Bats and Fireflies

Our weekend was full of family/community.

Saturday we had our niece's 10th birthday party. There was a 2 story inflatable water slide(think super tall monbounce) and three deluxe cakes + tons of food.
Every adult who walked in the back yard said, "woah!" every 7-10 year old said, "wow!" and set to stripping off their clothes. It was a good idea, albeit overwhelming in a city yard, and the screams got old(at least for me) after a couple of hours.

We helped out a lot as usual and Mr. S kept saying "It is OK if we go now,"(as we had another kid bday party that we'd responded to before getting the invite) but I was like "we have to sing 'happy birthday'" It feels weird to leave a child's party before that.

BIL was like, "Shall we expect similar parties from you two?" about Mr. S and I for our child. And I said, "I think bowling is more our style." SIL wasn't around for the query, so I felt OK to answer that way. It is interesting, I can see the fam starting to get curious about our upcoming parenting style. It is starting to feel real, this transition that is coming.

Sunday night we had another party, a housewarming for some pool friends. They bought a foreclosure house in poor shape and have done an amazing reno-job. The party was great fun, with an entire 'georgian(russian) feast' laid out, and drinks provided by the guests. They have a fantastic dress-up box and many of the 3-6 yr olds were decked out in costumes, which made for a magical backdrop.

Walking back to our car the sky was almost to night, that pale grey-blue, and the fireflies were at eye level while bats were flying overhead, weaving the sky. The beauty brought me out of my tired fun-weekend-but-too-many-parties mood and gave me one of those pure moments of gratefulness for family, community, my growing belly and summer abundance.