Oh Summer! Full of flowers and time spent traveling and time with family. I had this pretty flower crown from an anniversary shoot I did for me with another photographer (made by Naly’s Floral Shop on the northside). I stuck it in the fridge overnight and let the kids go to town with it the next day.

With the promise of staying up past their bedtime, and the joy of leaping through the late spring sunshine, they both came outside in something adorable and started twirling, leaping and generally being adorable in the one patch of perfect sunlight in our front yard. The last of the magnolias were still clinging to their favorite tiny tree and the mosquitos weren’t too bad just yet. John’s favorite way to make them laugh while I take a picture is to pretend to lick my ear. That’s…less than pleasant for me. The kids think it’s awesome. Their favorite thing is potty words. What 5/7-year-old can resist a good poop joke?

We also travelled up to Antigo, WI over Memorial Day weekend and spent some time both on a small lake that John’s family has a cottage on, playing in boats and swimming with cousins, grandma, grandpa, aunts and uncles. And time on a little piece of land along a tiny section of the Eau Claire River that his dad has cultivated and planted trees. The kids helped grandpa water the baby trees, splashed in the river, and climbed the big tree.

They are both surprisingly confident tree climbers, considering the lack of tree-climbing time we have in our everyday life and the general city existence that we live. I love watching them just exist in nature. Gathering nature things, examining them under magnifying glasses or microscopes, keeping nature journals. I hope that instilling a love of nature now will help them be good stewards of the Earth as grown-ups.

Both kids also love to leap for the camera. It’s their favorite thing if I have a camera with me. They want me sit in one spot, while they take running leaps across the frame and see how high they can get themselves. It’s so much fun!

I can’t wait to hear about your travel plans! Camps and travels, boat rides and s’mores. Summer is my favorite.