Ah, Summer...

If I had it to do over again, I would seriously consider becoming a meteorologist. I’m obsessed with the weather. I watch the local weather report during The Today Show every morning, and I check weather.com and The Weather Channel every night before I go to bed. When my sister and I were little we used to quietly make fun of my grandma’s husband for watching The Weather Channel ALL DAY LONG; now I’m only a little embarrassed to admit I could very easily do the same thing. (Or I could if I didn’t have a husband, two kids, and two houses to take care of.)

In addition to being obsessed with knowing what the weather will be, I also really like weather itself. I love splashing in puddles during cool, spring rains. I love playing at the swimming pool on sunny, summer afternoons. I love picking apples and pumpkins on crisp, autumn mornings. And I love – as hard as it might be to believe – bundling up and playing outside after snowstorms during the cold, winter months.

Playing in the rain.

Splashing in the pool.

Picking pumpkins and apples.

Snowball fight!

Snow angels.

Trouble grasping the correlation between mittens and cold hands.

But I don’t love – can’t stand, actually – heat, humidity, and wind. And do you know what the weather is like in Texas? Do you? It’s HOT and HUMID and WINDY. As I type this post, the temperature outside is rapidly climbing toward today’s record high of 105 degrees and the wind is blowing so hard that my son’s basketball hoop just crashed over on the back deck. Goody.

And to make matters worse, we’re moving this summer, at the end of July to be exact. I’m super excited about doing loads of work on our new house and yard, clearing out and cleaning up our rental house and yard, and moving all of our belongings across town in 100+ degree weather. I’m also super excited about paying for air conditioning in two houses during two of the three hottest months of the year. (Through the end of July we are still under contract with our rental house, but as of the end of May we own the new house. And yes, I turn off the air conditioning when I’m not in the houses, but there will be times when Tom’s working at one house and I’m working at the other and both systems will be running.)

In Madison, Wisconsin, where I grew up, summer temperatures often climb into the upper 80’s and even the low 90’s, and because Madison is home to multiple lakes, the humidity is fairly high as well. I thought summers were rough in Madison, but I know now that “Wisconsin Erin” knew nothing of what it means to experience a rough summer. “Texas Erin” doesn’t actually know what it means to experience a rough summer either though, because it’s only June. Summer and I have never been friends, and I’m pretty sure that by August we’ll enemies.

So in a nutshell, spring in Texas is hot, and summer in Texas is going to be hotter. Too hot for this Midwestern Girl. Bet y’all want to come visit us now, don’t ya?!