Tempus Fugit...Or In Which Time Flies Over the Summer

I suppose it was my own doing, since I was the one who wished for a summer of boredom. Instead, we got a summer of chaos, in which we felt we were only just keeping our heads above water.

I'm not sure exactly what happened.

I remember the feeling of freedom as the school year came to a close. I remember thinking of the possibilities of what we could do...and what we didn't need to do. The whole summer sprawled before us. We talked of joining the pool. I dreamt of leisurely moments of sitting outside and reading or coloring or simply watching the clouds drift by.

Snort.

Today, I returned a bag of summer toys I'd bought at the beginning of the summer. Jump ropes and bubbles and jacks and marbles... I'd had a brainwave in the beginning of our summer break to do stuff -- like play outside -- with the kids. I'd been excited to finally have the time to play again with them. The customer service clerk at Toys 'R' Us asked me why I was returning everything. I told her it was because we didn't have time to use it, didn't really have time to play. She asked me why, and I told her. She assumed it was because "teens don't play," but I told her my teens do...we just didn't have the time due to other activities crowding in.

I felt very sad as I walked to my car. Sure, it felt better to return things we weren't going to use and get the money put back in our bank account. But I felt -- afresh -- the speed at which time is passing. When did I stop having enough time to play with my kids?

That said, the activities we did were fun. Here's some of what happened:

Emi and I did the "Official College Tour 2014" together,  even buying t-shirts from each of the universities. She did some job shadowing for her senior project and held the WWCS birthday picnic and WWCS Open Forum. Edward grew 6 inches and took some more one-on-one soccer lessons and started playing on the high school soccer team. Ethan finished first grade and read lots of chapter books. And I was able to write a ton of stories for the newspaper. We did manage to attend/host some picnics; light some fire pits; and make some s'mores. Stuart completely redid our main bathroom. High-five, Honey!

So all was not lost.

But I won't be lying when I say that I'm almost (almost) excited for school to begin so as to get back some of our routine.

*wink-grin*

How about you? Are you getting excited for the upcoming school year? Do you find that time is flying faster as you get older? Share your comments below! I'd love to know I'm not alone.