Summer camp and the Zoo and other logistics

This morning Avery was an angel. He set the table for breakfast all on his own. Then, he packed a lunch for himself and his sisters -- all before I even got out of bed. Nevermind that the maincourse was a slice of bread in a zip-lock bag; he packed yogurts with the ice-packs too.

After taking the kids to school, I futzed around for a couple of hours before finally taking myself to the gym. The outdoor pool at AquAniene is now available for everyone's use. For a small fee, you can swim, lounge, use the umbrellas, etc. And, the outdoor cafe is now serving lunch. It's really quite nice. But, I didn't bring my swimsuit -- just my gym shoes, so I did my working out inside.

Afterwards, I came home to make lunch for Josh and I. Even with the heat, it is pleasant to sit outside under the shade of the trees in the garden. Before bringing the kids home, I had a few more errands to run. Today, I was giving one of Avery's classmate's a ride home, but it turned into a playdate instead. First, we stopped at the zoo on the way home from school because today, they were taking money for the zoo camp. Apparently, the camps are run by an outside company called Flauto Magico, and they "rent" the zoo space. I thought Olivia and Avery would go for a whole week, but it turns out June 29th is a holiday -- it's the the Festeggiatta di Santi Pietro e Paulo - the primary saints of Rome... and everything is closed. Huh?? So now there would be only four days of camp that week.

While I was trying to sort out the camp payment, the kids were running around and Avery was misbehaving. It was difficult to have a conversation, orcomplete a thought. I had been crabby all day; maybe it's just too hot.

Morris came over to cook dinner and babysit Avery. Josh got in the car for our big outing to see Olivia at her last swim lesson. In fact, it wasn't much of a lesson because she was the only swimmer in her group to turn up. So, it was more like playtime -- which was fun for her. I was looking forward to sitting in the outdoor cafe, but for some reason, it was closed this evening; so we had a drink inside. Actually, I had the drink and Josh had water --- because of the med's he's taking.

Olivia was tired when we came home. She's been struggling with a book that she'd been assigned to read as homework from school. She has just completely given up on it, refusing to read and whining instead about how she didn't understand it.

Later I returned to Aniene to pick Charlotte up from her practice. She was whining about having her iTouch taken away ahead of this weekend's roadtrip to Spoleto. She's relentless. A natual born litigator.