Summer Fling

My apologies for not posting in a very long while. Unfortunately, I haven’t been well. Being sick can feel like a full time job sometimes. It goes on and on for days seemingly without an end. But I am back, if you’ll have me.

Despite my ailments, I have been allowing the summer to romance me. From beautiful mystic summer storms that rage through the night and strike my senses like lightening to overly heated days that simply make you melt, summer is a dazzle of beauty, passion and romantic feelings.

I have now begun to enjoy it, taking walks to hillsides that overlook the cityscape and lavishing attention on friends I haven’t seen in a while. I love the summer. It’s a wonder for the senses. The colors are so vibrant they’re almost blinding. The streets are paved with aromas, sweet, spicy, others hard to describe.

Nature and I fall in love from now until November and oh what a love affair. We can’t seem to get enough of each other. I want to be outside everyday, even on rainy days…especially on rainy days. I want to wrap summer all around me until we feel like one.

For all the romantics, summer is a season to fall in love.

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Oolong tea setting

My mother was given a tea calendar this year, that has beautiful tea set ups and teas of the month. This inspired my tea loving family to create tea settings and parties based on the tea of the month in the calendar. For January, we steeped a bag of oolong tea and were transported to misty river banks of Shanghai. Chicken spring rolls were paired with the tea, to mimic the tea setting in the calendar.

The tea pot was given to my mother as a gift and as beautiful as it is, I found it challenging to pour the tea due to it’s shape. Unlike other teapots, it sits low to the table and does not have one large handle, but rather two little ones on either side. It’s not the best teapot if you’re clumsy like myself, but the rich deep red color is perfect for this Asian pot and makes one instantly think of China. This setting would be perfect for Chinese new year.

January was a long and painful one for myself, but through it I managed to make days that reminded me just how lovely and delicious life is. In addition to drinking I watched, When a wolf falls in love with a sheep It is a Taiwanese movie about a young man who is suddenly left by his gf, but tries to remain hopeful that she will return and in the meantime tries to do good deeds and cheer up a woman who meets through his work. It wasn’t the most exciting movie, but it was sweet.

Midnight Milkshake/Smoothie

There is no better time to eat than at the stoke of midnight. Everything tastes better when the sun has set and the sky is scattered with stars. But often times, I do not want to eat a heavy meal. In those moments, I make a midnight shake.

1 banana

1/2 raspberries

1 vanilia frozen yoghurt popcicle

1 cup coconut milk

3 strawberries

A date with Dracula

Red tea is transferred from pot to cup. I have come to have tea with the lover of Red himself, Dracula. Tea, cake, and mystery is what I feast on that evening as I read “Dracula, my love” by Syrie James. I won’t go into any kind of review yet because I am only half way through but as someone who has always felt that vampires were the most romantic of the supernatural creatures, I am always intrigued by tales of these blood suckers, and thus invited dear old Dracula to have tea with me.

The tea of my choice is cherry snow cone by David’s tea. Like the name would suggest it is a sweet blend with the aroma and flavor of cherries coming out strongly. It is perfect for a snowy day, because while it does hold flavours of summer, there is something cool about it. Cool, like the dead unbeating  heart of Dracula but is a beautiful redish pink color like the blood he hunts.

It is a wonderful tea to sip while delving into the journal of Mina Harker as she details the events between her and her undead lover.

 

A strange romantic habit

Once a week I watch Breakfast at Tiffany’s. I’ve been doing it for years. Well, to be honest, it isn’t always once a week some months I only watch it once or twice. But I watch it so routinely it’s almost the equivalent to my breakfast. I don’t know when it started; oh wait, I do…it started when my illness began to get worse and I found it made everything better…like tiffany’s…the store.

Have you ever been to Tiffany’s? I love it there. The people are always so nice. I’m getting off track. Forgive me. So around the time my illness began to worsen I started watching this movie habitually. And no matter how times I’ve watched it, it always feels like the first time.

It’s the kind of movie I can lose myself to, and yet, if I like, I can leave playing in the background while I do other things. I don’t only watch it when I’m sick. In fact, I watch it more when I’m not, or at least less sick. It’s like a treat. Sort of like having your favorite dessert, or sneaking off to a secret date. It’s just a lovely time. I often watch it in the morning or afternoon, when I can sip coffee or tea and eat pastry or cake, or waffles, or whatever I feel like. I eat and watch and laugh, sometimes I even cry a little.

I always find it interesting that people use this movie to depict Audrey’s fashion status. Oh it’s a fashionable movie, and it is romantic, but it’s really quite sad. And it isn’t quite as fashionable as Funny Face or Sabrina, which Audrey Hepburn also stars in. But I think people can relate to it or at least the idea of it–this being a person who dresses up themselves or their own lives to distract from the ugly bits.

It’s like going out partying when you’re so sad you could cry

Or making passionate love to a stranger because you’re aching with loneliness

Buying mounds of beautiful things because you hate the way you look in the mirror

Or watching the same movie each week because you’re too sick to do anything else

 

Photo of the breakfast is mine

Credit to gif owners

Thank you Tuesdays

Thank you to my new followers. If you haven’t already, please check out their blogs

darling and darling
http://darlinganddarling.wordpress.com

Zoë Sim
http://zoesfashionblog.wordpress.com

pmitsuing
http://www.PatrickMitsuing.com/Blog

Manny Rutinel
http://MannyRutinel.com

Elan Mudrow

Stuart M. Perkins
http://storyshucker.wordpress.com

Sheila Sea
http://sheilaseapoetry.wordpress.com

Shawn L. Bird
http://shawnbird.wordpress.com

Kevin Nowbaveh
http://kevinnowbaveh.wordpress.com

I of July
http://htmm.wordpress.com

Cristian Mihai
http://cristianmihai.net

stepheusebi
http://stepheusebi.com

 

Thank you to my friend for offering to make me soup to help me feel better

And thank you to my family for taking care of me during this episode, as they always do

 

Missing Summer Smoothie

For days when you are craving the sunbeams, the sweet scented blooms, and the lively atmosphere of summer here is a smoothie to transport your senses out from cold misty January to the sun drenched days of July.

It really does taste like summer

You need

A blender

A half a cup of blue berries

A half cup of strawberries

A quarter cup of raspberries

2/3 cup of pinapples

A tsp of lime juice

1/3 cup of orange juice

1/4 cup of water

Blend it until smooth and enjoy