside instead of having all of them on top of us in the house. We put out a bunch of snacks and get some refreshments for ourselves, and just enjoy each other. Lillian and Elisabeth are both great at playing with the little ones, and they all seem to have almost as good of a time as the mamas.
It’s also super fun that the kids are big enough to solve their own problems and largely manage themselves. The big girls arbitrate disputes and no one questions them. Even the smaller children have some sense about safety and danger, so we can kind of trust them to Not Do Stupid Things. Such a change from playdates where we exclusively had children crawling all over us. Now we only mostly have children crawling all over us. A round up of past playdates is here.
At my house, the bubble machine is super popular, unsurprisingly. Everybody loves bubbles! Beautiful kids + bubbles…it’s like photography cheating, right there.
And then, a different day, we took all of our usual playdate kids, plus Noah, who is spending some time with us this summer, to a local river park for some splashing fun. It rained, a misty deluge, and the kids couldn’t decide whether to be thrilled or angry at it. Rain sometimes has particular qualities that evoke a place, and this reminded me of the rainy season in Costa Rica. I’ve heard our ecosystem described as a temperate rainforest, and this summer, it feels very true.
Alisha. Your photos are absolutely stunning. I’m inspired to get my ” good” camera out and start using it again!! Do you edit in Lightroom?
I just use the now-defunct Picasa, mostly to adjust fill light and color a bit. I’m looking for a substitute for Picasa, but I just can’t be bothered to learn a more complex kind of software right now. Thank you for the compliment! The ones by the river were on a truly magical day, when the light was absolutely perfect.