Behind the Screen: Sweater Weather

Nothing gets me more excited than the feeling of sweater weather coming my way. It has been a blistering summer and I am so delighted to find cooler temperatures this week.

The kids are actually taking sweaters to school in the morning and I am so happy to be reunited with my jeans again. The summer body did not happen this year friends but my fall sweater body is seriously on point.

It was Pumpkin Spice Day yesterday- did anyone hit their local Starbucks?  This is a deep dark secret for me but I actually hate Pumpkin Spice Lattes.  Flavored and sweet coffee drinks are not my jam but I almost want to buy one year after year because I get so much FOMO seeing all the PSL joy on social media.

We are back on a fairly regular routine now with school back in session and I am trying to really charge ahead on a bunch of projects that are shamefully, shamefully past due.  Also trying to get motivated to work ahead on blog content.  Can you believe bloggers are already photographing ideas for Christmas?  I can never seem to get ahead on seasonal stuff- when it is 105 degrees I am not thinking of Santa let me tell you.

So what are some things I am loving lately?

Adventures not gifts.  I have mentioned this a few times over the years on the blog, but now that the children are getting older we have been trying to give experiences and adventures with them rather than parties.  Instead of big, elaborate birthday parties we try to find a family adventure instead.  This year my little one went to California’s Great America and for my older daughter (11 already!), we rented a boat for the day and took the kids tubing.  This worked out so beautifully because we went the day before school started and the lake was practically empty.  The price was actually the same as if we had done the typical skating rink/bounce place etc… party and we had so much fun as a family.  Addy still got a handful of gifts (a new softball glove, a gift card to an indoor rock climbing place, a mister for soccer, art supplies and so on..) but the money we would have spent on a party was spent on creating memories as a family.

I was talking to a friend about this and she has already purchased tickets to see the Harry Potter Cursed Child tickets with her daughter and planned a weekend away with another child as an alternative to Christmas gifts.  I just loved that and she inspired me to start thinking ahead to Christmas as well.

Wish paper. Have you seen this?  I haven’t been able to get this idea out of my head since I heard about it on Gretchen Rubin’s podcast.  

Wish paper is thin, tissue like paper that you can write down hopes, dreams, prayers, wishes on and you light the paper on fire and it floats up into the air and burns up.  I think this is such a fun idea for parties or would be a lovely tribute to someone or a cathartic way to say goodbye to something or someone that hurt you by writing something on the paper and watching it fly away…  I haven’t been able to get this out of my head so we will see what use I come up with for wish paper.  Click here to see a bunch of options of Wish Paper.

Dog Treat Puzzle. Completely random but I am ordering this dog treat puzzle.  We have two puppies that get bored and anxious when we all leave the house and I heard these puzzles can be great to stimulate a dog.

(Calm… sleepy… happy… the minute I leave the house all h**l breaks loose and they turn into little beasts of destruction)

The treats are hidden in the puzzle and the dog uses his paws and feet to try and dig them out. Click here to take a look. We did order the slow feeder awhile back from the same company for our puppy that seriously inhales his food. He would make himself throw up because he ate his food so quickly. So gross. Our vet recommended this and it just forces the dog to eat a bit slower and has worked really well in extending his eating time from 30 seconds to about 4-5 minutes. Click here to take a look.

Did you read the book Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn?  Boy it was a creepy one but I could not put it down.  Just as dark as her other book, Gone Girl, but even more disturbing characters.  If you enjoy Law & Order, you will like this one.  The book was adapted into a mini series on HBO and I am just about to watch the season finale.  The series is obviously not nearly as good as the show so you might consider reading the book first because I thought the conclusion of this story was completely unexpected and so creepy!  If you have been watching the show, what is your opinion?  It was gritty like I expected but there are so many little things that they weren’t able to get into the show- I feel like you miss a lot of the character development and background.  I do not like scary movies and books but I still couldn’t stop tuning in for this show.  (Just not right before bed- ha!)

That about wraps up August for us.  Soccer is in full swing- we are pretty happy with both teams for the girls this year.  It is always tricky finding the right coaches and the right groups of girls to match their skill and bring out the best in them.  This year we seem to have a good fit for both to keep them loving the sport.  I always remind myself children’s athletics are a marathon not a sprint so it doesn’t have to be the best team, it just has to be a team that challenges the child at the moment.  Winter Ball started so you will find me at the ball park every weekend for the next 5 weeks or so and my little darling girl has decided to do cross country too.  Bless that sweet girl that actually enjoys running.  Mommy only runs if something is on fire behind me.

But that brings me to my last favorite thing for August.  If you have girls in sports or boys with longer hair, I FINALLY found headbands that are amazing!  They don’t slip off, they are nice and thick to keep all hair off the face, they are durable and I am just delighted with them.  These Nike head wraps are basically a sash and you fit them on your head and knot them in the back for a perfect fit.  They stay in place and I have one for each kid.  I found ours at Dick’s Sporting Goods but the color selection was really limited (Addy has the royal blue one you can see here) and her sister has a lighter blue color.  I avoided black as you obviously don’t want to attract sun to the face and white as I think it would look filthy all the time. I found this one at Kohl’s that I will probably order too.  These are awesome sports moms!  Pick them up for your strong girls.

I hope your August was amazing and thank you for sticking with me this summer!  Hoping to have lots of content for you going into fall and the holiday season.