Hi, friends! I'm sipping a mid-morning iced coffee and marveling that it's the last full day of school for my kids. By the time you read this our summer will have begun! It's getting really warm (in the 90ºs and next week we'll break into the 100ºs) but I'm still enjoying a short mid-day walk and staying positive in the heat. A few notes from May... May goals review + Have a summer summit with Chris. We've had good conversations about summer, have put some additional activities on the calendar, and are feeling as ready as we can be. We've... Read more →

Recently, Chris and I kicked off a day date in our favorite way: with a coffee + budgeting session. It was a particularly fun one because we were incorporating Chris's new salary as a full professor and projecting out a few years to include some possible big goals. After diving into our budget I wanted to share a few places where we are trying to manage spending, and a few budgeting wins lately. If you'd like to see more about our budget, last year I wrote an overview post about how we manage our finances and a post about our... Read more →

I'm ready to shift into a summer mindset. And good thing because summer weather is knocking at our door and the kids are done with school next Thursday! In my previous post I shared how we're designing our summer with activities for the kids, daily routines, and family fun. Today I'd like to share how we're designing our summer in terms of my mindset, summer eating + drinking, and everyday joys. If you'd like more ideas, I wrote about designing my summer last year as well. Summer mindset: be where you are During the summer we don't have as many... Read more →

I can't believe it's time for my "designing our summer" blog posts again, which I really enjoyed writing last year (kid summer, my summer). But here we are with a week and a half of school left!! Today I'll share what we're thinking in terms of summer kid activities, daily routines, and family fun. Later this week I'll share a post with ideas for how I'm designing summer for myself as well. Summer big picture Here's a fun little realization I've had this year: as much as I dislike the extreme heat of summer, I kind of love planning for... Read more →

Hello, friends! Our palo verde is in peak bloom and as I glance up from writing this I'm met with a view out the window of golden yellow blooms drifting down from branches of bright green. I love this time of year when our front yard becomes blanketed in gold as the blooms fall and keep their yellow color even as they dry out. The Phoenix Valley cities really should advertise our palo verde blossom season along the lines of D.C.'s cherry blossom season. It's truly so beautiful to see trees bursting in bright gold blooms this time of year.... Read more →