ain't it just like the night to play tricks when you're trying to be so quiet

Dara recently declared that summer is for water parks and I steadfastly agreed. I had plenty of water parks on our summertime agenda. Us Floridians tend to go a little nuts for water parks which probably explains why there are so many in our general area, but no one really argues for the side of rationality when it comes down to cooling off from the brutal summer heat. What I wasn't planning for was all of the rain. Every afternoon seems to be taken over by gloomy, looming black clouds and the promise of rain. And not just regular rain, but that hot, steamy rain that doesn't feel remotely pleasant -- and then it inevitably turns into a downpour anyway. One day I was brainstorming for things to do in the event of overwhelming heat or inevitable rain when my brain just sort of went VISIT ALL THE MUSEUMS! and that's what we've been doing. "Muth-ee-um" is Ethan's newest vocabulary word and each afternoon has sort of spun into a new adventure at a new museum. Much like water parks, there are no shortage of museums for children in South Florida and for that, I am grateful.

It's been an exhausting few days for a few reasons. One, because I've taken up -- independently, without bribery or brute force -- some conglomerate of walking, jogging and running by myself in the evenings. I came home feeling defeated and like I should lay down on the floor and wait my impending death, but as soon as my husband peeked at my pedometer and muttered the words "wow, that's faster than I could have done," I was all superstar in my mind. Of course, I stayed out until after midnight a couple of nights ago taking my teenage sister and her friend to their first open mic night at the little restaurant where I spent just about every night of my life back in high school when it didn't feel legitimately painful to see the clock hit two in the morning. The looks of happiness on their faces made it worth it, as did the super strong cappuccino I downed in record time immediately after we were seated. Of course, the true culprit for this wave of exhaustion I mentioned is the fact that Ethan's naps are likely gone. Gone forever, a thing of the past, another notch in his baby book. Goodbye, farewell, we already miss you -- at least I do. It's less shocking to me than it is to the people I encounter who ask if he still takes two naps per day (which, for the record, he stopped doing at six months old). Naps have been hit or miss for some time, and it's not as if he's tired without them. He's perfectly capable to go an entire twelve hour day without being fussy, cranky or requiring sleep to recharge. Me, on the other hand? The small wave of productivity I experience on a daily basis during his naptime has slowly turned into before (my) bedtime chaos of frantically trying to get things done. Our days just got a whole lot longer.

But that's where the museums come in.

These extra long, super hot summer days are shaping up to be pretty fun.