5 Essentials for the Perfect Summer Picnic

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This past weekend, I visited Cameron in his hometown of Carlisle, PA. There is nothing like going out to “the country” in the summer. It always reminds me of our first summer dating, when I visited him for the first time. He showed me all of the local haunts, we went hiking, fishing, and visited all of his favorite places. Carlisle is an adorable town with a lively main street, lots of shopping, and excellent restaurants. But some of my favorite parts are the really quiet, rural details of the area. I can’t resist driving past the fields mid-summer to see the flocks of lightning bugs covering every inch. I love how there are so many available lakes and mountains to swim or hike in every direction. It is so peaceful and serene. I feel so refreshed after a Carlisle weekend.

To my delight, Cameron suggested we go on a picnic Saturday and that’s exactly what we did. It was like a European adventure, summer loving, and a camping trip all rolled into one. It was all so romantic and dreamy. Looking for your next date idea? Try a picnic during the day. You’ll fall in love. Here’s what you’ll need:

1. Location, Location, Location

When it comes to picking your picnic location, you should keep three things in mind; convenience, shade, and shelter. It might be fun to hike up a mountain to have a picnic, but if you’re planning to cook or carry a lot of food, that will be quite difficult. We chose a nice shady spot of grass under a big tree separated from the crowds that were congregated around the pavilion and various docks on the lake. It was easy enough to walk over to the grille area to cook, but gave us our own special spot too. The weather predicted thunderstorms for the entire afternoon (never happened), but if it had rained, we would’ve had a convenient shelter to run to. Another tip, never cancel your plans based on a faulty weather app. We would’ve missed out on the most perfect sunshine-y day.

2. Delicious, European-Style Eats

Cam was in charge of the menu for our picnic and he chose a very European-style spread. Obviously La Croix made the cut, but we also packed a wheel of brie (that we warmed up on the grille) with crackers, grapes, pasta salad, and bratwurst with grainy mustard. We brought Cam’s family’s portable charcoal grille to cook and it was so convenient. It cooled off to pack away again after our long picnic. Both Cam and I traveled through Europe at separate times and were immediately brought back to our days of grilling Bratwurst outside of youth hostels in Germany or selecting cheese and meats from a breakfast spread. The only thing missing was a baguette and a bottle of wine. Motion to allow open containers in PA?

3. Picnic Basket, Picnic Blanket & Portable Decor

A picnic is not complete without a basket, blanket, and a little design touch 🙂 I am physically incapable of throwing a bed sheet and some paper napkins together and calling it a day and designing something a little prettier is one part of my life that brings me so much joy. I love that Cam doesn’t mind when I go a little overboard. I linked some adorable baskets, blankets, and picnic essentials below that will take any date day or gathering to the next level. It also helps that my parent’s house is basically a stylist and merchandiser’s dream. The only thing I’m missing was a little bouquet of wildflowers, but I was too scared to find a slithering animal in the weeds.

4. Music & A Spirit of Relaxation

It’s always important to prepare ahead of time with a downloaded Spotify playlist, but if your picnic attendees also play a peaceful instrument, bring it along. I brought my ukulele that I used to play quite frequently in high school and college. I’ve pretty much lost all of my skills and have wanted to start playing with Cam again as he has become such a whiz on the guitar, so we spent some time refreshing our chord knowledge and remembered the classic, Somewhere Over the Rainbow. Otherwise, we napped under the shade of a big tree, listened to the boaters and fishers go about their days, and did a lot of smiling. Oh boy, that’s cheesy but SO true.

5. Your Favorite Person or a Group of Friends

I recently came to the very shocking realization that Cam and I only spend 4-6 days out of each month together. Let’s just take a moment of silence for that…. It is kind of alarming that we haven’t lived in the same town for 4 years now. Fully aware of the challenges that will come from soon living near each other again, long distance has taught us so much that I appreciate more than anything. For one, our weekends together are so important and so sweet. There’s nothing like being reunited on a Friday night, honestly, a bit awkward with each other after the few weeks between our last visit, but then falling in love with each other all over again each time.

We value communication because how would we even maintain a relationship without that. We rarely check our phones all weekend because we don’t want to waste a second. We plan activities together and specific dates instead of winging it. We dress up for each other for date night (even though we have been together all day beforehand). We go out of our ways to be kind and encouraging. We spend as much time outside, listening to music, talking, as we can. Those things should be no different when we live 5 minutes from each other, as they are living 100 miles from each other. So, a picnic, although simple, means everything.

xoxo,

jojo

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