Summer at The Bungalow

We're a fortnight into the summer holidays, and we're finding a relaxed groove.

We've been lazy risers.

Sometimes we eat berries and yogurt beside the bathtub size pond Mr Johnson dug seven years ago that we've spent much of the spring reclaiming. (We ordered 12 yards of mulch to spread around various landscape projects in the yard, which we quickly realized was about six yards too much ... slowly we whittled the pile down.)

Twice we've packed picnic lunches and headed to the Windy City. Other days we've simply gone to the museums, and skipped the parks and beaches.

We come home and eat salad dinners on the front porch and watch rabbits sneak out from the hedge. And talk about our day.

We listen for the birds we can identify (mourning doves and cardinals and the cocky, squawking starlings). We've had a clear vantage point of a momma robin and her trio of sky blue eggs in our living room window. And an equally clear view of the harsh reality of nature. All three chicks hatched... but momma pushed the weakest one out and left another alone and rejected in the nest just as he had begun to fully feather out. (Our morning dove momma under the eaves proved more devoted, and has carefully coaxed two sets of chicks into this world.)

EHJ is studying the Bird's of Illinois handbook. Trying to determine which kind of bird is most likely to live in the cavity high up in the old hack berry tree. She has an app on her iTouch to identify birds and their calls. And one for trees. When we go on what Bei Bei calls 'family walks', our Middle is keen to collect leafy folliage from around our village and come home and try to classify it.

MGJ stays up late reading. Moving quickly through a stack of books from the library, but turning down the opportunity to mail in a weekly math challenge to her jr high teacher. She is learning how to do the laundry and unfurls towels and sheets to air dry on the line. And more begrudgingly unloads a dishwasher perpetually full of plastic picnic ware.

Bei Bei watches the changes in the yard ... loving to go on rides on the green mower and make observations about the perenials. The tulips and magnolias of Spring, now a distant memory, have given way to lilacs, followed by the Korean variety of lilacs, with smaller tighter blossoms that bloom two weeks after the traditional ones. The peonies have nearly all faded, the white ones opening first, followed by the dark pink ones. The rose bushes are both blooming, fighting against heavy down pours to keep their petals. The hydrangea bushes have opened with bright white balls of blooms. The mock orange, beside the porch, where cardinals are keeping a nest, is full of fragrant white petals as well. Our overgrown, untidy, uneven hedge has a small white blossom that is lightly scented, and wafts all the way back to the clothes line.

Earlier Bei Bei had a friend over for a play date and with the seriousness of a 60 year old (not six year old) pointed out projects around the yard ... "We're not quite done with the mulch yet, we still need to put some over there." (She faithfully scooted her own little wheel barrow around the yard in May and June beside my garden cart, and loaded and spread mulch with her pint size rake.) Bei Bei pointed out where the cardinals live and the momma birds on their nests. "I can see it's butt," her friend quipped, but and our resident comedian didn't take the bait. "Those are her tail feathers," she replied solemnly. "She's sitting on her eggs."

The girls have invented their own game of kickball, where the pitcher rolls the ball to all the bases, not just home plate (which happens to be a corner of the playhouse.) When my parents spent a short weekend with us, they quickly versed them in the ever-evolving-rules of "johnson girl's kickball." And a sweaty, multi-generational match ensued. The have finished their soccer season, and still seem compelled to be kicking something around the yard, to each other, or in a disadvantaged scrimmage.

We are drinking in these sweet first moments of the summer ... in our yard and on the porch of The Bungalow ... Creating memories of summers in North America with The Three.