The Links/Blogroll section is up and running! I've started adding my usual round of blogs. Send me your links--to your blog or websites, and to your favorites, too--I'd love to have them all. Leave a message here, no matter whether you read this right when it's posted or whenever you find the site, and I'll add you in.

I'm loving late summer. The heat spell here broke, and we've been graced by the longest spell of clear blue sky, mid-80's days I can remember. Summer isn't often a catching-up time for me, but this year, both early and late summer have been stock-taking, future-planning times. Only mid-summer, with its rat-race of evening swim meets, provided a very different kind of energy.

The kids are great. My older daughter is having a blast. Camp has ended, and still, she seems to find something and some friend to fill every moment. She's unstoppable. The baby is healthy, sitting up well, babbling, gaining weight after her bout with sickness earlier this summer. She's entirely cute, as babies are, and this morning reached out and gave her big sister the biggest sloppiest kiss known to humankind.

For me, late summer energy usually has some desperation. It's the dog days. Camp is over, school hasn't begun, in fact, it won't start until September 6th, making ours one of the later starts; our old friends in Atlanta have already started school. Late summer is usually a weird time inbetween with no real definition. Maybe I'll feel that way as September looms closer.

For now, late summer feels energizing. Eight months after giving birth, I'm exercising everyday. The baby fits happily into a baby backpack. The baby-who-doesn't-like-the-stroller-when-Mom's-nearby does just fine leaning over mom's neck. We go for walks in the morning, and even in the afternoon, it's much easier to get out and about with her.