slowing down for summer

**canadian gardener** · 07-10-2005, 09:58 PM

taking time to smell the flowers.

What do you do to slow down, unwind, destress, and make your life more relaxed?

It's summer time and the living should be easier, slower. More flower sniffing, rasberry picking, porch swing sitting, listening to jazz or other mellow sounds, sipping lemonaide, chatting with friends, reading books.

Porch life!

So how do YOU bring back the feel of an old time porch and the lazy hazy days of summer?

I have been sitting on my porch, with some jazz playing softly in the background, reading and sipping water with ice cubes in it. It's been a bit rainy but some other things that contribute are

not watching the news too often. Catching the headlines in print is bad enough. taking a newsbreak is fine and the world still wags.

getting some books and magazines out of the library. Some libraries also loan out movies and music CDs. Free entertainment.

I've been calling up friends for a catch up visit and if they live in the area, inviting them for afternoon tea.

using the bbq. Marinated meat is lovely. So are fresh raw veggies (rinse and cut up) and fresh fruit for dessert (watermelon, strawberries, cherry season is upon us!!!)

Organic prewashed salad mix and leftover meat for lunches, cold cereal or hm waffles/pancakes are easy breakfasts. Nuts for snacks. I'm not cooking much at all and what there is, fits onto the Bbq a lot of the time.

Having a glass of wine in the evening with my dh as we read.

Watching the sunset.

Picking rasberries in the garden and eating most of what I pick.

Weeding in the cool of the early morning.

Watching the birds in my spruce tree and in my garden.

Share your favourites and let this thread inspire us all to slow down, relax and appreciate summer. This summer won't come again, it's gone too soon, so enjoy it while it lasts.

**homesteadmamma** · 07-10-2005, 10:14 PM

We've been forced to slow down the past couple days. With our temps at +34C and 100% humidity, you don't do much.

However I do take time to slow down by:

~reading late into the night when all is quiet in my home
~not watching the late night news. Your right the world doesn't end because we don't watch the news.
~catching up on phone calls.

~going out for an ice cream cone when we fancy one. Its 24 mins. to the ice cream stand but oh so worth it.
~going for a drive through the back roads
~picking roses and bringing them into the house

~I'm not cooking much at all either. My slowcooker does most of the work. I'm not even baking bread this summer.

~playing Yahtzee with dh and the kids. What fun we have breaking the rules and making up our own.

~eating fresh strawberries by the handfulls.

**PrairieRose** · 07-10-2005, 10:59 PM

We haven't really slowed down much yet due to working on our house BUT we have managed to squeek out a few afternoons lounging around the pool in the heat and yes the sun.....having a margarita in the shade afterwards followed by a nap.

under the air conditioner. Those days have been bliss for us. Otherwise we've been doing more with friends, cooking out lots more, eating fresh veggies from the garden....this one thing makes it seem like summer to me. I love summer, I wish it would never end.