Currently August

Currently...

*Enjoying settling in to our new home! After moving across the country and knowing for about a year that a move was likely, it's a relief to be able to settle in and have things feel less up in the air. I love how light and bright the space is and lots of cool features and quirks of living in a 100-year-old house.

*Embracing novelty and discovering new things in San Diego. It's a significantly bigger city than where we were in Colorado, so it's been great exploring new restaurants, museums, parks, beaches etc.

*Struggling to get into a good routine, particularly around bedtimes and nap time for Avi. Moving twice in two months has been a lot for all of us, and I'm trying to remember that it will take time to feel settled again. The lack of predictable routine (and time to myself) has made some of the days feel particularly long recently.

*Feeling ambivalent about working vs. staying home. For the first time in nearly a decade, I am not returning to the classroom. It felt like one to many transitions this year to start work at a new school, and I am really grateful for the extra time at home with Avi and getting to nerd-out on Montessori and early childhood learning. That said, I'm noticing that I'm feeling guilt for not working or worry that I should be doing more right now. I'm trying to sit with the feeling without impulsively readjusting everything. I know that I don't feel the same judgement towards other stay-at-home parents that I do towards myself, and I'm also guessing part of this is just adjusting to the back-to-school season away from a school community and job I really enjoyed.

*Listening to Kate Bush and The Head and the Heart (especially after going to their concert earlier this week). Also listening to all the Music Together cd on repeat with Avi and melting a bit each time I see her paging through the songbook and singing along.

* Walking around our new neighborhood and to the park and library just about every day.

*Shopping at Trader Joe's again and obsessed with the veggie soba stir fry.

*Reading books like: Wahala (loved but the ending was a bit off the rails), The Best We Can Do, and rereading Pride and Prejudice.

*Appreciating being an hour away from so many family members and reconnecting with friends who live in the area.

*Looking ahead to feeling more at home each week here and building many more memories in this new place.

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Adventures Big & Small

Photos from a recent adventure I just started listening to Tranquility by Tuesday by Laura Vanderkam, and one of the ideas she mentioned was planning 2 adventures each week: one big and one small. As I was listening to her describe the rule, I thought about what I had planned this week and realized that I had a few adventures planned without thinking of them in that way. It really helped shift my mindset to realize that I do have some fun and novel things planned, and I'm curious to experiment with adding this to the routine, particularly as we are settling into a new city. I feel like I've plateaued a bit the last few weeks even though things are finally starting to feel settled down. I hit a point where I missed our Colorado friends and my old job, even if I feel like this move and taking time to be at home is right for us in the long run. Thinking through new adventures in this new phase of life is a way to balance some of this feel...

Toddler Travel--Road Trip Edition

So happy to be writing from Southern California after our road trip out from Colorado. It has been so nice to see family and enjoy cooler weather and time at the beach. This was far and away the longest Avi has ever been in the car, and it was definitely less relaxing to drive long distances with a toddler, but it actually went better than I thought it would. I love road trips, so I'm happy that this is something we can look forward to lots more of as a family. In case anyone else is planning to travel with their little one(s), I thought I would share a few things we did that helped, and a few things I wished we did differently. Tips: *Bring various activities that can be easily done from a car seat. I brought some of Avi's favorite toys including: a toy she could buckle and unbuckle, a chunky beads and thread kit, and a paint with water set from Melissa and Doug's . I also brought bubbles which were a big hit although we left them in...

May in Review

One of my favorite features of my planner is that it has a month in review section for each month. I like having the prompt to take a look back on the month and remember some of the highlights and big events as well as favorites (anything ranging from books, tv shows, games, music, and food). May was a very full month. It was Joel's birthday, we had family visiting for a bit, and it was the end of the school year. I definitely felt spread thin for parts of the month, but overall, I'm really proud of how I ended the year at work. There were lots of fun end-of-year projects like Wonder Week, a memory book, and our beach day! Hopefully these projects felt like a good way for students to look back on the year and celebrate how far they've come. I feel lucky to have had such a wonderful group of students in such a strange school year that ranged from virtual to fully in-person and everything in between. ...

Eye to Wonder

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