37 ways to feel like you're on holiday when you're not ⛱️
no Abroad, no problem
I keep seeing pictures on Notes of e.g fields of lavender and photogenic Provençal villages, and then realising loads of them are from Pinterest (which is not always made clear, quite sneakily). In real life, not everyone goes away for weeks on end in the summer. Not everyone goes away at all!
I don’t - I haven’t been abroad in the summer for two years, partly because I feel like I’m on holiday at home. Living in the country with easy access to the sea helps, as do the succession of heatwaves we’ve been having this year in the UK (August is supposed to be hot too), but last summer was incredibly rainy and I still summoned up the holiday vibe. I’ve always been good at it, even in London.
It’s important to create a holiday feeling if you’re staying put - and to extend that feeling on your return if you do go away. Otherwise it’s a complete waste of summer. Summer should feel like summer, regardless of where you are and of whether you’re trotters up or working.
So here are some tips, in no particular order.
Tidy up a bit and have a light declutter. Imagine your home is the sort of Air B&B that’s even nicer than it looked online and that you’re absolutely delighted to be staying in. I don’t mean get rid of things you love - I mean don’t have empty crisp packets or piles of clothes or full waste paper baskets sitting about. Seeing your house as somewhere that is visually a treat to be in changes how you feel in it. It’s really easily done - I’m not proposing some terrible giant summer clean. You can just shove things into a cupboard.
Get up slightly earlier and make yourself proper coffee (or whatever you like in the morning), a long glass of water with mint in it (scrunch it first to release the mintiness), and something simple to eat, like ripe figs or nectarines. Or strawberries, or melon. Or a bowl of Greek yogurt and honey, maybe with pistachios, the queens of nuts, on top. Take it all back to bed, or to an open window with sunlight coming in, or to the garden if you have one. There you go: holiday breakfast.
For me one of the really nice things about holidays is hotel (or holiday let) bedding - ironed, pristine and refreshed frequently. Launder your sheets more often than usual so that you get that cool, crisp bedding feeling more than once a week. It’s worth the effort, and I say that as someone who really loathes making beds. Also, I am generally against artificially fragrancing laundry, but this does smell pretty nice.
Same with towels. Get out the nicest, fluffiest ones.
In fact, get out anything that is ‘for best’ or ‘for guests’, and use it every day. It feels celebratory and special, therefore holiday-like. (Also I don’t believe in ‘for best’. Why wouldn’t you use your nicest things all the time?).
If you’re working from home, have a siesta every afternoon with the windows open and a fan if it’s hot. The sound of fans is very holiday-evocative when you’re falling asleep. 20 minutes is supposed to be the perfect nap length to avoid grogginess, but I often have giant siestas and wake up feeling perky and fantastic. The longer I siesta, the better I feel, in fact. Naps refresh the brain as well as the body, and are therefore an excellent use of time.
Observe Golden Hour every night with an apéritif. Stop what you’re doing, put your phone(s) away and have a spritz with lots of ice or other drink of your choice. Outdoors is ideal (pavement included, unless you live on a main road) but inside works too. Have something holiday-feeling to pick at, like taralli (so moreish), or olives, salted almonds, cubes of cheese, charcuterie, good crisps + something to dip them into - you get the idea.
Like this. It’s so easy to recreate Upgrade your drinks generally. Try e.g. sparkling jasmine tea instead of Diet Coke (which I now think of as fizzycan because of Welcome To Glorious Tuga, the perfect summer read, as previously noted). Water gets upgraded too - mine is iced, in a jug on my desk or in my giant stupid cup, which keeps it perfectly cold, with thin slices of lemon and a sprig of rosemary in it. Sometimes I do one drop of rosewater, a few raspberries and some bashed cardamom seeds. It’s really delicious.
Prettify everything, because why not? Tan or fake tan. Pallid limbs do not induce holiday joy. I use Tan Luxe drops for the face and Gatineau for the body, but you’re not going to go wrong with James Read either. I like this cream bronzer, too.
Dress the part. Work clothes and shoes come off the moment you get home. Bare feet and something loose, is the idea. You don’t need me to remind you how much what you wear changes how you feel, but I’m saying it anyway.
