I blinked

And just like that, June is nearly gone.

It's the first summer since Ryan was born that I've ever worked outside of our home. I've since come to realize that summer is no different than the rest of the school year- you go to work, pick up your child from school/family/friends, do some homework, pick up the house, rush over to karate/swim, come home at 7, cook dinner and go to bed. Needless to say, the routine isn't super fun, and weekend days blur together until you get to the weekend- then you cram in laundry, groceries, yardwork and errands and hope you'll have some time to read a book or watch a show or take your kid to the freaking beach.  It's not always fun, and I need to do a better job of living in the moment a little better, but I have no regrets. It's still very doable and necessary- I do not want to sit at home and do nothing. And this job offers a little extra cash, great coworkers and insight into an industry I'm interested in. It's truly manageable too, I get a day off a week, sometimes two. I'm just being melodramatic when I talk about how tired/busy I am because I'm not great at balancing things, and it's all still a bit new to me.

We've managed to have a little bit of summer fun this month...but I need to do better in planning some outdoor summer fun activities for my son, who aside from karate, math class, drumming and friends coming over, is being raised a bit more like human veal lately. He's indoors on tech way too much. The minute all his daily chores/homework are done, he's watching YouTube videos of gamers, crazily recording on Musically (he just discovered it), and/or laughing like a hyena with friends at Minecraft.

Thankfully, he desperately wanted a hammock we spied at a store a few days ago, so in trade for the hammock purchase, he's agreed to do extra chores this week. Sooooo guess which mom had two rooms vacuumed and steam-mopped today?! THIS MOM!!!

I won't mention the dust bunnies and hair I still saw around all the baseboards, and I don't dare put a white glove on and run my hand under the beds. For now, I'm going to turn a blind eye to my very mediocre cleaner's oversight and chalk this up as a win. Because I'm pretty sure the market rate for a vacuum/steam mop session in Hawaii from an experienced, professional cleaner is not $5 per room. (But shh! Don't tell Ryan. I've convinced him he's radically overpaid based on his skill level.) I have long dreamed of the day where I could sub out my house cleaning duties, and I'm basking in the glow of satisfaction that this day may have dawned. :-D Sloppily-cleaned floors are better than my normal dirty, never cleaned floors!

Volunteering for the American Cancer Society's inaugural 5k, meant to bring awareness to the LGBTQ community fighting cancer...and showing our family's love, support and PRIDE for the cause!

After a year or so on the waiting list, Ryan finally started taiko class! This means he can finally stop his weekly swimming class (which we enrolled in for a year to improve/strengthen his overall swimming stamina), as I don't want him to have too many activities each week. I'm sufficiently pleased with how much he's improved in the water, and his coach has told us he's welcome to return at any time (which I hope to do every few years, just to ensure he's always a competent and safe swimmer).

We got to spend some time with Ryan's two younger cousins...who are adorably different and bring such light to the family with their vastly different personalities.

We celebrated Fathers Day with three of the four fathers in our family...the fourth one stayed home to help nurse his sick family! We went with an old Americana bbq theme, so I got to dust off the 'ol checkered table cloth and yellow plastic food baskets! Despite never having grown up eating in roadside diners...I have nostalgia for the era. In my head, I'm recreating a Ruby's diner experience for the family, complete with nutritious, definitely organic American comfort food...like burgers and fries!

It's almost time to pack up and hit the road for Ry and I...we'll be gone a few weeks in July. So our final week here will be spent purging (time for the semi annual garage sale), packing, stepping up our hiragana/katakana practice and God willing- a trip to the beach for my little veal! If I haven't mentioned it previously- Ryan is off to Japanese language school. We'll be in the city we used to live in for three years, with my mom visiting us for 5 days, a few miles away from my brother, SIL and two nephews (although they'll be very busy with their family there on their annual trip), and should have two Kona friends (Sei, Yuri) passing through while we're there that we hope to hook up with. It'll be fun, it'll be hot, it'll be challenging!