Summers are for being bored and free ($$). (Only on the afternoons you don't have class/work/internships.) Because if you're like me, you need to save your money up this summer for things of the future, like growing up and traveling and continuing your education. Some of these ideas might cost some $$, but less $$ than it'd cost to.. say.. go to Wet n' Wild water park for the day or.. rent a beach house. I don't know. But I decided I'm allowed to spend a few bucks here and there as long as it's not on beer.
Put cool barrettes in your hair
Pull sweaty hair back out of your face with no effort and still look put together from the back.
These starfish barrettes are from etsy.com. While they are precious, I just said I didn't want to spend any money, so I'm going to go rummage through old drawers in my mom's house in search of those plastic snap kind from '96 instead.
Make a picnic
Yea this picnic is a joke. I bet they have fake scones on those Pottery Barn plates, too. But you don't have to have lacy throw pillows and billowing sheets hanging from trees to make a picnic adorable and delicious. If you have one of those wooden woven baskets with a checkered table cloth in it- that's awesome. But if not, I think those reusable grocery bags from Harris Teeter or Trader Joe's work pretty good. Basically bring cheese, Ritz crackers, strawberries, french bread and spicy hummus, cold asparagus with a container of melted lemon butter for dipping, tortilla chips and guacamole, and anything else berry-like or having to do with dipping. Also friends that play guitars or ukuleles so you can have strumming and sing-a-longs for dessert.
Get ice cream
It's different than scooping yourself a bowl from the pint in your freezer. 1, you have the option of getting a cone. 2, you can sample all the other flavors before you order the kind you knew you were going to get all along. Get off your couch and pay someone else 5 bucks to do the scooping so you can do the licking and showing off of the sailor outfit you put on this morning.
Wear sweatshirts with shorts
Like when you're in England in July and you're wearing flip flops and shorts thinking it'd be hot like summer in Chapel Hill, but really it's 50 degrees and rainy and you're wearing flip flops and shorts and there's no hiding you're American.
Ride bikes
This actually used to be something to do before cell phones and driver's licenses. It was like -"Hey can you play? Ok wanna ride bikes?" And then you'd go wheel over to your friends and take the adventure from there. Something about hipsters and beach bikes and 2011 has made riding bikes cool again, but I think even still the activity is underrated. You don't have to go anywhere, you can just cruise around a close-by parking lot, and you certainly don't need to go anywhere that takes you down hills -unless you have calves that will take you back up- But there's almost no argument I can think of for why you shouldn't. It's free and fun, and, well, that's all you should really be concerned about in the summer anyways.
Pick flowers from people's yards and arrange a bouquet
You might get yelled at because I'm pretty sure this is illegal, but there are tons of great flowers blooming around Chapel Hill right now, and every time I pass by a little garden of colorful ones, I always want to snatch one. Do this until you get a good sized handful of stems and design a summery bouquet for your house. I guess if you find long stems, you could put them inside your rainboots near the front door like this idea from Funky Junk Interiors. Or just use a rinsed out jelly jar. Or any vase-type container. I just think glass looks best, because you can see the water and the stems sitting in it. I have this empty glass bottle of linseed oil that comes to mind. If you get a bunch of glass bottles of different shapes and sizes, you could create a series of bouquets and line them up in a varied pattern. Yea, that'd be cool.
