Saturday, July 23, 2011

Summer in Texas

I love the summertime! My backyard fills with hummingbirds and squirrels, my dogs run around like they are crazy, and the weather gets, ahem, warm. If you have never experienced the joy of "Summer in Texas", you should try it once. However, if you can't get to the Lone Star State this summer, here is how you can live the dream that is the Central Texas summer:

First, go purchase a heat lamp. You want the biggest one you can find. Set it up in your kitchen next to the stove (you'll understand why soon). Position it up high so that it's light covers your entire kitchen floor, with the exception of a 2 x 2 foot square of "shade" for you to stand in.

Next, you need to procur about 10 hair dryers. Mount them on your kitchen walls so that they point in all directions. Set the fan speed to high on some, low on others, but make sure the temperature on all of them is "hot". Now turn them on.

Third step: the oven! Find the highest temperature you can set your oven to and turn it on. It really helps if you have a convection style oven so that you can use that fan to really pump the heat out into the room. Make sure that any potential sources of water are completely turned off, because we wouldn't want a hint of moisture to offer you relief.

Now, set your family up in a room that is a couple of rooms away from the kitchen. Make sure that the temperature in that room will not exceed 76 degrees. Give them comfy places to sit, a nice beverage, the works. We will call these your "friends who live in places north of Kansas".

Your kitchen should be ready, so go on in and just try to do some regular daily activities.  Every now and then give yourself a "break" by stepping into your safe zone of shade.  I would tell you to enjoy the breeze from the hair dryers, but hot air swirling in all directions does nothing more than mess up your hair and make you stabby, doesn't it? 


If you still have any calm feelings in your heart, just call into the room that your family is in, and make sure you speak to the person who is "just burning up in this 76-degree heat" and see how much peace you can muster then. 

Yep.  That is summer in Texas.  And, lest you all think that I don't love my new home state, I will make sure to post in December about "winter in Texas".  It is why I make it through each July and August! 

Well, the winters, and working on Christmas cards like this one during the hot summer months: 
Card from my "Christmas in July" class


I hope you all are having a great time this summer.  Stay cool, and come make a card with me!


2 comments:

Alice said...

Most of the US has been like summer in Texas this week -- too hot to move around. I'll be in San Antonio next July for a convention -- thanks (?) for the preview!

leslie (crookedstamper) said...

I hear you, although adding moisture to that air will NOT make it any cooler. It will just make your clothes stick to you when you step outside. It's so humid here in DC your sweat won't evaporate and people are keeling over. Seriously.

But no, I don't want to be in TX in the summer. Thanks, anyway. :)