August: What I Read

Oh, August. I loved you in so many ways, but reading? Not one of them, despite my productivity in that space. I was underwhelmed by Jane Harper, Riley Sager, Kate Alice Marshall, Lisa Gardner, and Lisa Jewell this month.  But! I was proud of myself for scoring ALL OF THEM via the library! Sometimes on the DAY THEY CAME OUT EVEN. ALL ON LIBBY as either ebooks or audio reads. Talk about an old lady flex!

And. You guys. It pains me to say this, but I was also disappointed by my very favorite author in the entire world, Richard Russo. His new books was... not my favorite. I bought that one ahead of time so it would e on my Kindle the second it came into the world, and it just... was not the best.

(I have the new Liane Moriarty on my Kindle from Libby right now-- came to me ON PUB DAY you guys I am killing the library holds game.)

Here's the month in books from worst to best, with stats compiled at the end:

📱The Heartbreak Hotel by Ellen O'Clover: Why was I on the waitlist for this for so long?

📚🥳 Clutch by Emily Nemens: I wanted to like best friends dramZ book, but there was so much telling and so little showing. Or dialog. Many sentences that started with AND SO

🎧🥳Anatomy of an Alibi by Ashely Elston: I DNF'd this thriller on paper but then thought I'd try the audio book. It was... fine?

📱🥳The Unknown by Riley Sager: This is the second one of his scary books that I have NOT LIKED. 

🎧🥳The Girls Before by Kate Alice Marshall: Liked but did not love this thriller.

📱🥳The Last One Out by Jane Harper: She does such a good job of describing late stage capitalism and small scale social collapse and making the environment a sinister character. Lover her.

📚🥳Cleanup on Aisle Five: Essential Work, Poverty Wages, and the View from Behind the Supermarket Register by Ann Larson: Listen, she is no Barbara Ehrenreich, but I liked this one and liked talking about it with NGS even more.

📚🥳The Divorce by Freida McFadden: Yep. No notes.

📚🥳Transcription by Ben Lerner: I like a book that I have to read slowly and think about. SOMETIMES.

🎧🥳It Could Have Been Her by Lisa Jewell: I have not been a fan of her last 2 books, but this one was good.

📱🥳Look What You Made Me Do by John Lancaster: Ooooh, you should read this one.

📚🥳Arrivals and Departures by Amanda Eyre Ward: This was charming and delightful-- I really like this author.

📱🥳Famesick by Lena Dunham: I have mixed feelings about this book, but it made it to the top-ish of the list in a meh reading month.

📱🥳Under the Falls by Richard Russo: This book! It featured some of his perfectly flawed people and some snatches of the dialog I love so much, but it was a weird plot for him, and the emotional parts just did not land for me. I wanted to love it though.

📚🥳Ghost Town by Tom Perrotta: This was quick and fun but also sad-- recommend. 

📱🥳Into the Blue by Emma Brodie: This was extremely long. I liked it, but imagine if it were like 150 pages shorter.

🎧🥳 You'll Be Sorry by Lisa Gardner: I liked this better than the Frankie Elkin series but not as well as the DD Warren books. But! I do really like her. Gardner, Slaughter, and Cornwall are my thriller faves. Plus Louise Penny.

🎧🥳The Secrets We Hide by Karin Slaughter: YES I sure do love this Sara-Linton-free new series.

Wednesday Whines

 It's like, I love summer so much you guys. And also? Summer is WILD. WIIIIILD. Every second of every day is absolutely spoken for (but I do have time for a Big Love rewatch here and there).

Something that at least makes me feel like I have no time is that we go to swim lessons and then just.. stay at the pool. So I have to all the other non-pool parts of my life in like 3 hours a day. And sometimes we go back to the pool for Minnie's water ballet practice and stay until close.

So I mean. Maybe my real problem is a time management one?

Typical day:

5am-7am: Watch Big Love and work on various things

7am-8:15am: Exercise (run, weights, yoga)

8:15-11: Pack lunches and snacks for pool and activities, make sure Dorothy and Cooper are ready for their days, house tidy and laundry maintenance, emails and classwork as needed. Get Dorothy and Cooper to the pool for dive team

11:00: Ready Minnie for swim lessons, gather giant bag of towels and snacks and books and sunscreen plus Dorothy''s dance lunch and bag and drop Minnie at the pool with Cooper. Pick up Dorothy and take her dance a little early (she gets ready at the pool post-diving and eats lunch in the car). Race back to the pool to catch the end of Minnie's lesson. Cooper is relieved from babysitting duty and bikes home to get ready for afternoon diving on campus.

12-3-ish: POOOOOOL (I often work in the shade here). We also have to pick Dorothy up between 1-3 depending on the day. Usually a boy is around to help, or Minnie and I will leave our stuff and go get her and come back.

3-4:30: Laundry and house work blitz

4:30-5:45: Pick up Cooper and friend from diving and take friend home

5:45-7-ish: Dinner and clean up

7-8:45 POOOOOOOOL

8:45-10:30: Make sure Dorothy, Cooper and Minnie are in bed (really, Minnie should be in bed before 8, but what are you gonna do?) and collapse.

Sometimes there's water ballet. Sometimes Dorothy brings friends to the pool after dance or goes to their pools. Sometimes I have meetings. Sometimes Coper has a private dive lesson at our pool with another coach. But the basic structure of the day stays the same. 

For like 3 more weeks-- then diving is over! Til fall! When I will be the onl driver home 3 days a week and we will have kids at 3 different schoooooools.

Sunscreen is FSA approved! Why did I not realize this $ooner?

Speech nats and the return of SUMMER DIVE

 Jack went to Richmond, Virginia, for the National Speech and Debate Association tourney last week. He left right after graduation and capped off his high school career with a week long trip with his favorite extracurricular friends and his coaches whom he adores. He had an absolute blast and did great.

Jack qualified for nationals in international extemp, and he was not even sad when he did not break into out rounds because he really wanted to compete his poetry program, selections from Dog Show by Billy Collins (it's wonderful, and I think you should read it if you haven't already). Jack had a lot of success in WI with that program over the season, and he was successful at nationals, too-- he made it to octofinals, which is SO SO COOL. And! He was next in to quarterfinals. He went 1, 2, 6 in the octo. WHAT WAS THE 6th place judge THINKING???

It is a big deal to break at nationals, and we are so so so proud of him

The team even had time to sightsee before their flight home

And now? SUMMER LEAGUE is upon us, and the All City Dive season is in full swing. Minnie, who gets to pool hop and try out every pool club in town, is most excited, but we all love it.

 

Is this not the most Madison sign that has ever Madison-ed???

Season 2: SUMMMMMMMMA

 Oh, do I love summer!

The relaxed mornings!

The pool!

The light reads by my favorite, most reliable authors! 

Minnie and I put together a light summer structure that we are super excited about since we are continuing to be camp-and-childcare-free.* Here's what we got:

Make it Monday (baking or crafts, weather dependent)

New park Tuesday

Sweet treat Wednesday (stole this years ago from Kelsey Wharton)

Library Thursday (this one is mainly for me because I need a regular day f I am actually going to read my books).

Fun Fun Friday

Here's Minnie's Friday bag of destiny:

Besides that, I have a few other goals for this fleeting season:

Celebrations:

We have 8th grade promotion, high school graduation, our 15 year house-iversary, our 21st anniversary, Harry's 20th, and Minnie's 6th-- I want to make them all special and memorable. We will also celebrate TWO college move-ins this summer and dance and dive nationals season. Phew!!

Fitness:

Increase my daily run from 30 minutes to 40

Take a barre class

Take a hot yoga class

Household:

Trade out some of my daily cleaning products for less toxic versions. I will still use bleach spray in the bathrooms when they need it, but my everyday wipe-down cleaner could be something gentle not lemon bleach-free Clorox, for example, that makes me cough and cannot possibly be good for us.

Use baking soda and a toothbrush to clean the sink when I am putting the kitchen to bed

Personal/professional development:

Work on an intentional email check in routine instead of the avoid and dig out shuffle I have going on now

Use my planner every day

Write in my one-sentence journal every day-ish instead of doing a binge

Do 2 no-spend days a week

Observe Christmas (shopping) in July

Fun:

Visit our town's James Beard nominated bar

Go out to dinner with Ben

Order pizza at the pool

Drink Tito's and lemonade by the pool (literally does not feel like summer until I do this)

Cultivate a yes-and mentality as default summer mom mode

Do a Girls rewatch while I lift weights (this show is freaking hilarious now that I am basically Hannah's parents).

*Cooper and Dorothy both have diving from 10-11:30. Then Cooper dives again from 2-5. Plus Dorothy has 12-ish hours of dance a week. And Cooper works at the pool's front desk in his off time-- they are SO BUSY that they really don't have time for anything else. Sports ARE their "childcare" and they are both old enough to BE my childcare for Minnie, so this is not the flex it used to be.