Your Spring To-Do List: 8 Ways to Celebrate Spring

One of the great joys of living in a place with four seasons is seasonal traditions. Things like spring cleaning, summer boating, fall pumpkin carving, and winter sledding give the year texture. Every quarter brings its own delights and inconveniences, which is why I hesitate to choose a favorite season. In spring, we enjoy a few of my favorite things about life on planet earth: flowering fruit trees, weather in the 60s, and the satisfaction of cleaning out the overcrowded underbellies of our homes. These are the eight rituals I perform each spring that consistently fill me up and inspire a springy-spirit in my heart:  

Enjoying a sunset at Esch Road Beach on a cool spring evening on a walk with my dog, Bob.

1.     Drive to the lakeshore and take in the melt and a sunset.

A trip to Lake Michigan is necessary medicine year round. In spring, I go to watch the ice melt. The evening I sink my bare feet into cool (still-thawing) sand and watch a tangerine sunset fade over the inaugural beach bonfire of the year is an annual rite of passage. It acknowledges the glorious fact that we endured the year’s darkest days. As the days grow longer and we enjoy more sunshine, the sunsets grow more colorful, the light lingers longer, and the ice formations crinkle, shrink, and fade. It’s a beautiful thing to witness. I recommend Esch Road Beach or Good Harbor Beach for prime beach-bonfiring terrain.

My friend Tricia and I planned a flower plot on her property in Cedar, MI last summer. This was our first outdoor planting day after starting seedlings inside weeks before.

2.     Plan your garden.

I have a smaller-than-eight-by-eight patch of garden in my tiny in-town back yard, but that does not stop me from growing a miniature jungle of cosmos, heirloom tomatoes, sunflowers, pumpkins, parsley, mint, and zinnias. Few things bring me as much joy as sketching a planting game plan based on my failures and successes from the previous year. I plan to do this every spring for the rest of my life, and I know I will never perfect it. Just like you can’t easily tame a wild animal, you cannot easily tame soil, weather, sunlight, and seedlings in a backyard garden. But it is a worthy practice, and the rewards are sweet.

I can taste the first sun gold cherry tomato bursting in my mouth right now.

If you need a little planning and seed-buying inspiration for a flower garden, check out Floret Flower Farm. Locally, I love to follow Second Spring Farm and Lakeview Hill Farm for veggie inspiration.

This is a photo I took when I was at school at Michigan State University. I love MSU’s horticulture gardens and greenhouses like the one where I took this photo. I could explore there all day! More about MSU’s gardens.

3.     Visit a greenhouse and fill a few flower pots.

Greenhouses are one of my favorite places to be in the entire world. The warm, damp air. The intermingling aroma of soil and blossoms. The light streaming in. Go. Fill a cart with annuals. Invest in a new perennial that will fill you with a sense of joy and accomplishment when it breaks through the soil next spring or summer. Spend an afternoon filling a pot of greenery and flowers. Sink your fingers into the potting soil. Set the finished product by your door. It will dutifully and happily welcome you home all spring and summer. Seriously. It’s. The. Best. Here are some container gardening tips to inspire you. Plus, this is my favorite local greenhouse to visit.

This was a first spring cookout a few years ago in May. We spent the day touring wineries on Old Mission Peninsula during peak cherry blossom season. We closed the day with this meal and a few beers at a friend’s house near the base of the peninsula.

4.     Enjoy a grilled meal outside.

Grilling season is upon us. My favorite grilled meals include: vegetable kabobs, barbequed chicken, and shrimp on the barbie. Grab a bottle of wine, invite your neighbors, and plan to grill a smorgasbord of meat and vegetables. No matter what you grill, it will be a wonderful night and it will be one of the best nights of the year. If you don’t have a grill, find a friend who does. Or, cook over a campfire.

I snapped this photo during a 5-day backpacking trip along Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore last June. This was one of my favorite views along the route.

5.     Plan a summer getaway.

Once northern Michigan summer sneaks up on me, it can be hard to gather groups for last-minute camping trips or to find availability for rentals. Now is the time to scheme. My favorite places to get away in the summer are Leelanau State Park (near Northport), Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, the Keweenaw Peninsula (way up in the UP), and Marquette. However, there are loads of beautiful places to get away along the entire west coast of Michigan and throughout the upper peninsula. My bucket list for this summer includes camping on Isle Royal for my 30th birthday (we’ll see if I can pull that one off) and camping on South Manitou Island.

My sister, Lindsay and I went bikeriding together along the Kalamazoo Valley River Trail, near where our parents live.

6.     Find a trail and take a long bike ride.

When the weather’s warm, but not too warm, the biking trails call to me. I can’t decide whether I enjoy road or mountain biking more, so I do both. I plan to spend at least one spring morning or afternoon biking enjoying my road bike on the TART Trail, Leelanau Trail, and Sleeping Bear Heritage Trail and my mountain bike on VASA Singletrack, Glacial Hills Pathway, and Arcadia Dunes Mountain Biking Trails. Afterward I will reward myself with beer because I believe the best a cold beer has ever tasted in the history of the world is when I am sweaty, dirty, and freshly finished with a bike ride.  

I took this photo at Shady Lane Winery in Leelanau County during a wine tour with girl friends in mid May.

7.    Pick a sunny day and take a blossom cruise.

Traverse City is known for its cherry blossom bloom, and each year I make a point to take a cruise up and down Old Mission Peninsula to take in the stunning rolling hills of light pink blossoms. The peak blooming season varies depending on the weather and how far north you’re cruising, but it usually starts in mid-May and lasts about a week. Keep in mind, the blossom beauty does not stop at cherry blossoms. In early to mid-May Trillium start blooming alongside leeks and elusive morel mushrooms across northern Michigan forest floors. The combination is quintessential spring in northern Michigan, and I will not miss it. An easy spot to see the Trillium bloom is in the Grand Traverse Commons Natural Area.

8. Empty your garage. (Or closet, or basement, or…)

Opening a few windows and sorting through everything that stacked up over the long, cooped-up winter is always therapeutic. It doesn’t matter if you empty your garage, your basement, a closet, something else, or all four. Whatever it is, it is about bringing more movement and circulation to your home. It’s about shedding stagnant winter feelings and refreshing. And yes, it may also be about clearing a winters-worth of dog poop from your yard and unearthing the fossilized popcorn kernels from beneath your couch. Any way you slice it: it’s a good practice. If you need a little extra kick in the pants, I just started watching Marie Kondo’s viral Netflix series and immediately started refolding all of my clothes. It’s inspirational.