Big Summer Catch-Up

Greetings, long-lost friends! For the last three months, I’ve struggled to put these posts together until it felt too late in the month to do so. I’ve had no energy + distraction-free time to write anything down. It can be a lot of work just to get through the day. So I’m about to feel accomplished when this goes up!

Main Events

Item 1: I am now the mom of a two-year-old! This feels both crazy and appropriate. We had a Wheels on the Bus party for C in the backyard, with friends and neighbors and water entertainment. Everyone had fun – I felt a lot more relaxed than I did at his first birthday party. When I look at these pictures, I see how much C has grown (physically and as a person) in a short time. He is talking up a storm, building social skills and humor, has strong opinions, loves music and books (yay!), is coloring and building with blocks, knows the alphabet and can count to ten. I’m really proud of him. Also so thankful for the great preschool he now attends.

Item 2: This Taylor Swift Eras Tour Summer will live in my heart forever! I was #blessed to attend Night 2 in Nashville at the beginning of May, with my sister Debra and her best friend Erin. The three of us went to the Speak Now tour together, forever ago, and were able to continue the tradition thanks to Erin staying in the Ticketmaster queue all day. We met up in Nashville the morning of the show and headed down early for the full SwiftieCon experience.

Our seats were almost at the top of the stadium, but we could still see everything! The entire time, I was filled with the kind of collective joy that I usually only feel about sports. The energy was amazing and so was the show. Best concert of my life (so far).

We packed snacks for our long wait to get out of the parking lot!

All summer I’ve loved watching videos and following the various events on the tour. I believe documentaries will be made about it someday, and I’ll get to tell C I was there. To extend the fun, I am throwing myself a Swiftie birthday party. You’ll hear all about it next month!

Item 3: Taylor and I celebrated our fourth anniversary. It was on a Thursday, and we just exchanged cards and then he cooked dinner for me. In fact, we had to spend some of the evening emptying my parents’ fridge into a dumpster after a power outage. #realmarriedlife This sort of tracks with our other anniversaries (two of which happened in lockdown). Taylor says we’ll take a nice trip next year for our fifth. Fingers crossed.

Reading

Three months of books. Here we go!!

How to Keep House While Drowning: A Gentle Approach to Cleaning and Organizing by KC Davis (5 stars) If you follow KC on TikTok or Insta, this short book is a collection of her greatest hits, which feel even more helpful and powerful all together. This is a message so many of us need.

Four Views on Hell, ed. Stanley N. Gundry (3 stars) My church book club decided to read this in May, since some of us only recently learned that there’s more than one perspective on hell!! We skipped all the smarmy rebuttals, but the actual viewpoints were interesting.

Transforming: The Bible & the Lives of Transgender Christians by Austen Hartke (4 stars) We read this for July book club. A very approachable, personal, and well-written book.

Happy Place by Emily Henry (4 stars) EH has become an automatic-purchase author for me. Her latest is about a group of friends on their annual coastal vacation, and the couple who hasn’t told the others that they broke up.

Remain Nameless by HeyJude19 (5 stars) In April, Manacled was my gateway drug into Dramione fanfiction. I saw a lot of people recommend the rom-commy Remain Nameless as a palate cleanser, and I loved it so much that I read it again a week later! This fic begins with Hermione and Draco, now in their late 20s and trying to heal their post-war trauma, running into each other at a Muggle coffee shop. It’s swoony and as relatable as a story set in the wizarding world can be, and this Ginny is fantastic. More on my fanfic deep dive in a minute.

Draco Malfoy and the Mortifying Ordeal of Being in Love by isthisselfcare (5 stars) This fanfic is set 15 years after the war and features Auror Draco being Hermione’s bodyguard as she works on a secret project that’s earning her death threats. It’s a bantery adventure and an absolute delight. I really regret that it can never be a movie.

Live Learn Love Well: Lessons from a Life of Progress Not Perfection by Emma Lovewell (3 stars) Emma is one of my favorite Peloton instructors, and it was fun to read stories from her life.

House of Sky and Breath by Sarah J. Maas (3.5 stars) Like its predecessor, this book was brilliant in spots and interminable in others. I thought I was never going to get to the payoff. So ready for the ACOTAR/Crescent City crossover!! I know I need to knock out the Throne of Glass series too, but I’m not there yet.

All My Knotted-Up Life: A Memoir by Beth Moore (4.5 stars) We read this for June’s church book club. If you have ever heard of Beth Moore, I recommend this.

From Hollywood with Love: The Rise and Fall (and Rise Again) of the Romantic Comedy by Scott Maslow (3.5 stars) A brief history of the rom-com.

Scattered Showers by Rainbow Rowell (4 stars) A short story collection with check-ins on most of her past characters, and some really creative new stories.

Hello, Molly!: A Memoir by Molly Shannon (3.5 stars) A fun and moving memoir. I loved hearing about everything Mary Katherine Gallagher.

Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld (3.5 stars) A writer for a late-night comedy show has sparks with a guest host, but his fame makes her feel too insecure. Then they get a second chance. I think this is the first novel I’ve read that incorporates the pandemic.

Humans of New York: Stories by Brandon Stanton (4 stars) I’ve been meaning to look at this forever. Good stuff.

Memphis by Tara M. Stringfellow (4.5 stars) A moving novel about three generations of women in a house in North Memphis, their community, and their brushes with history.

Will by Will Smith with Mark Manson (3.5 stars) I was iffy about this since Will Smith hasn’t been a super reliable narrator lately, but it was better than I thought? I definitely understand him better.

The Roughest Draft by Emily Wibberley and Austin Siegmund-Broka (3.5 stars) A pair of successful co-writers are forced to fulfill their contract and write one more book together, despite the fact that they haven’t spoken in four years. This was predictable, but romantic and it’s set in Key Largo!

In My Dramione Era

Above are most of my favorite Dramione fics that I’ve read since falling down the rabbit hole in April. This relationship has clearly become my coping mechanism, but oh well. I owe it all to the TikTok algorithm that showed me a random video about Manacled. I’m currently only counting five-star reads in my book totals, which means an embarrassing number of words is going unlogged. If you are also Dramione trash, please reach out as I have no one to discuss with!! The three below are my GOATs and I’d recommend reading them in this order. I think DMATMOOBIL might be enjoyable even if you’ve never read Harry Potter.

Watching

The Barbie movie was so good!! I did not expect to cry. You can read America Ferrerra’s monologue here, IYKYK.

I have also watched Air (really good) and the miniseries Love and Death (Elizabeth Olsen was flawless, and I was obsessed with her pre-trial haircut). I never really watched Succession, because I have a low tolerance for horrible people being horrible, but I knew enough to want to watch the finale. Taylor correctly predicted the… successor.

Listening

The Barbie soundtrack is solid.

And this brought joy to me and the rest of the class of 97:

Summer Fun

We enjoyed our annual Redbirds outing with the friends I used to go to the Redbirds with, like, weekly. C was more into it this year, pointing and saying “baseball!”

More snapshots of our summer:

Botanic Gardens with BFFs Kara and Ollie

Travel

I went to Hollywood Beach not once, but TWICE in July! We took a family trip with all my in-laws over Fourth of July weekend. We got a condo Airbnb just off the boardwalk – I could still see our balcony while in the ocean. It was perfect and I wanted to move in permanently. Since my last update, C has developed a terror of the bath and I was worried how that would translate on a beach vacation. Happily, he had fun in the pool and the ocean! Guess I can start thinking about swim lessons again!

My uncle took Taylor, me, and my MIL out on his new boat!

We also visited my grandfather – my last grandparent standing. He turned 90 in January!

A few weeks after our trip, my mom, sister and nieces had plans to go to Hollywood Beach too. Since our grandfather is getting a little frail, my brother decided to join in on the trip with his family so they could visit him. Meanwhile, I’ve been trying to get out west to visit Kevin all summer and nothing has worked out. Taylor suggested I fly down for the now-big sibling trip instead! I was able to get a room at the same resort, just a few blocks from the Fourth of July place.

On the boat again! Note: I can testify to the Atlantic record heat, because Biscayne Bay was creepily warm. It was sweltering in general this entire trip. I can’t remember the last time I was just as uncomfortable in South Florida (ocean breeze) as Memphis (oven). We ate outside a couple of times and felt like we might pass out.

One night we watched a beautiful sunset from the boat, and the next night we saw dolphins! I was so excited to get this shot of the dolphin with the Miami skyline.

At Home

After over three years in our house, my greenhouse is fully complete and functional!! Taylor took out all the glass and replaced it with corrugated plastic, which will hopefully not shatter every time a tree branch falls. This is the first time the greenhouse has actually been sealed! We can now safely winter the lemon tree in there, and I should be able to grow some cool season crops. I also have a potting bench!

We semi-purposely let one side of the backyard grow wild. As a result, we get a lot of wildlife. Chipmunks, a rabbit family, and lots of birds!

Meanwhile, I overhauled our cat litter situation, because the odor was becoming a problem. I implemented everything a church friend/cat expert told me to do. Rufus now has a litter genie and official litter genie brand box, filled with Fresh & Natural cat litter from Hollywood Feed. HIGHLY RECOMMEND this equipment if you have a cat.

Since May, a cleaner has been coming to our house every other week. It’s a huge help. Honestly life-changing. I was barely staying on top of basic chores and felt pretty hopeless. Now that I know the house WILL get cleaned again soon, keeping up seems more manageable.

Beauty

My favorite products this summer:

Megababe Thigh Rescue. Everyone do yourself a favor and buy it. You have suffered enough.
Pearlessence Hydrating Makeup Remover. This is only available at Marshalls and TJMaxx (where I saw it and thought, why not). It works better than even Clinique Take the Day Off, feels amazing, and cost a whopping 4 bucks. If they stop carrying it I’m going to be very sad.
Curlsmith Hydro Style Flexi Jelly. The good news is, I think my long search for a new everyday hair gel is over. The bad news is, *flying money emoji*
SeoulCeuticals Vitamin C serum. It’s an actual serum, not a lotion like Kiehl’s (which I was using before).
Eczema Honey eye cream. Wish I’d known about this two years ago!
Elemis pro-collagen night cream: this sample came in my Ipsy bag and smells/feels wonderful, but the cost for a full size made me swoon, so this will probably be it.
Not pictured: IT Cosmetics CC Cream with SPF. Great summer foundation.

In June, feeling bleah about the eternal quest to cover my grays, I tried Overtone Rose Gold for Brown Hair. I wanted something fun and was a little nervous it would be too much, but after two applications, no one could tell any difference. BOO. I then discovered that my usual, Natural Instincts, has a rose gold shade. I was much happier with those results!

Wearing

Since becoming a mom, I have constantly lost things. Important things, like my phone and wallet. It’s gotten worse, and of course every incident made me feel worse about myself. I decided I needed a larger, quality purse with enough room for C’s important things, so I wouldn’t have to move my stuff to and from a diaper bag anymore. After some research I got the Cairo bag from Elkie & Co. It has multiple strap options, tons of pockets, and a washable lining. In addition to everything I could need, it easily holds a few diapers, snacks, a sippy cup, and C’s tablet. I’m loving it so far.

I got this floral romper at Old Navy. They also have it in gingham and a few solids.

This summer, I’ve done a lot of shopping for a particular type of dress. Casual, but nice enough to wear to work or to lead liturgy. Nothing super short. Nothing too fitted. Nothing requiring a weird bra. NO ZIPPERS. I’ve bought several dresses from Pact (including this one) and am pretty happy with them.

These earrings from Target are great.

Random Happiness

The true community vibe at my church is one of the best things in my life these days. I was able to attend a church women’s swim, which was exciting enough, and then we saw this great rainbow.

I found this rearview mirror decoration while looking for a license plate frame. I’m not usually into this kind of thing, but in this case I needed it.

I bought this set of rabbit abstracts for $20 at a neighborhood yard sale. I don’t have anywhere to hang them right now because we’re maxed out on art, but I had to have them. The top left is my favorite. I had it propped up on my dresser for a while.