Summer Painting #2

Summer is such a fun time of year. Most of us look forward to the longer days where we have much more time in the evenings to enjoy being outside or even just getting things done around the house. The sun comes up earlier which means we can get out earlier to do our daily exercise before the sun gets too warm. It sets later so we still have plenty of time to sit on the beach and veg out.

When you live in the Northern part of the US, the sun comes up a LOT earlier. Here in Florida, the sun starts lighting up the sky around 6-ish and doesn’t officially rise until almost 6:30 AM, give or take a few minutes.

This morning, our sun came up around 6:29 AM and will set around 8:25-ish.

I find the difference in daylight fascinating between where I live now vs I where I lived before. I remember getting up early in the Cape May area of NJ to go for a morning bike and being surprised that at 6 AM, it was already cooking the landscape. Here, if we go out at 6AM, we need to make ourselves visible to drivers in the dawning light.

Summer sun can be really warm, but the shade here isn’t bad, especially when the humidity drops midday. I sometimes sit out on the lanai to escape the AC, listen to the birds and the whisper of the banana leaves swaying in the breeze. The Summer is making our bananas more prolific, too. We currently have 4 plants producing bananas right now. Three weeks ago, we harvested two full stalks of bananas and they ripened so fast that I quickly gave some to my daughter and her family, made banana bread and muffins, chopped up a bunch to make banana “ice cream” and froze the rest for smoothies. I wanted to bring some to my son’s family in New Jersey, last week, but they ripened before I could. I gave them banana bread instead.

To honor the sun, today’s daily painting is a friendly sun welcoming the long days of summer.