Monday, August 23, 2010

Endless Summers!



What a wonderful summer! We were on The Cape for most of it! With our friends. We've been friends for a long time now.  Since Grace and Camden's first baby swim class. That's where we met.  At the pool with our babies. New moms and new babies....the babies were seven months old...the moms were thirty somethings.  Kit was my first friend with a baby in my new stay at home mom life.

Who knew that first meet would be one that the moms would laugh about forever.  It seems that Kit was making note of the fact that i seemed so "together" as a new mom.  Color coordinated with my bouncing baby girl....in her navy polka dot lined stroller and accessorized with her big baby bonnet for sun protection and sweet swimsuit....I felt pulled together with our fun summer attire but not so pulled together emotionally!

New to the stay at home life with a new baby, husband's new job, new home and far from "home"....home being anywhere near family.  It was exciting for Biff and I to move to our new home and life to start our own family.  Just not so exciting to leave all of the family and friends in my support system as a new mom. Moving was a bigger deal with a baby.

At first my new found friends were soap opera stars who I remembered from college days.  I sat amidst the boxes while Grace napped.  My mom would say, "you meet your friends when your kids get to school."  Well, that seemed an eternity. Grace was bright but not ready for reading, writing and arithmetic.  So, when Kit wrote down her address and phone number for me, it was as though I had met my first friend on the kindergarten playground!  I went home with my scrap of paper in hand and showed Biff....I had a new friend! Maybe.


Back in those days, my friends were in little pockets of my mind....hometown friends, family friends, grammar school friends, high school friends, college friends, work friends and city friends.  Kit was a new friend.  Very new.

Once again, it seems what "Amazing Grace" told me was true.  I met many of my friends when our kids went to school...we met Kit and Camden at baby swim class!  Then again at Gymboree!  Yes, we had to be friends once we were singing to a little "gymbo the clown" going up and down....it would be too embarrassing to share that with outsiders!  We moved on to baby music classes. we were in the same kooky playgroup, we had our second babies within a month of each other. our toddlers went to the same pre-school.  We had similar interests.  We enjoyed our jog strollers and hikes.  We both had great husbands.  Our babies became friends.  We grew our friendship over the years just as our kids learned to treasure their first friends. And the rest is history.


Here are some summer pics.....




























There's not much more to say. Seeing some our summer pics is just a tidbit of the goodness that we've experienced.  We are all thrilled that we could have so much fun as a group.  The kids, the adults, the kids and the adults and all mixed up.  All of the kids really know each other, through the teenage ups and downs and hot buttons and hilarity,for good and for bad.  That's a gift.  Every friendship is a gift.  Our friends, new and old, all mixed together or one on one are a gift!  It's something I marvel at everyday.  I'm just grateful, very grateful....for our endless summers.


Oh! Did I mention that just as we sat down on the beach....Kit's husband called to say, "Hey, did you hear that they had shark sightings off of Chatham today?"  Well, we were at The National Seashore beyond Chatham....and what IF, as only a mom can think....there is that one recalcitrant shark....who doesn't stay with the others....and .....well, we didn't want to alarm the kids....we had plenty of alarm for all of us.  We noted that a shark would probably go for the surfers first.  We stayed at the breakers and not too far beyond.....because we're moms and we always have to think....JUST IN CASE scenarios.  WHAT IF?  COULD IT HAPPEN?  and all of the other mom thoughts that run through my head like a ticker tape on the stock exchange!

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