Yeeehaaaa!! What a ride! We’ve been stateside for nearly two weeks now and just as every other time we return, we find ourselves flooded like low water crossings with emotions big as Texas. Elation, nostalgia, disbelief, joy, overwhelm and utter contentment are all wrapped up in one glorious mess of year-older kids, favorite foods craved all year, bear hugs held lusciously long, frigid swimming holes, fresh fish fries and enough car time between all the lovin’ to keep me from thinking the whole thing a midsummer dream.

I never thought I’d say it, but whatever it is trapped between July-baked Bermuda and canopies of half-wilted live oaks is one of the most soul satisfying smells I know. The cicadas’ deafening song, the likelihood of chiggers in unkempt grass, the spilling over of fire ants from soft mounds of sandy loam? Familiarity — however biting — proves more valuable every year we’re away. Give me a cypress banked river, more snacks than dripping requesters and a handpicked mess of Texans, and heaven is apparently mine.

Here’s to soaking in summer wherever it bathes you! Sending love from deep in the heart.

1. a blessing circle

2. we’ll miss you, Kim

3. speckled trout, happy fishermen and more maritime memories

4. road trip home from the coast

5. out with the old, slowly

6. evolution in the making

7. faces of the fourth

8. mixed use pool

9. inside the cozy cruiser

10. morning on a favorite screened porch

11. my friend

12. my girl

13. Jester King Brewery

14. Stanley’s Farmhouse Pizza

15. good friends: the Fustes Four

16. open-walled barn turned mess hall

17. more of my Peeples

18. friends since birth in a ring around the baby

*To all you Austinites: I highly recommend our friends’ new eatery and brew pub just west of Austin. Jester King and Stanley’s Farmhouse Pizza are true gems of the hill country (situated right together with a giant, open-aired mess hall alongside them) and perfect for laid-back, fun lovin’ families.