Skip to main content

Wait a Minute, Let's Celebrate Summer!

As most of my friends and family know, I'm not a fan of summer. I'm not a fan of Florida Summer is maybe more accurate. It's hot. It's sticky. The dog can't walk between 7am and 8pm with his 10lbs of fur... We gotta close all our blinds to keep the apartment cooler... It's a challenging time for me.

But the other day, during a good old beach day with franz, some stranger offered us watermelon. This watermelon turned around my summer brain. I realized we need to milk summer for all it's worth and learn to love it for what it is before it's over.

"Dylan! We gotta celebrate summer! With watermelons! And pina coladas!" (I've never even cared for watermelons that much with all other fruit options available, but with it's juicy coolness as well as its summer-food stereotype, it won me over). I went on brainstorming what things make summer summer to come up with hot dogs, lemonade, fruity salads...

We gotta swim in the pool and dip in the ocean... Sit on the beach (under an umbrella) and take out the old kayaks that are covered with bugs and branches and at least see how far we can go before the blue one takes on too much water.

So that I actually did this morning. I lathered up with sunscreen, popped on a hat, sunglasses and a shirt (going out at the beach is much different than my 18 year old self. No skin cancer, please) and dragged that hunker kayak across the street and onto the beach for a nice little paddle.

Things that are making it more bearable: hat and sunscreen (I don't know why I'm JUST now discovering the wonders of wearing a hat), umbrellas on the beach, taking water on every walk and even driving to shadier neighborhoods to walk there, iced coffees, and cold showers.

Time to make myself like summer for what it is. What are some of your favorite things about this steamy season that would add to my enjoyment?


All my pictures are of the dog lately so here ya go.



 Oh hey! It's not Hobie!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

2023 in Review (Plus 2020-2022, oops)

I am super bummed to realize that I haven't done a yearly review/highlights since 2019! That's FOUR YEARS ago! Pre covid, pre Oregon, pre master's degree, pre return to Florida, pre a million babies being born... So much has changed! It's always to nice to sit back and look at all that happens in a year too.  It's now February. I started this post in December and was about to go and try to edit and make it all fancy with links to other posts and all kinds of cool things.... I'm sure there are some mistakes even with the years, things left out... but progress over perfection right? We're just going posting it in 3...2...1... Have fun!  2023   1. Bike bike biking everywhere. To the Grom for tasty lunch treats, Indian almost every week, grocery shopping, to the gym, just to bike around in the sun. It's been great!   2. All the babies came: Lowey-Balls, Krupkas, Bakers, neighbor friends x2, Sarkissians, and even more to come!  3. Finally got the best job wit

Things I Learned This Weekend

1. Throwing away pictures quickly turns into hours of laughing at old selves and bringing back so many memories. High school friends and I have often wondered what we did in high school since we weren't the typical partying teens. After this picture raid, I realized... we took pictures. In dressing rooms, walmart, cars, kitchen islands...  2. My parents are awesome. I didn't learn this this weekend but it was definitely reinforced. They are just such dedicated, good people. We're also surrounded by some amazingly supportive friends.  3. My dad is so cool. I mean really... Cool guy on the right... Can he get any more awesome? Not to mention that crazy guy on the left, aka Uncle Dennis. I never did get a straight answer about whether he dressed like that on the reg or not. So was that a regular occurrence, Dennis?! ;) 4. Sleepy babies are one of the sweetest things to see.  5. Having adult conversations with toddlers is so amusing to me. Brooks and I dis

Opposite Ends (Atlantic to Pacific)

It's been over a year since being back in Florida. I started thinking of some of these comparisons shortly after returning, but now I have even more to add. And it's more comparing the Oregon Coast to this area, of course. If you're new here, we were in Pacific City, OR a little old town of ~1000 people. Now we're in Atlantic Beach, FL.  1. The amount of laundry. I'd say 3 shirts a day in the summer is typical for this Florida heat and humidity. Go for a morning walk, change shirts...  Plant some flowers. Gotta change... Workout, definitely change. Shower, dog walk-- one more change before the night's done.  2. The bank and post office are open on Saturdays here! And restaurants don't close for the winter.  3. Florida neighborhood strolls: Seeing 10+ humans on every walk compared to often only 0. I love the community here! Lovely neighbors, gym rats, baristas. Even my parents! The Padres moved 40 minutes away vs 2.5! Yahoo! Pacific City was just so empty. On