The Soul of Austin

"Welcome to Barton Springs... the soul of Austin" says the sign.

Observing turtles, runners, people who haven't bathed recently, etc. on the Zephyr

You know the saying, "when the cat's away, the mice will play?"  Well, in our case, when the figurative cat, read: John Michael is away at day camp, us figurative mice do all sorts of things that we don't get to do when big brother is around.  For Noah, this means getting out all of John Michael's favorite toys the second that the door closes.  For me, this means we take outings that I never would attempt with three kids, such as this morning, when we met our friends from around the corner, Elle and Birdie and Mandy and went to Zilker Park to ride the train.

He who wears the concert T-shirt to the concert

Being at Zilker makes me so happy.  The park really is the best our city has to offer.  Swimmers cooling off and doing laps in Barton Springs.  Runners running Ladybird Lake.  The train, so unique and fun.  To think there was a period when I used to run the trail, both Town Lake and also the Greenbelt, multiple times a week!  Those days are looooong gone.  I wonder if I'll ever run that seriously, again.  I have no desire to run these days.  I'm lucky to make it to the gym once a week and that is just fine with me.  Do you know what else is long gone?  The days when I used to think an outing with two kids was hard.  Now, it's no big deal.  Aaron passed out on the train ride and slept in in the Ergo long enough for Noah and I to share an ice cream under the big oak trees and watch the lap swimmers after our train ride.  The ice cream was needed because it was already sweltering at 11am.  But, seriously, this summer has been a dream compared to last, where on the news this morning, they said last year at this time we'd already had 47! days of 100-plus temperatures. I am so glad we didn't move to the 'burbs.  I really would have missed being close to this...