Tick check!

Summer is here. Flowers. Green -- so much green. Fairs. Weddings. And ticks. So many ticks!

Hubby and I have picked 4-6 ticks off the kiddo's so far. Mostly poppy-seed sized ninja ticks. They are so small! And tricksy! And they hold the potential to inflict such harm. Lymes disease -- yuck yuck yuck! We're vigilant and the children have been quite remarkably compliant, allowing us to do a 'tick check' every night before pajama time.

Besides it being tick season, it's also the season of travel. Mostly people travel to our part of the world -- New England offers sundry appealing destinations. We're staying put mostly, as a young poor family must. We make our own fun in the lakes and rivers and trails right outside our door.

From now until September, we have weddings and a family reunion, a short 5-day vacation in July and the Lowell Folk Festival. Lots to do -- and fitting in time for swimming, hikes, and bike rides. I wish we could enjoy some of the vacation time my German relatives enjoy -- some of them have 10 weeks of vacation a year! If we had that, I'd just take a few weeks off to stay home and relax. But alas, being workaholics comes with being American I guess.

Anticipating the boom of summer is almost as fun as anticipating the quiet, slow implosion of fall -- and Fall means pumpkins, blueberries, and county fairs. But we're not there yet. Once school lets out, happy and safe summer to all!