I have been reading these threads and I am thinking my family is a bit unconventional...

I am looking forward to volunteering at a local organic farm every morning at 5 a.m. to work where ever needed alongside amish and  many other culturaly diverse  families, until 10:00 a.m, then we come home, wash up and nap, (which we have done since my boys were walking).  The rewards are incredible, then each boy gets a week of camp. One will go to art camp and the other wants chess.  

Then we will go camping somewhere, and beach and day trips, all are fun.  I work during all this so they will also help me,  I get to spend real time with my boys.  I love that, then back to the farm where we will spend time harvesting, as I am a chef I will be picking and cooking like crazy.   My boys by my side.  They will be honing knife and fire skills this year and one will be baking, the other will be learning how to can.

Life skills with fun attached!  We also are conservationists, so somewhere in there they will be with tree surgeons, entomologists, geologists, biologists  and a partridge in a pear tree...

They will also bike, play with legos and eat.   So will I .:)   No T.V.  From June until Sept.

Dar

For one full week they will be with their dad at the shore and I will be kid free. 

Mcoyle,  ENJOY the beach.  I hope you are going to a place where they allow you to build bonfires in the evening.  There are beaches in Washington State that allow it, it is so nice to be slowly falling asleep around a bonfire with the crash of the ocean waves near you.  Oh and the feel of salt water air on your body and the smell of it in your loved one's hair and clothes.  It is just a wonderful sensory experience.

Well we are hopeful for time off to do some motorcycle riding.  My husband now has a 1200 and is ready to put our 14 year old on the back so we are thinking of tooling down the Oregon Coast for a few days this summer.  And who knows another trip East of the Cascade Mountains later in the summer.  We went on a five hour ride this past weekend and I tolerated it well so I think I am up for it. 

Last night we were in a Kawasaki shop for my bike to be serviced and they had a steal of a deal on a Ninja.  Oh how I'd love to buy it for my eldest when he comes home for a month this summer.  Then we could all go riding. But I don't have any space to store it for him when he goes back to school.  Maybe I should see what it would cost to lease a motorcycle for a week when he comes home. 

Good for you, Nashbobs, on trainign for your triathlon! That's really fantastic, and your son sounds amazing too. Our summer: We are having our daughter's wedding in June! It's on a beautiful lake in Maine. It's hard for me to think beyond that... but we hope to get away by ourselves to the Berkshires in Massachusetts for a couple of long weekends.

My older kids are working all summer; but I am taking the younger two to Hilton Head in a week and to The Cape in late summer just before school starts.  When they were all younger, we used to go camping and to the beach house on the Cape.

I know that with the coming of summer in the Pacific northwest we will be out hiking, camping and working in our organic garden and orchard. As a family we will be atteding the Oregon Country Fair in July in Veneta Oregon. I work as a volunteer with the Community Village at the fair and can't wait to see old friends and meet some new ones. This idylic event allows me to hear great music, see live vaudville acts and dance and dance. Then for my daily tribal fix I will sit in the drum tower and play my djembe for 3-4 hours a day while I watch my wife and daughter dance to the power of the drum. I will hang out in the village green for a while each day and network with other community activists and enviromentalists. In the evenings after the fair closes for the day to the public I will gather my family around me for a simple supper at one of the hundreds of food booths and then plan what we will do that evening; in the past we have done fire dancing, the Midnight show, the magic parade and other great events. In the early mornings my wife and I will head to morning Yoga and Kirtan ( Bahkti yoga ) and then find a quiet spot and meditate then off to the communial showers and sauna's..what a way to start a perfect day in a perfect place.

  We will go to many music events and to a lot of spiritual places in the Northwest such as MT. Shasta and Shasto buddist abby, MT Lassen, and of course brighten bush hot springs for summer solstice in June.

  I wish the best to all in this world and pray for peace and love between all on humankind.

Namastae

Keith