What have been the highlights of your summer?

With the unofficial end of summer this weekend (Labor Day), now seems like a good time to reflect on the last couple of months. This summer had some definite lowlights for me, which makes it even more important for me to focus on what made me smile or gave me some joy.

So here goes, the highlights of my summer:

I'm a visual person, so making areas look attractive makes me happy.

• refreshing the front porch, including cleaning the flooring, adding 2 new chairs, spray painting the wall troughs and welcome sign, filling hanging baskets with begonias, spray painting 2 pots a bright green and planting with colorful coleus, and adding a new doormat. The front porch has become a favorite morning hangout.
• making the chair bench and setting it on the front patio (adjacent to the front porch). I sometimes stop at the front window to look at that pleasant little spot.
• spray painting a wood chair purple to set next to potted lavender.

Spending time with my family brings me joy.

• the whole 4th of July holiday, including a cookout with our son and daughter-in-law and watching fireworks afterwards, plus decorating for the 4th and buying some "flag" napkins at Dollar Tree.
• picking cherries with my daughters and husband. We had a lot of cherries this year. I'll be baking cherry pies well into winter.
• all of the Friday movie and pizza nights we had. One favorite was Swiss Family Robinson. We all enjoyed watching that one.
• making root beer floats and peanut buster parfaits with my family.

Observing nature makes me smile.

• watching the hummingbirds visit the nasturtium blossoms right outside my window.
• enjoying the copious begonia blossoms. I planted begonias in a few places this summer, as they seem to do well in my yard. I still have the plant from summer 2021. I keep it in the garage over winter then bring it out each spring. It keeps blooming for me. I'm hoping my new begonias will do as well overwintering in the garage.
• the bunny population has been thinned in my neighborhood (owls, hawks, coyotes?), so the few bunny sightings I had were sweet moments watching a bunny nibble the grass.

And of course, food made me happy this summer.

• blueberries
• raspberries
• strawberries
• salads
• our own cabbage
• a good steak dinner at home one evening
• barbecue chicken
• homemade burgers
• rosemary and garlic potatoes
• cherry and blackberry pies
• blueberry muffins
• our apples
• s'mores

So, for summer with its share of lowlights, I can also recognize that there were more than a handful of wonderful summer moments.

How about you? What have been the highlights of your summer?

Would finances motivate you to consider moving to a different region of your country for retirement?

I've mentioned our high cost of living in my area of the US before. My husband is approaching retirement in a couple of years. Lately we've discussed the possibility of moving to a part of the US with a lower cost of living for retirement, so our funds will last longer and go farther. 

Our house has appreciated quite a bit in the last 29 years here. We could sell our house and have a nice sum leftover to enhance our retirement and be more generous in our giving. But here's the catch, we would likely be leaving some or all of our kids in our current area due to their choice. 

So, less expensive housing, same size house and land, lower property taxes 

vs 

staying here where we're comfortable and have all of our kids nearby.

I know we're fortunate to have all of our kids right here. That's just not the case for many retirees. But I also think it would be nice to worry less about the cost of every last thing.

This is a big question to think about over a long period of time. So I'm asking if you ever considered moving away from family, friends, church, community for your retirement years? What were your considerations?