A Perfect Summer

That Krazy Kat kinda woman of Mama's Losin' it  has some really great post ideas.  Recently, she asked what is your idea of the perfect summer?  I'll attempt to bottle the response here.

Lake Michigan waves

msu.edu

For the past four or so years,  summer isn't complete until we've visited a good friend of ours who lives near Lake Michigan.  Big Sister and Fuzzy were fish in former lives, and the visit isn't complete until we've spent an afternoon getting buffetted about by the crashing waves of Lake Michigan. 

One huge wave will completely soak you, so no fears about getting used to the water by degrees - pristine beaches and beautiful weather make this a "can't miss" every summer.

grillingconcepts.com

Grilling makes for a perfect summer, especially since I don't have to do it.  Not that I'm the head chef in our house, anyway - I'm chief bottle washer and assistant to the chef, Hubby.  It doesn't matter if he's grilling hotdogs, steak, or fish - it all tastes gourmet and it means less clean-up for the chief bottle washer (me).  Plus, it smells sooooooo good!  Vegetables on the grill are absolutely yummy as well. Toss in a salad and here's dinner.  The year we got the new grill though, the kids were so tired of grilled food - they complained, "Oh no! Is daddy grilling again?" as if it were a fate worse than death.  Well, they've gotten over that.

raspberryrunner.wordpress.com

Gardening is another thing that makes summer complete. It just isn't summer until you've got a garden.  We always end up with too many tomato plants, but that makes it fun to play "tomato fairy" in the neighborhood.  You take your extra tomatoes and line them up on the neighbors' porches.  I haven't had any returned to me, yet.  Herbs, spinach, beets, zuchini - those are among the favorites we plant at my house.  Leave room for flowers, too. Nothing wrong with mixing up the veggies with a few sunflowers.

fromoldbooks.org

Summer isn't perfect until we've spent part of it at the local library.  As a kid, my siblings and I spent many a day going to the library - sometimes a couple of days in a row.  Avid and voracious readers, we'd walk home with stacks of books weighing our arms down, and stay up all night reading them.  It's a sure sign summer is over, and school about to start, when there is less time for reading.  Sad, but true. I resolve to find more time for reading, though. Even if I have to pretend my clock has 8 more hours than everyone else's.  

iguide.travl

I know summer storms can be dangerous and deadly, but it just isn't summer unless you've been through a few thunderstorm warnings and watches.  Even a gentle summer rain is a wonderful thing to make summer complete. My yard, which strongly resembles a Triscuit, would agree.  There's nothing like rain in the summer to break the heat and send refreshing waves of coolness through your skin, or - maintain the heat and turn your yard and garden into a sauna of flora and fauna.  If the conditions are right, it's nice to get caught in a summer rain, or to open your windows and let that cool air breeze through and clean away the closed-in staleness we so often experience with air conditioning.

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Kids on bikes is a sure sign that summer is here.  Packs of kids riding six abreast down the road, or a kid riding solo - whatever the formation, when the bikes come out - summer is here.

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There are no Dairy Queens where I live - unless you count me, personally. Where I used to live, we had one of these places to go and indulge our need for softserve ice cream.  When we were kids, and we traveled northward, that's when we'd see the Dairy Queens. They were only open in the spring, and would close in the fall, after the tourist season was over.  Even though I don't get to the Dairy Queen too often anymore, it's a sure sign of summer when the Diary Queen is open. Time for a Blizzard!

What are the things that spell summer for you?