The boys finished school last Thursday so it's officially summer for us! Given that summer is my least favorite desert weather and I don't typically love the lack of routine, I'm feeling surprisingly excited and optimistic for this summer. Hey, I'll take it! Chris and I spent some time this spring brainstorming around "designing our summer" (a term from Gretchen Rubin that I fell in love with years ago) and then we had a summer planning coffee date to make concrete plans. We made plans for how we'll keep the kids busy, what family fun we can look forward to,... Read more →

here's our house; we think it's so cute! I'm really looking forward to a fresh coat of paint at some point next year / University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire campus and Rod and Gun Park Yesterday we woke to rain. Glorious rain. When we checked the rain gauge on our deck in the afternoon it read nearly 1.5 inches which is a bit shy of a quarter of our annual rainfall in Arizona. I've become relatively acclimated to the very extreme climate in Arizona and so now marvel at the most mundane weather. We still have two weeks left in Wisconsin... Read more →

Hello from Wisconsin! We are here, we're settled into our house comfortably enough for now (although we still need a couch), and the weather has been glorious for this Arizona family (although perhaps a bit cool for locals). May was full to the brim, so much so that I wrote no blog posts although I had many on my mind. Things that happened in May included: + Putting new flooring throughout our entire house in Gilbert. This entailed Chris removing all the baseboards and carpet and then hiring someone to level the floors and install the flooring and baseboards. This... Read more →

I'm heading into June feeling summery which is to say light in spirit and ready for fun. A world away from last June. I re-read my June 2020 goals post and sat for a moment thinking about one year ago. We were facing a summer at home, Arizona was making national news as a COVID hot spot, Chris was about to be back at work (from his home office) after parental leave, and I spent my days holding and nursing Maeve. And yet I was publishing blog posts?? I honestly don't remember where I found the time and I'm laughing... Read more →

summer fun in 2019 Summer break starts for the boys TODAY and my planning brain has been at work to design our summer. In thinking about our summer I realized that summers feel challenging to me for two reasons: one, my very energetic boys are out of school which means more active parenting and entertaining; and two, it's really, really hot so we're pretty much confined to being indoors (reminder: two very energetic boys) or in a pool. I thrive on structure and routine, and I think kids do too, so I wanted to create a rhythm to our days... Read more →

June was an adventurous month. We started the month camping in northern Arizona and I'm ending the month with the boys in Austin. I'm writing this from my parents shaded screened back porch where he ceiling fan is barely holding the humid heat at bay. But honestly it's a welcome break from the intense dry heat and cloudless skies of Arizona. When I look up from writing I can watch a mama deer and her fawn roam around the back lot and check on an armadillo in a live trap in the yard (we'll release him somewhere where he can't... Read more →

It's late summer with early fall still a few weeks away and the heat and humidity (mostly the humidity) is really putting a damper on my summer cozy optimism. It was inevitable! I chat regularly with a dear friend in Austin and we decided to just admit that August is the worst and allow ourselves a little bit of complaining. Otherwise we try very hard not to complain about the heat in our respective towns. So: August is the worst. Ahhh, that feels a little better. What I am trying to remember is that every single fall (every time!) when... Read more →

On Thursday we'll drop the boys off at our neighborhood school for the first time – a new chapter for our family. And with that my brain is switching out of summer mode and into school mode. It's hard to call it "fall" since temperatures will still sit comfortably above 100 degrees for a while but it won't feel quite like summer any more. Especially once the university students return in mid August and Chris's work starts to ramp up for the year. We had a great summer and packed in a lot. We traveled for three weeks to Texas... Read more →

We are more than half-way through June and my mini summer sabbatical is well underway. Not going to work feels surprisingly normal for having gone most days for the past ten years but I am being consciously appreciative of how I spend my days now. I am not ready to take this big change for granted. My goal for this summer is to clear as much of my mega to-do list as possible so that with the start of the school year I am ready to get to work writing without my list nagging me. Although I always know there... Read more →

In June and July I have part-time childcare so both boys are home a few days each week. It's my first time doing significant and consistent solo parenting! Heading into it I felt both excited and a little bit intimidated wondering how much squabbling or other challenging behavior there might be. But so far it's been really great! For days at home with the boys I need some routine and predictability. So I consulted my schedule-loving mama friend Sarah Powers who shared a blog post with me that she wrote years ago about a "just structured enough" summer schedule. I... Read more →