Ending the summer

It feels like the last week of summer to me. By next week it will already be Ramadan, inshAllah, and we'll be getting back into education routines.
For now we are squeezing the last out of our summer break. I've been busily trying to give the garden another overhaul, doing things like trimming the conifer hedge, sowing grass seed over the bare earth patches, clearing the tangle that was the right side border and fixing up the tumbled over rosemary bush.
Yesterday we spent the day visiting friends, spending hours and hours of the afternoon out in a park. I feel satisfied when I see the children playing for hours outside with their friends. That is what a summer break is for, along with bike riding, football, cricket and walks.
We returned home late in the evening, which must have confused the electricity meter cupboard spider, as it had decided to venture out into the quietness of the house. It was a particularly huge spider, which I had noticed often sneaking behind the phone directories in the meter cupboard. In any case, it was a risky adventure to come out, as it is now safely inside the Dyson.
In the mornings I'm reading aloud from a book about Ramadan, to remind ourselves of the details about the coming month and to get us into the right frame of mind for it, inshAllah.