Summatime

The buckeyes won. So that's reason enough to celebrate with a pictures post. Tomorrow (fingers crossed) I'll give an update post.

This has been one of the longest and shortest summers of my life. Being a teacher, I have a chunk of the year that is all mine. To do with what I want. After working for 3 years in the 'real world' post college, I fully realize and appreciate how much of a difference this is from other working joe schmoes out there. For the entire 3 months of summer, I had approximately 3 weeks of downtime. The other 9 weeks were spent camping, glamping, traveling, and sleeping on a train. So here are some (way too many) pics from my summa summa time, summa time.

First camp! Two hours of English teaching + 4 hours of laying on a beach = perfect balance

my buddy

7 puppies I came home to after a camp

the house that kolya built this summer. soon we'll have piggies and chickies.

an impressive teekva growing in our garden

my neighb, billy

baby watermelons

the only way to cool down during summer afternoons

iced coffees

the chase

the hunt

the capture

baby wine in my yard

Alyona's Birthday Bash!

prettiest holodets (aka meat jelly) i've ever seen

there is nothing wrong with this picture

neighbs

shots

birthday girl and my favoritist landlady

the siberian cohorts (not joking)

get it gurl

party favors

how to take a shot (of apple juice...) without hands is taught at the ripe old age of 9

tha girls. we spent about 85% of the time on the dance floor

kitten purse

Camp Model United Nations! and brick face.

BiH doing some research

'nastya, hold up our sign!'

killing it, as usual

this is what donetsk does

donestk

honeymooning in donetsk

donetsk

like a school girl

my heart was all a'flutter at finally meeting this stadium

coal mines in the distance that built this city

it's just pretend

more honeymooners

WWII understated statue

you've got some coal dust there, right on your face

dead cat pose

our first restaurant in budapest, OFFERED HOT SAUCE!!!

our second restaurant in budapest, we ordered all the things

not a postcard, or hogwarts, or a torture chamber

we touched the iron curtain, and survived. but cody slept through it.

hero's square

pesht

reunited with my love

croatian farmer's market

someone had a late night

he's on vacation

i'm on vacation

oh yea, we witnessed croatia officially joining the EU

led by this guy

then we went here: Plitvice Lakes National Park

i never wanted to leave

ever

my happy place

are they just floating in air?!

on the road to dubrovnik, down the croatian coast

no one was home

saw a pirate ship during our island hopping tour in the adriatic sea. NBD

camp EXCITE counselors!

ukrainian dancing my tail off

me and a camper, coordinated ukrainian flag nails

teachin 'em the dance of the irish

she learned some new skills this summer

So that was the majority of my summer in picture form. Missing are pictures from the actual city of Dubrovnik because...well those are on a disposable camera that hasn't been developed yet. Someone's camera ran out of battery and someone decided not to take a charger with us on vacation so someones had to purchase a 1990s style kodak camera from a souvenir shop just to get pictures of one of the most beautiful cities I've ever seen. Anyway, on a more random note, here's a blog post from my friend McLain that accurately spells out a lot that I've been wanting to say for the past few months. So read it.

Yay summer but even more yay is FALL!! I can't express how happy I am that the weather is cooling and football is back on. Even if that means that first bell starts tomorrow. Happy buckeye season!