How I Spent the Last Day of Summer Vacation

Does anyone remember how when we got back to school we had to write those essays on how we spent our summer vacation?  To make this assignment modern, I am going to write a blog post on how I spent the last day of my kid’s summer vacation before they start school on Monday.

We started the morning with the my two youngest (there was no way my oldest the teenager was going to wake up early on the last day of her summer vacation) and I heading down to the Real Pirates exhibit at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science (see picture below).  It is the final weekend and we have talked about going all summer long so we finally did it.  Put together by National Geographic, it is of course well done telling a great story. It does a great job of showcasing the artifacts and providing a multimedia experience with video, hands-on exhibits, and even a live actor pirate crewmember.  Beyond just another ride on the Pirates of Caribbean at Disneyland or watching Johnny Depp stumble around in the movies of the same name, this exhibit covered all aspects of a pirate’s life from why various people were motivated to become pirates to the fact that they actually had a very open, ethnically diverse, democratically governed society.  Some of the folks in Congress could probably learn about the mutual good from the pirates since both of them ultimately are after plunder most of the time.

The Real Pirates Leave Denver This Weekend

Spending all of that time learning about the high seas made us antsy to get on the water so in the afternoon we talked about going stand-up paddle boarding.  While the threat of and afternoon thunderstorm that never came kept us home, I at least used that motivation to promote the Save Chatfield Facebook cause page I talked about a little bit more so the afternoon was not completely wasted (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Save-Chatfield/211376865577886).

Monday will mark the change of seasons in our household with our three kids now at three schools, while my wife works at a fourth, instead of having two of the kids and my wife all at the same school.  So as a preemptive strike, I bought my wife flowers knowing that the back to school fun is about to begin.