June 18th
Solstice Parade! Walk in parade while wearing giant silver lame (women) or bright red biohazard suits (men). Gather several tons of plastic water bottles and aluminum cans in our Suessical Reuseable machines. Hug lots of friendly on-lookers. (Pics in gallery soon.)

Family attempts to watch Solstice Pagent with out of town guests. Plan is aborted when it is discovered that four-year-old is breaking out in chicken pox. Return home and attend to feverish child, thereby missing out on fellow-monk’s fabulous fire-spining, live-band-jamming solstice par-tay. (Sorry Craig!)

June 19th
Amber (Eden’s godmom and our good friend from Regent) comes for a week’s vacation and kicks things off by soaking in the hot tub and drinking mojito’s at my Mom and Dad’s place in Maple Valley. We eat enormous amounts of barbeque with my Dad and Paul for Father’s day. I nurse a migraine.

June 20th
Eden heads off to Golden Garden to explore the beach during a record low tide.

June 21st
Eden’s last day of school. Still quarantined by Cate’s chicken pox, so Dad and Amber go alone to take Eden and Rosie to celebrate at Coldstone Creamery. (Best ice cream ever!…’cept for Paul’s homemade.) Cate’s chicken pox spreads to her throat, between her fingers, etc. We spend the night applying ice to her various itchy spots. Catie takes a 2am oatmeal bath. At 3am we finally resort to pulling the TV up next to our bed so she can watch Veggie Tale’s Jonah while wearing headphones. (Did I mention we are all sleeping in one room so that Amber can have the girl’s room?) Everytime Paul, Eden and I drift off to sleep, Cate forgets about having the headphones on and starts laughing and talking to the TV. At 4am Cate finally falls asleep.

June 22nd
Cate’s Birthday! (She gets a pair of high healed shoes with black sequins for dress up.) Amber’s Birthday! She get’s a Happy-Birthday-to-You gal’s day out — yoga in the AM and pedicures in the afternoon. Cate is recovered enough for a babysitter so we meet Lindell and his pal Mischa at the movies. (Batman Begins…blah, blah, blah…you have to face your fears…yeah, yeah just get to the kick_butt super hero stuff….cool!…high techy superhero toys!…NOW we’re talking…) This is followed by a late night dinner at Matador with copious amounts of sangria. Finally! We meet Aleece’s significant other, the kind and funny Quinn.

P.S. Quinn and Aleece are now the proud owners of Mona’s in Greenlake. Calling all locals! Stop on by.

June 23rd.
Monkfish Abbey’s Solstice Celebration! Friends and neighbors join us for a little ritual-dinner-crafting evening. Kids run around playing with bubbles. Four year old Olivia jumps up and down in her pink lame cape shouting “I LOVE SUMMER!’ My sentiments exactly. (Pictures and info on our little Solstice-y ritual forthcoming.) It is now light until after 9pm.

June 24th
Lynette Friesen insists that I NOT have them over for dinner. (That’s what friends are for!) Amber heads out to see friends at the People’s Seminary. Paul and I crash early.

June 25th
Cate scabs up nicely just in time for her Fifth BirthdayParty. Aleece arrives with ridiculously elaborate Barbie cake. All the little girls are in seventh heaven! Balloon animals-pinata-treasure hunt-craft-cake extravaganza ensues. Cate is deliriously happy.

Paul loads up a bunch of stuff with our neighbor, Bill, and runs up north to deliver much-needed household supplies to a schoolmate of Eden’s. The family now has a sofa, kitchen table, and computer due to the generosity of various BF Day families. The new house is considerable warmed.

We wrap things up with one final birthday celebration for Aleece and Amber Alexander. We all pack up in the van and go to Teatro Zinzani for a evening of extravagance and wackiness. Lindell, Darren, and James round out our festive little party.

June 26th
Sabbath, sabbath, and more sabbath. A late wake-up, followed by a nap, followed by some unexpected friends for lay-ed back visits, followed by a 9pm bedtime. (oh, and a little bout of food poisioning…but you know, you can’t have it all.)

So that’s where I’ve been lately….