The Summer List for 2013

It’s time for my annual summer list, the list I make every summer of things I want to make a point to do during the course of the summer. My lists for 2011 and for 2012 have included everything from pitchers of pink lemonade to full days spent on a tube in the Atlantic. Each year’s new list is meant to supplement the old lists; in fact, I still also try to accomplish as many things on the old lists each summer as possible. Without further ado then, here are my new must-dos for the summer of 2013.

1. Opera in the Backyard

Some day, I’m going to grab a blanket, spread out on my lawn, and listen to opera music. I’m not a huge opera fan, but I do enjoy it from time to time. This must-do will be somewhat challenged by my latest random fear, that while I’m lying there, eyes closed, an otter will come up from the salt marsh and accidentally walk across my face. You know, because I know so many people who have had that happen to them. Seriously, I don’t know how that image came to mind, but now that it has, this will prove a challenge, because lying there waiting for the face-crossing will clearly defeat the whole purpose of the activity. Ultimately, I LCB may have to pitch a tent with very secure zippers in our yard to bring this one to fruition.

2. Waffle Cones

This one has two parts.

I had my first waffle cone as a child in Estes Park, Colorado, lo these many years ago. As an adult, most of my ice cream consumption takes place at home, and is served in a bowl. However, in my first Summer List I mentioned that I like to buy a pack of cones once a summer as a splurge. Lately, I’ve been noticing these packs of waffle cones in the grocery stores, so I think I’m going to try one of those packs as a variation.

Secondly, I am a connoisseur of Wendy’s Chocolate Frosties. To give this relationship some quantitative perspective using an oft-wished-for hypothetical, if someone offered me a free frosty every day for the rest of my life, I’d take it. I’d be ecstatic. Excepting days where I was struck by the bubonic plague or some mutated version of the bird flu, I would not want to share my free daily frosty with my offspring or the love of my life. I might do it under some weird sense of obligation or if someone threw the golden rule all up in my face or whatever. But I wouldn’t be all excited about it or anything.

Anyway, all that is to say that I want to try the new Wendy’s waffle cone frosties this summer.

It’s the small things that lead to big hips, folks.

Interesting trivia here: The Wendy’s frosty has its own Facebook fan page.

3. A Lantern

I want to walk around my yard with at night with a lantern.

You heard me correctly.

Somehow, I have this image of myself walking barefoot at night, with a long white dress trailing behind me in the breeze, going about my business throughout the yard. Since we have virtually no yard and since I don’t garden, in truth I really have no legitimate business there. But I could pretend. It just sounds so…I don’t know, interesting, so different from my life now. It sounds like I stepped fresh from the pages of a literary work written during the Romantic period, minus the crazy woman locked up in the attic who’ll at any moment burn down the house, or dying on the boat ride to Camelot, or any other such inconveniences.

Never mind that my yard quickly becomes marsh, a place I’d never venture in barefoot at night. Never mind that I don’t have a long white dress. I’m going to walk across my little square of grass in my t-shirt and cutoffs, lantern in hand, and just pretend that my life has a mildly exotic quality to it. It’ll be kind of like drinking your Ensure Clinical Strength out of a wine glass or serving yourself your laxative on a silver platter, you know?

4. Roll in the Sand

My son, the one without inhibitions, loves to roll across the beach. It’s almost a method of traveling with him. Watching him do it makes me want to give it a whirl. Here’s my only problem. The beaches are really crowded during the summer, and this is after all a summer list, so completing it during the allotted time frame guarantees many witnesses.

I’m not sure how I feel about a great host of witnesses observing my beach roll. We shall see. Or should I say they shall?

5. Make Homemade Granola

Recently, one of my blog friends, Mia at Modern Mia Gardening, shared a recipe for homemade granola on Facebook. This got me thinking. I love granola, and I’m 99% sure I’ve never made my own before. (I say 99% because, whether because of age or three babies or both, the memory’s not quite what it used to be. Many of y’all know what I’m saying here.) This seems stupid on my part, so I aim to change it. Thanks, Mia!

6. An Outdoor Foot Soak

It’s been a long, long time since I’ve indulged in a foot soak. My last clear memory of one was when I was pregnant with my second child, and my toddler thought it was great fun to jump in the foot bath along with me and splash to the high heavens, thus erasing the relaxing aspect of the soak. However, the small people are, well, increasingly less small these days. The downside is this means food and clothing costs have gone up precipitously. The upside? I’m thinking none of them will immediately try to jump in my foot bath. Therefore, some night this summer, I’m going to sit and watch the sunset over the marsh while soaking my feet.

I always love hearing what your must-dos for summer are, so give me a holler!