Life Lately

Yesterday, I sat at the beach while Caden played in the sand at the edge of the water. It was 80+ degrees out, warmer than they’d predicted, and my hair stuck to the back of my neck until I fished a hair tie out of my bag and pulled it into a ponytail. It’s still August, which signals summer to my brain, but also it’s September tomorrow, which screams nothing but fall. Time to transition. Again.

The kids start school next week and I feel all the normal excitement that goes along with a fresh school year—what always feels like more of a new year than January ever does. And also there’s the anxiety that’s become the norm around masking and local case counts and how long before one of my kids is in quarantine?

I’ve been in a flurry of ordering things because it seems like I’ve either been running out or needing all the things all at once. Clothes for kids who have outgrown everything from pants to socks to shoes. Refill tablets of hand soap and house cleaner. Boy brow and yes that is an affiliate link in case you’d like to help feed my addiction to the product that I would bring with me even to a deserted island. Three whole sets of school supplies. A fresh box of contacts. Laundry detergent. Parchment paper and tin foil and plastic wrap. A fresh bottle of elderberry gummies because besides masking, it’s the thing that feels like I’m doing something to help my kids stay healthy. Name labels for the aforementioned school supplies which have somehow been held up in customs for weeks and I am crossing my fingers they arrive before the first day of school. Tea and a new sweater because despite that 80-degree temperature, fall is coming, dammit, and I intend to be prepared.

Everything around me feels in or about in transition. Though thinking back to a year ago, things were largely the same. The start of school was pushed back a week but I was still buying up masks and elderberry and school supplies and Costco orders made up entirely of snacks. (Mental note: place Costco order.) We didn’t know exactly what the school year would bring and we largely still don’t have the answer to that question this year.

I don’t know what else to do except to continue keeping under control what I can, even if it’s just stocking the snack shelf in the pantry and baking first day of school treats and emailing the teachers to see who in their class needs school supplies. Remembering that this, too, is important work, even if it doesn’t always (ever?) feel like quite enough.

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Action Item

I’m not sure how you can feel anything but sick to your stomach after the way things unfolded in Afghanistan this month. TIME magazine has an excellent round-up of ways to support refugees and people still in Afghanistan: from organizations taking donations to contacting your representatives.

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Around the Internet

• Tom Daly knitting is one of my favorite things this summer and R. Eric Thomas is one of my favorite things on the internet, so put them together and it brings me an enormous amount of joy.

• “But I think the real problem is that life is still exhausting because the pandemic was and remains exhausting in so many invisible ways — and we still haven’t given ourselves space to even begin to recover. Instead, we’re just softly boiling over, emptying and evaporating whatever stores of energy and patience and grace remain.”

• We Could Have Changed the World (really the title says it all)

• For those of us who have or are about to send our kids back to school.

• “This is parenting these days, for us and too many people we know. Peak inconsistency. Complete incoherence. Just decision after decision based on a little bit of science, a little bit of outdated guidance, and a little bit of how much time or energy we have to think it through.”

• Did I go down the rabbit hole of ‘Bama Rush in an attempt to understand why all of America was suddenly invested? Yes I did. And then this deep-dive on Greek fashion.

• This feels like it sums up 2021.

• So does this.

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Eating

• Have I told you to make falafel before? Because you should definitely make falafel. And then serve it with pita bread and roasted veggie (team bell peppers over here) and kalamata olives and a healthy scoop of caramelized onion hummus.

• This mushroom pasta stir-fry is delicious. Unfortunately, I can almost never seem to find broccolini around here so I subbed regular broccoli and it was fine (but if you can get your hands on it actual broccolini would be better!).

• I will now evangelize you to the ways of dark chocolate hummus. I will continue to pretend it is the healthiest of healthy snacks because the first ingredient is chickpeas and continue to ignore that the second ingredient is sugar. Mostly because I don’t care. It’s delicious.

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Fun Things

• Currently wearing a late summer/early fall pink and gray ombre mani of my own creation using AW, RP, MG, Wild & Free, and BI from Olive and June and the Gen Z barista told me she loved my nails this morning so #winning.

• This button-up shirt was an impulse buy earlier this summer which will go down as one of my favorite purchases of 2021.

• This tee. The color is more of a gray-washed lavender in person. Love the fit, love the rolled sleeves, love that I foresee wearing it under lots of cardigans come cooler temperatures.

The Kids Will Be Fine

A year ago, when the world shut down, I did what any reasonable Type-A person would do: immediately crafted a schedule to structure my days with a four-year-old and twin six-year-olds. Included were daily bike rides, schoolwork, free play, regular meal times, iPad time, and 15 minutes of silent reading time.

It was the last one my daughter protested.

“I don’t waaa-nnaaa read,” she would whine, draped like a spaghetti noodle over the couch. “I don’t even like reading.”

“That’s funny,” I would reply, “Because we read an entire Princess in Black book together last night before bed.”

To which she would try to suppress a smile before sighing and then continue on with her grumbling.

We’d get through the 15 minutes. Some days were better than others. It often felt like I worked for almost every one of those 15 minutes.

Let me be clear: it wasn’t that she couldn’t read. She adored being read to and was a strong Kindergarten+ level reader herself. She just…didn’t want to. Maybe she found it overwhelming. Maybe she wasn’t confident in her own abilities. Maybe it was that the world felt upside down. 

I did what I could to make silent reading appealing. I combined snacks with reading time. I encouraged her to just look at the pictures; she didn’t have to read all the words. I had small crates of books I’d curated specifically for each child’s interests and reading level. (Bless my early pandemic heart.) 

I’m a prolific reader myself. I see memes which say things like “I was the kid who sat up reading under the covers with a flashlight” and feel seen. Books are an enormous part of my life, and all this whining about reading unnerved me.

What if she falls behind? What if enforcing a mere 15 minutes of silent reading time a day turns her off reading forever? What if she never, ever likes reading?

I didn’t always think like this. But in my weaker moments, like during the it’s-day-four-of-this-whining-nonsense moments, my mind definitely went down that path.

It was several months into this schedule, late summer, when I realized she hadn’t whined about reading in…days? Weeks? I realized we’d fallen into a pattern with our silent reading where each kid grabbed a book and I did, too, with 15-20 (mostly) silent reading minutes each morning. I didn’t even know when the whining had stopped. I just knew that silent reading had been a battle I’d dreaded every day until one day, without even noticing…it wasn’t.

Read the rest over on Twin Cities Mom Collective.

Life Lately

Taking a page from Pantsuit Politics’ Instagram page, (who apparently take this practice from Emily P. Freeman, so I’m just another link in the chain at this point), to list the things I learned in June:

• If you have the option for your kid to be bussed to an activity instead of driving them, you should do it. Every time. It will be worth all the dollars.

• I can’t keep up with anything lately and feel like I’m failing at everything. There are too many small children around and also we’re coming out of a pandemic which I’m sure has something (read: almost everything) to do with it, but I don’t have time to unpack that now (see: I can’t keep up with anything). I feel like I’m behind in every area of my life and also things feel like they take between 2-5 times longer than I think they should. The kids should be nicer and the kitchen should be cleaner and I want to get back to doing yoga and I want new furniture for almost every room of my house and maybe the kids would be nicer if I set a better example instead of snapping at them. However, if my little corner of the internet has anything to say about it, apparently that’s how everyone is feeling lately. So maybe that’s just how life is, at least for right now. Solidarity.

• I think number one on this list might have a decent amount to do with number two on this list, since I have spent approximately all of June in my minivan. So. There’s that. Maybe I would have more time to do all the things if I weren’t driving around the entire Twin Cities every single day.

• Driving hours in the car by myself with a bunch of podcasts and good music (read: Taylor Swift and Olivia Rodrigo) is my new favorite form of self-care.

• Grilling anything and throwing chips and a sliced melon on the table is a good enough meal when it’s one million degrees out. We can just pretend the kids ate a fair share of the fruit instead of gorging themselves on chips and processed white buns from a package. It’s fine.

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Action Item

The disaster in Surfside, Florida and the unprecedented heatwave in the Northwest are both on my mind this week. CNN has a great round-up of organizations to support, if you’re able, who are on the ground in the Miami area. Bustle has a list of organizations to support in the Pacific Northwest, as well as general links to organizations who are advocating for climate change solutions. We had our own unheard-of heatwave here in Minnesota in late May/early June, and unfortunately, these climate events are only going to continue. Less unprecedented, much, much more commonplace.

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Around the Internet

• This thread is an entire sermon in ten slides.

• Because I can always have to link to at least one Anne Helen Peterson piece, and this one is everything.

• “Families desperately need help. In other countries, they get it. In the United States, they get empty homilies about the importance of family.”

• An important read about female athletes, especially as we move forward into the Olympics.

• I feel this piece in a very deep way.

• Have you heard of FaceTune? This read was both fascinating and gag-inducing. “Cosmetic surgeons who spoke to HuffPost said they now regularly have patients come in with photos of themselves that have been so heavily Facetuned they would be anatomically impossible to replicate.”

• “A residency is typically designed to give the artist the space to create. In the art world that translates, almost always, to being alone, she explained. ‘It felt quite offensive that somehow you are more creative away from your family than with them,’ she said.”

• In case you haven't seen the “Dear Intern” thread yet. It will make you feel ten types of encouraged with the world.

• I’m in a (usually) happy marriage, but damn if I don’t wish I had someone to break up with so I could blast this perfect mash-up.

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Eating

• These harissa meatballs with whipped feta. Though—UNPOPULAR OPINION ALERT—I don’t actually care for the whipped feta. I make the meatballs and bell peppers, omit the zucchini, and serve it all with homemade pita chips, hummus, sliced cucumbers, and kalamata olives.

• These cheesesteaks but add more bell pepper, onion, mushrooms, and cheese, and buy prepackaged shaved steak from the store so it all comes together ridiculously fast. And deliciously.

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Fun Things

• Back in April, I told you to get a For Days Take Back Bag. Now I’m telling you to buy this relaxing romper because it looks like I put effort into getting dressed but feels like I’m wearing pajamas, which is my exact goal with every outfit.

• The tagline of this product is “the (cashmere) sweatpants of lipstick” and I co-sign that 100%. I’m always on the look for a product that glides on like a chapstick but deposits a little bit of color; something I can use whether I’m in the drop-off line or date night. Ultralip is that thing. I bought it in Lucite but will definitely be back for more.

• This tank. I’ve dressed it up with black shorts and all the way down with athletic shorts and a ponytail. The exaggerated shoulder/extra fabric under the armpit means you don’t have to worry about flashing your bra. It runs large—I tuck it all the way in or it’s a lot of fabric for me. Recommend sizing down if that’s an option for you.

• Okay, I’d seen this Supergoop Unseen Sunscreen going around my corners of the internet and finally tried it out. It’s not shiny or greasy but glides on smooth and matte as the perfect makeup primer. I’m a believer.

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Another thing I learned this month is that June doesn’t quite feel like summer yet. The kids spend the first two weeks wrapping up school. Caden had an activity that’s started at 8 am (!!!) the last few weeks. (See: if there’s a bus option it will be worth all your $$$.) Baseball has largely taken over our evenings. All of these activities have walked us right up to a point where we’ll be traveling for a few days at a time here and there, where it feels like I’m either packing for or unpacking from a trip. And, you might be saying, what do you mean it doesn’t feel like summer? Baseball! What’s more summer than that?

I know. And these things aren’t bad. I’m so glad we’re able to do them this year. And also: it doesn’t feel like summer to me until we’ve had a chance to lay low, sleep in, and do a whole lot of nothing around the house for days at a time.

Those days are coming. I just wrote up our July calendar and am admiring all the blank spots on the calendar. The same blank spots I will then probably curse around the second week of August. Because: balance!

That Minivan Life

Brooklyn and Nolan tumble into the mudroom where they kick off their sandals. I’m right behind them, glass of iced-coffee-going-to-water in hand. 

“You have one hour. I’m going to eat breakfast. Make sure your teeth are brushed and you find your water bottles before we head out again.” They scamper off to play and (hopefully) follow directions.

Summer began barely a week ago and already I feel as though I’ve been living in my minivan.

Our day kicked off with a near hour-long trek to drop Caden off at Summer Academy by 8 am. (Praise hands that concludes before The Fourth.) Brooklyn and Nolan have PlayNet on Tuesday and Thursday mornings from 9:30-noon. There have been playdates and park meet-ups. There will be day camps.

I’m already regretting not taking advantage of the bussing option to get Caden to and from Summer Academy. I thought I was saving him close to an hour each way. Well, I am, but I didn’t stop to think who would be spending that hour driving instead. *insert raised hand and slap-face emojis here* Tyson told me we should bus him and let it be known in writing here today honey that you were right.

(Also, the pollution. Why didn’t I do the communal drive option? I mean, I guess we hardly went anywhere last summer—the first eight weeks of lockdown we didn’t fill up a tank of gas once— so maybe I’m allocated some extra miles this year? Still. Ugh.)

This minivan life can be chaotic. And I’m not talking about the lunacy that is Minnesota roads under construction in the summertime. I’m talking about what happens inside those marvelous power-glide, push-of-a-button sliding doors.

There are kids who expect me to do some sort of backward yoga move to retrieve whatever toy/snack/piece of trash they dropped while also navigating us safely through traffic. Kids fighting over things like “looking at me” and “breathing” and “maybe they rolled their eyes at me.” There’s the general state of the car, what with the leftover Starbucks cups and granola wrappers and Goldfish dust and LEGO pieces which are expressly forbidden to leave the house but somehow migrate out to the minivan anyway. (That they escape in pockets and tiny fists while I distractedly dash through the house to go to the bathroom, yell at everyone else to go to the bathroom, ensure everyone has a water bottle, mask, and shoes, and run back in the house because I forgot at least one of these things is just a guess.)

We’re managing. Wow in the World has already emerged as the podcast of choice to get us through the long drives to and from Summer Academy. Water bottles and snacks are a must, even if stray pretzels and fruit snacks end up atrophying on the floor. 

Sometimes we’re more than managing. There are giggles during the podcast, even if it’s about poop and I’ve already heard that word or one of its many iterations 34 times that morning. Sometimes we sing along to Hamilton or Taylor Swift. Yesterday they practiced the song and actions they’ll be performing at church on Sunday, Nolan’s voice practically shouting despite the song being called “One Small Voice.” (Guess that title is only a nice suggestion.) 

There’s Caden climbing into the car after Summer Academy, full of stories about his day and reminders for tomorrow. “I made my picture like this and no one else did it this way, Mommy. They all made a flower because that was the example but I decided to do something different!” and “Don’t forget we need to wear our Summer Academy shirts tomorrow.” and “I spent my fifty cents of snack money on a Fruit by the Foot because you never buy them so I took my chance.”

There are the times where we drive and it’s blessedly quiet and I see their big blue eyes staring out the windows as the trees and the lakes and the buildings pass by. They seem to be just taking it all in and I think, “This is nice.”

I’ve only ever thought of the minivan as a thing to get us from point A to point B; from this one thing we’re doing to that other thing we’re doing. It’s time to kill: please sit down and buckle up and let me think and don’t ask too many questions. But having spent several hours in the car each day this week, I’m discovering it’s all its own time. 

It might not be exactly how I wish I were spending my time, which would preferably be reading a book in a hammock with a light breeze, cold drink, and children playing in the background. (Reader, my children never play in the background.) (Also, I don’t own a hammock. Details.) At the very least, I might wish I were listening to a podcast of my choice instead of the same few episodes of Wow in the World on repeat.

I’ve heard people talk about how much time they spend in the car running kids around, how they feel like a chauffeur, and I thought, Surely they’re exaggerating. Guess not. I have spent so. much. time. in my minivan this week. This wholly ordinary thing I never thought all that much about when it was only eight minutes to school and back, twelve minutes to dance class, ten to hit up McDonald’s for Happy Meals. 

All these drop-offs and pick-ups and the kids are there and so am I. We’re our own little universe bumping down the road, and sometimes they fight over who gets to put their hand where and I wonder if I should even bother with the ground-in crackers in the carpet and other times they ask about each other’s days and pass around compliments like candy and sing along to We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together and it’s both harmonious and also entirely off-key.

This post is part of a blog hop with Exhale—an online community of women pursuing creativity alongside motherhood, led by the writing team behind Coffee + Crumbs. Click here to view the next post in this series "Minutiae".

The Middle Years

It’s 8:00 at night and my seven-year-old son wanders into the room.

“Hi Mommy, what are you doing?” he asks. He’s wearing pajama shorts and no shirt, but he does have a fuzzy blue blanket wrapped around his narrow shoulders. I think it was last summer when he began to eschew sleep shirts, opting only for sleep bottoms like my husband. I usually sneak into his bedroom to check on him before I go to sleep and cover him up again with the blankets he’s tossed off.

“Oh,” Caden continued, not waiting for my reply, “You’re ordering something. It’s a book! Can I get a book? Let’s see: first name, last name, address, email, payment information…”

Because he can read now, of course. There’s no more hiding things in words from him or his twin sister, no more assuming that a combination of letters is coded in and of itself. I can no longer spell out I-C-E C-R-E-A-M over their heads to my husband. (Really, they’d pick that one up right away.)

The blanket around his bare shoulders. The 8:00 pm still-awake wandering. The reading.

We’re entering the middle years.

The middle years are interesting, at least where we are, on the cusp of them with two seven-year-olds and a five-year-old. They’ve gained a piece of independence. They can be trusted to knock on friends’ doors in the neighborhood without supervision. The older two can be left home alone for short periods of time while I’m still somewhat nearby, like down the street at the park with their younger brother. They can make toast and pour their own bowls of cereal and grab their own snacks from the pantry.

Read more about entering these middle-aged years over on Twin Cities Mom Collective.