The last days before school starts

Laundry basket of rutabaga, growing nicely

With only two weeks left of our school summer break, I'm doing my best to relax before going back to work. 

Franklin and I have a goal to build with every single one of his legos, even the tiny ones.  We started building a tower, but decided to tear it down and try something else.  Over Christmas break we built a beach town with shops, vehicles, and animals like whales and fish--but we didn't manage to use every piece.  We're on a mission!

Pond filter cleared the pond!  What pretty fish

Partner's had some time off too, and will have next week off with us.  Two weeks ago we all went to the beach, on a sunny day.  We even went swimming in the sea!  I really enjoyed paddling about;  I don't think I've swum since I moved here, more than 10 years ago.  I don't even have a swimsuit anymore.  I swam in a black tunic and regular underwear.  I say swim, but I didn't go past my waist, as I didn't want to get swept out.  Still, it was deep enough to duck down and get wet all the way to my neck, and float around.

I've been harvesting vegetables from my garden every day, and some of them are really producing well.  We have so much chard;  over the last two days I've picked 2 pounds of it!  And the runner beans are finally taking off, almost a month later than last year.  But I'm picking them every day, and salting some down for the winter, too.  We've had one zuccini and one cucumber so far.  The zuccini plant had slug damage early on and took a while to recover;  it's still a bit sad.  Cucumber likewise, but at least it's growing more fruits, unlike the poor zuccini.  Still, we might get another couple before the season's done.  And one of my friends from my knitting group gave me a sack of her zuccinis, so all is not lost.

Before going back to school we hope to have a barbecue, maybe go to the beach again, and definitely pick a load of blackberries from the park.  And I'd like to put my log cabin quilt together too:  the top is all finished and it just needs a backing and some wadding (I have both--just need to assemble them).