I haven’t been updating my blog for a little while now….sorry for being a blog slacker. I tend to be real busy during summer….when the sun is out, when the sky is cloud-free and oh so blue, and when the temperature is just perfect to my liking. I always thought that why waste being indoor, glued to your TV screen, and do nothing but couch potatoing -- if you can bask and enjoy the sun outside? There’s actually so many things you can do in the summer. Though there are also occasions that the temperature and humidity is just too hot to handle, I just try to meet those cooling needs the best that I possibly can. For instance, last week, it has been a real sticky, scorching hot days and nights for me and my family. And while it has been fun for some, it’s a bit unbearable and uncomfortable to others…I would say, we gotta enjoy the sun while it is still out there and while it is still literally closer to the Northern Hemisphere …I don't have real issues embracing the heat, I can totally handle the humid. I love summer. I love its sunshine and shade. I love its brightness and the happiness it can give me!
Summer, summer, summer ---ice creams, and sweet dreams, palm trees and ocean breeze, salty air and sun-kissed hair...summer, you are so sweet and so divine. Yes, we suffer a little bit but we really really like it!
To me, summer is one of the most beautiful words in english language. Nothing beats a summer afternoon, where I can lie on the grass and watch the clouds slowly floats across the sky or listen to the gentle humming of water by the river that runs through it, where I can see people jog, bike, brisk, and stroll with their love ones, including their very precious chihuahua dog. On summer late afternoons, I can smell the nicely done bbq’s on the neighbourhood, where I can smell the garden fragrance of pink roses, of the lush blooms of lavender, and the freshly picked peaches, blueberries and cherries …and I can hear the carefree children playing noisily outside....which reminds me a lot of my happy summer childhood memories in my small barrio of Santa Cruz…Oh you don’t have any idea how I love this season! It brings so much joy to me, even its ordinary days of delightful idleness, or some of its rare moments simply gaping at the beauty of our nature…the vast creation of our Creator.The other day, when I was photo shooting and practicing my SLR aperture setting, and while I was so absorbed trying to achieve a ‘bokeh’ effect, carefully following a perfect combination of ISO, shutter speed and the DOF in manual focus, a sizeable spider in bright orange colour and a bug of some sort caught my eyes. I excitedly took about a dozen of shots with different angles, zooming and white balance exposures. But then, I started to notice too that the leaves around me has started to yellow already, our backyard grass are half covered with withered leaves and some of the leaves up on the trees has started to turn into unappealing browns………With much disappointment and silent dismay, a slight pang of panic and a heave of sigh, I told myself weakly …..Oh no!…It’s the end of summer! Where have all the whole 90 sweet-summer days had gone?
Life is so good! PTL! I guess, it was a pretty good summer after all, we did a lot of fun things this year. We watched the celebration of lights fireworks festival, we went to night market and enjoyed authentic oriental food on the street, camping with close friends, we checked out vintage and antique boutiques, we visited beautiful gardens in the island, immensely enjoyed the seafood there! We had couple of picnics by the lake, the kids did a lot of biking and went swimming, had couple of trail walking, we went to movies, and we watched a Sting concert and a symphony. We also had lots of late nights TV comedy shows, played scrabble and even learned to play cards with the kids. We had the opprtunity to attend a friend’s 50th birthday bash, had a couple of girls’ night outs, tried out new cafes, I've read few ‘easy-read’ books, and my favorite of all --- watched sunsets, which is for sure is always at the top of my list.
Seriously….we truly had an amazing summer vacation even we did not have the chance to go away for a trip. Not to mention I had a chance to spend some lovely bonding time with my niece who came to visit me from Florida and a cousin and her family from Alberta. We did shorter trips though just within BC and its lower mainlands. And one can never go wrong to “staycation” and enjoy the beautiful British Columbia. I didn’t take as many pictures as last year though. I thought, I just wanted to be “in the moment” a bit more and just enjoy myself. Sometimes it is hard to relax when you are standing up and snapping away. I did take about more than 500-600 photos which is just half as many as last year and still I have not found enough time to organize and pick out my favourites.
Overall? It was not a bad summer vacation at all! Though I am not ready for it to end yet, but ready or not, the weather has to sizzle down, the season has to end, to prepare for the next one…
