My Summer '16 and What's to Come!

I’m not typically one to do lifestyle posts—for fun I usually just go to the movies and go shopping, nothing blogworthy. However, this summer has been really fun and I’ve actually done a lot of things that have been on my bucket list for ages!

After school ended in April I literally had a whole month where I didn’t want to do anything but work, sleep, and binge-watch TV. I worked about forty hours a week, sometimes fifty, so I didn’t have a lot of time for other plans even if I’d wanted to go out. I also tried to tan when I could as my skin was so pasty after a long winter!

The weather really started to warm up around June and then my summer began. I went kayaking a few times and did something I’ve always wanted to try: swimming to an island by my friends house. It took about an hour (it’s farther away than it looks!) but it was a lot of fun and I want to do it again next summer.

                                 (Photo from my friends Instagram of the island on a foggy morning...)

Both of my jobs opened up in June so I worked 12 hours as a lifeguard each week and about 30-35 hours in a tourist shop downtown. I actually really like both of my jobs because when there isn’t anyone in the store or the pool I can read. I finished a ton of books this way!

In July was my sisters 21^st so we went out the whole weekend. We went out late Thursday night/Friday morning, the day of her birthday, and she was a complete mess by the time we got back home! It was frustrating at the time but it’s a great story now. The next night she invited more of her friends over and we went to the bars and crashed a wedding reception, no puking involved to my relief!

        Me, my sister and her best friend looking squad goals af in leather jackets the night of her 21st!

For her birthday I got us tickets to a Cassadee Pope concert, one of her favorite singers ever. She was playing in Charlevoix, only a few hours away, so we had a mini road trip to the concert! She was incredible live and we got in the front row. After she performed we got to meet her, so I think it was a good present on my part even if we did get lost on the way there.

                           Me meeting Cassadee, the humidity making my hair look crazy

The next weekend my parents were out of town so my sister and I invited some people from work to our house for drinks. It was just a small thing but it was fun and we ended up running on the stacks of hay bales near my house! I may have fallen off once or twice, they were really slippery.

August was even more fun. My family has an annual camping trip at the state park near my house. I had to work most of the weekend so I only went to the campground at night, which resulted in some night swimming in Lake Superior. It was a lot warmer than I expected and the waves were huge!

We also took a trip downstate to Indian River, a little town in Michigan that is one of my favorite places to travel to. There are two lakes connected by a river so we like to go boating through the channels and tubing in the lakes.

                                                                        Indian River

I think the best thing I did all summer was quarry-jumping with my sister, my best friend and her little sister. We drove about an hour to go to a rock quarry and it was beautiful. You could jump off the rocks into the deep water below. There’s a video on my Instagram @beautyfromkatie if you want to see me jump off the highest point! My feet actually touched the rocks at the bottom.

                             The rock quarry and one of the lower places you can jump from

To finish off the summer I went on a trip to Detroit to do some shopping and see a Tigers baseball game. The game wasn’t fun at all because it was raining and I hate sports, but the shopping in that area is incredible. My next post is going to be my Detroit haul!

This was probably the best summer of my life but I am ready for school to start again. I’ll still be working a few hours a week as a lifeguard at my university. I’m taking mostly gen ed classes, Biology, Geology and Humanities, along with a psychology class (Personality Theory) and the class I’m most excited about: skating! I love skating and I hope I learn to do it well.

I hope you all had an amazing summer! What was the best thing you did? 

Xx Katie