gift guide part 3A: gifts of time together

• A trip to the fire station
• A dance performance, play, concert, or trip to a museum -- Or, if you really want to get extravagant, how about season tickets or a membership that you can enjoy together?
• A trip to the swimming pool
• A picnic (indoors or out)
• An offer to teach the recipient something: how to ride a bike, how to play chess, how to do origami
• Read aloud to the recipient (consider making a recording, so they have a tangible record of your time together)
• Go to the movies, or have a movie night at home -- Dante once received a present of an empty popcorn tub with a packet of microwave popcorn, some Hot Tamales, and a Blockbuster gift card
• Ofter to listen, really listen, to anything s/he wants to talk about
• Skip all gifts and take a trip together
• Graffiti the neighborhood together -- Just kidding! (Sorta! It's okay with me if you do really cool, artistic, politically astute and graphically compelling graffiti with stencils. The police and your neighbors may disagree, however)

what i did on my summer vacation

Summer 'O8 photo highlights! We went camping a couple of times with friends of Will's. The campground is perfect for us. It's only a little more than an hour out of town, and there is plenty of hiking, fishing, and forest to explore...These are just four of about 400 pictures that I took!



Seems like Wednesday rolled around really often -- that's our day to pick up CSA veggies. I wasn't organized enough to use and store nearly as many of them as I should have (I gave a bunch away, and ended up throwing some out when I didn't use it fast enough) but here's some gorgeous spinach that I got into the freezer in time.

Will and I did the Great Urban Race with my sister and her boyfriend. Part costume contest, part scavenger hunt, part photography contest, part foot race, this was really fun, despite the fact that we all ended up with bloody feet. We figured that we probably walked/ran at least 20 miles over the course of 4 1/2 hours. We didn't even come close to winning, but we've got some strategy planned for next year...

yeah, right!

From my dad's blog:
"...one of the favorite pastimes of the family is putting me in humiliating situations." I have no idea what he could possibly mean by that.