So the summer will soon be a memory, the days will shorten to what feels like 93 minutes and I’ll be phoning the doctor to refill my happy pills.
To celebrate, I’ll be picking up a new read from the library, visiting with friends tonight, watching my daughter chase lightning bugs and sipping wine in the backyard to ease myself into August.
I’ve been buying up loads of fresh summer fruit to simply cut them into squares for tossing into a bowl together. Makes a two-year-old squeal with delight. THE COLOR! THE SWEETNESS!
Or when I’m feeling especially domesticated, I’ll even take that gnatty, rotting banana from the bowl and mix it up with a bag of banana bread. Apron optional.
I am going to the beach, many miles from my home next week with most of my extended family. My plans are as such:
watch the sunset along the horizon
take photos
collect shells
eat new foods
absorb inspiration through my barefooted feet
share the joy of taking a break from our regular routine with my daughter
wear flippy flops, every day
medicate myself when it’s time to make the return trip to landlocked Indiana
Happy Independence Day, everyone. You are my lucky stars.
We like to be outside.
Swinging, planting, swimming, walking, sitting and talking.
Whichever, really; as long as we’re together.
My daughter and I often begin and end our warm weather days by sitting in the yard reading books (she is suddenly into French books, go figure), talking about nature (‘Mommy! I know where mulch comes from!) and snacking on popsicles (banana, mostly, because they are the BEST EVER CREATED). Our dogs frequently find their way into the part that includes the snacking. There’s Stormy in the background on her back, chewing on a stick and generally just being a summer dog.
Oh, and this dog doesn’t smell, at all; which is so foreign to me I’m beginning to believe that she must be another species, considering my last few canines sponged up every possible foul odor imaginable and lovingly shared that aromatic swampy scent on sheets and car interiors all year long.
So she does get high marks from me in that category, but not so much in the Not Pissing in the Dining Room column.
We’ll work on her.
I figured since I’m feeling uncharacteristically chatty, I’d share some photos from my own yard that I shot today. This is just one example of why this is the greatest of all seasons. Divine, rich color.
Enjoy.
This is our much-loved German Shepherd/Husky pound dog, Natasha.
We adopted her in 1998 from our local Humane Society and she has been with us long enough to see two other dogs, um, come and go, if you will. I had always thought that she had still retained many of the endearing puppy qualities until our new dog, Thunderstorm, came to live with us (aptly named by my two-year-old, who both fears and adores the unpredictable weather of our midwestern spring season). She is a Great Dane/German Shepherd mix who we brought home from the shelter 16 days ago.
We call her Stormy and talk daily of the Storm Report (how she disembowels Rosemary’s stuffed toys, pees in the basement, sleeps on the couch, pulls newly hatched birds from their nests to throw around the yard and other lovely things that young dogs do when left alone before they are taught the abc’s of coexisting with humans in a home with a mortgage).
So in other words, she fits in nicely.
Enter my fave time of the year.
Hot. Humid. Heavenly.
Dayreaming of outfitting a summer cottage with a long garden path through a winding bank of maple trees. All airy with whites, spindly furniture, old nautical finds, and framed magazine clippings.
How are you?
I had driven by the same home improvement store and wearily side-eyed their garden center from the artificial warmth of my Jeep Cherokee for the last 4 weeks while driving to and from daycare each day.
Waiting.
Waiting.
Hoping.
Today is that lucky day.
Pansies.
My much-anticipated and beloved marker of warmer weather. This morning I feverishly planted the entire flat of a light purple variety (they were out of the purple/red, my favorite) in front of the store and then performed the ceremonious giving of the middle finger to the crap days of winter.
Adios, it’s been real.
