How Did It Get to Be Summer?

Hi, everyone!

The things we were doing to stop the bad virus — like wearing masks and staying away from other people — have been working!  Now we can start doing a few more things together, especially outside.  And our chilly weather is over, too!  We’re at the end of an entire week of sunny, warm days!  All of a sudden, it feels like summer and people are out doing summer things.  For Grandma and Grandpa and me, that means spending more time at the bay.  After we had day two of Uncle Steven’s birthday celebration in town, we came back out to the bay on Sunday afternoon.  That night, there was a sun dog at sunset!  That’s the bright spot to the left of the actual sun as it was going down!  The air was playing all sorts of optical tricks on us, because we could see the power plant cooling tower that’s forty miles away on the lakeshore!

We went back into town on Monday.  Grandma made a flourless chocolate birthday cake in advance for Grandpa.  I spent my days sitting in the front window greeting anybody who went past and watching the impatiens bloom.  We invited Uncle Steven’s family back out to the bay on Friday for Grandpa’s birthday dinner.  We forgot to bring any candles for his birthday cake, so he had to pretend to blow them out!

Uncle Steven’s family were staying overnight.  That meant time for another bonfire with more marshmallow toasting!  This time, Grandma brought out the ingredients for s’mores.  Aunt Kara and I showed Thomas how to toast a marshmallow without burning it.  Then we taught James and Thomas how to assemble a s’more!  James lost a tooth, so I made sure the tooth fairy knew where to find it!

On Saturday morning, it was too windy to do anything on the water.  That meant it was electronics time for Uncle Steven’s family!  Then everybody worked on the jigsaw puzzle.  When it was finished, there was a piece left over!  I was happy that Grandma recognized it as a piece from the puzzle she did last week.  Now it’s back in the box where it belongs!  We all went back to town on Saturday.  Grandma and Grandpa stopped to get the first local strawberries of the season and picked some up for Uncle Steven’s family, too.  They were yummy!

Back in town, Grandpa got around to framing the print of chickens crossing the tree tunnel road that Papa Dick-san and Grandma Sue bought for Grandma in Kauai.  Grandma had Grandpa hang it in the kitchen and it looks very nice there!  We were back out at the bay the next Sunday when we Facetimed to sing Happy Birthday to Uncle David!  Then we went to Sodus Point to watch the sunset in honor of his birthday.  The US-Canada border is going to be closed for at least another month because of the virus, but we hope we can watch a sunset together in person in August!

Grandpa wanted to put the dock in the water and retrieve the powerboat, but it was too windy over the weekend to do that work.  On Monday morning, it was calmer.  Grandma and Grandpa and I got the first section of dock in.  Then Grandpa invented a measuring pole for setting the length of each dock leg to the proper height before each frame section went in the water.

While Grandpa was busy doing pruning and other outdoor work, I helped Grandma with her project.  She put a new coat of stain on the siding on the porch.  The rest of the outside was re-stained last fall, but the porch siding hasn’t been done since it was installed almost thirty years ago!  We had to use masking tape and newspaper to protect the doors, window, floor and ceiling!  Doing that took almost as long as the actual staining!  We got back to Fairport just in time for dinner!

On Tuesday, we went back to the bay again after dinner. Uncle Steven was coming Wednesday morning to help with the rest of the dock sections.  I was happy to help take down all the masking tape and newspaper on the porch!  Thomas and I helped Uncle Steven and Grandma and Grandpa get the rest of the dock out!

Once the dock was in, the powerboat could come home!  It wasn’t ready until after lunch!  James and Thomas went with Uncle Steven and Grandpa to get it.  Uncle Steven and the boys brought it home while Grandpa drove back with the trailer it was stored on.  Grandma and I were the welcoming committee!

Grandma thought she was going to need to re-stain the porch ceiling, as well as the siding.  Once she started to wash it, she decided that cleaning was all it needed.  Everybody was glad we didn’t have to use up more masking tape and newspaper protecting the walls and doors and windows and floor from staining overhead!

Grandma has two new projects!  Joe-san and Nancy-san bought a jigsaw puzzle of Mount Fuji at the gift shop at Oishi Park.  The pieces are even smaller than the jigsaw puzzle of the Skytree and Nancy-san was never able to finish it.  Grandma said she’d assemble it and then number all the pieces on the back.  Then, Grandma Arlene’s family found the crochet dowel and instructions for Thomas’ well-loved and now tattered “magic blanket.”  Grandma said she’d get some help learning to crochet and make a new one.  I hope a can be a good helper on both projects!  Yesterday, Grandma and Thomas went to the yarn store and matched his magic blanket to new yarn!

Yesterday afternoon, we came back out to the bay in time for dinner and sunset.  Our favorite restaurant is open for inside eating again, but Grandpa thought getting takeout and eating on our porch was safer.  There were lots of people out at Sodus Point watching sunset!

This morning, Grandma took me on my first kayak adventure of the season!  We went all the way up the bay to the breach in Crescent Beach!  It’s much wider than it was two years ago!

We paddled back along Eagle Island and the east shore of our part of the bay.  The cottonwood trees are in bloom, so we have fuzzy bay!  Grandma took me up Clark Creek to see the beaver dam.  The beavers have repaired it since last year!  It’s actually holding back water at a level higher than the creek!  The water lilies and wild rose bushes are starting to bloom and were very pretty!

We got splashed by the wake of a big boat on our way across the bay from Clark Creek!  I needed some time in the sun to dry out!  Summer officially begins about two hours from now, and I’m ready!

Love,

Lion-san