June’s been pretty good! Lots of warm weather, parks, splash pads, fireworks, concerts, softball, and fun. May was a bit of a mess, and I had been planning on taking a blogging break for all of June and a social media cleanse at some point in the month. But I came back from vacation and I was all fired up! I had a bunch of ideas and projects and blogging was easy again. I wouldn’t say I’ve fallen into a slump again, but I am considering taking that blog vacation for real in July. But I am about to go on another vacation and may come back totally jazzed again. Who knows.

One of the really cool things about June is that I kind of just said “meh” to a lot of stuff. I started asking myself “well… what happens if I don’t?” a lot and it meant I was less overwhelmed with my to-do list, cared a lot less about what people thought, and got all my essential stuff done. I also looked like I let myself go most of the month (turns out that is NOT my priority lol) and my house was a disaster. Idk. Still a mixed bag.

Hence the random Monday blog post – I like to do my GBOMB as the last post in the month but last week it just wasn’t happenin’. Better late than never? I don’t care.

Good

• Omg I did my first escape room with Harry Potter Book Club, it was HP themed and it was SO MUCH FREAKING FUN. I haven’t had that kind of adrenaline in YEARS. (It was Horcrux Hysteria at Alcatraz Escape Games.)
• I finally started feeling better – kicked that stupid cold that had literally plagued me for 6+ weeks. This meant HIGH classes and Zumba classes and dropping weight each week on the scale. That felt great.
• Malone has reached my absolute favorite age – 4 months. She’s healthy as a horse and right on target according to her 4 month appointment. She is smiling and cooing and laughing and just SO FUN. It’s hard to want to do anything but play with her.
• I found a cute Mia Maid in my ward to babysit occasionally for dates and while I get work done during the week and it’s honestly been a game changer.
• I’ve been doing a good job at paring down my list. I found a simple joy one day in just reading a good interior design book I checked out from the library. I was sitting on the couch with a Diet Coke, cuddling Lolo and reading this great book. Then I found myself making THAT a priority instead of one more article or one more blog post or one more tiny chore. I still have a long way to go to find the balance, because I dropped a lot but still. I’m proud of it.
• My brother came out! This is pretty firmly in the “good” category. I will write about it, hopefully soon. I’ve gone back and forth and drafted 4-5 posts, but just never felt ready for any of them. A good friend told me it’s a good idea to wait until I was done processing (if I ever ~get done) before sharing and that’s good advice I’m trying to take. I’ll be sharing more about my feelings and the roller coaster emotions aftermath, but for now I want to be very clear – this is so good. I’m so happy for him and proud of him and so excited for his future now that he can live more honestly and freely. It’s just good. Any other thoughts and feelings aren’t about him or his coming out, just the “other”stuff that comes with it. Other people, to be precise. Whatever. We’ll talk later.
• Found a new podcast I’m liking – the Purposeful Home. Two young Christian moms with 4 little kids apiece talking about motherhood and minimalism and life hacking and just all the stuff I want to know!
• Ryan has been taking Reese out for golf dates and it’s adorable. She rides in the cart and picks up the golf balls she’s not supposed to touch, and just hangs out with her dad. I think it’s the cutest. I’m supposed to be getting work done while they go but I just check my snaps every 5 minutes for more funny videos and pics.

Bad

• Reese can open her door. So we had a couple of rough days before Amazon Prime came through with those childproof handles lol. She does 1-2 hours of independent play in her room each day (napping when the Lord decides to bless me) and boy do I need it.
• We got SO CLOSE to our very ambitious savings goal but not quite there. Now that I’m at the end of the month I’m just really feel disappointed because I know we could have done it if we’d just been a little more diligent.
• I. DRANK. NO. WATER.
• I feel like I say this every month but honestly my house has not been clean this entire month. Like I clean up big messes and gross messes and easy messes, but never like a legit clean.
• I have not been doing great about reading with Reese. It makes me feel so guilty that she used to love books and now she asks for movies or the ipad or youtube all the time. I need to do better.
• I dealt with a LOT of aggression and anxiety and fear this month. Some warranted, some unwarranted. It’s not like me to want to hide at home, but that’s how I felt for a lot of June.
• June still found me in my doctor’s office twice trying to find out what is going on with my thyroid and (TMI) post-baby healing stuff (4 months later eyeroll). The changing medications and blood draws are just wearing on me. I just want it all to go away.

On My Brain

• I think I’m going to start scheduling “nothing” days. Days with absolutely NOTHING scheduled. Those days are the days I weirdly get the most done! I randomly decide to mop and sanitize my floor. I get way ahead on blog posts. I just feel 100 emoji.
• This blog post is one of the very best ones on parenting/motherhood I’ve ever read. I keep coming back to it. It’s funny, helpful, poignant, inspiring, and just plain good. Parenting think pieces are a dime a dozen but this one is worth your time.
• I’m reading Ashley Mae Hoiland’s book “One Hundred Birds Taught Me To Fly” and I just want to go so slow and savor it. HUGE RECOMMENDATION. But this one part is just walking around with me everywhere I go. She talks about putting herself in the story of the friends cutting a hole in the roof to lower their buddy down to be healed by Jesus inside. She says she wonders if there were people who were in the house or waiting patiently outside who were upset about it, these people cutting ahead to see Jesus while they were doing it “the right way.” I felt my heart just fold because… yeah. I would be. But I was heartened when she went on to say that she hopes most people would just be happy for the healed man and impressed at his compassionate friends, feeling lucky to have witnessed a miracle. I think I would be that too, after I got over being a Type A self righteous loser. She says everyone takes different paths to Jesus, and yeah, going through the roof is an unorthodox one but its not any less valid. Maybe we should just be happy to be witnessing the miracle in their lives.
• My heart has been hurting so bad for all the domestic violence victims in the news lately. We have to talk about this, guys. Abusive partners absolutely have the potential to kill you. Please look for signs of abuse in your friend’s and families’ relationships. Do whatever you can to help them leave the situation safely. Listen and believe them – don’t call them crazy or dramatic.
• Wow sorry to be heavy two bullets in a row but I also read this super interesting article about abortion in Utah (spoiler: it’s a lot of married women, with some probable explanations). I think there are so many connecting pieces to abortion, and although I don’t think I will ever be able to truly support it as a pro-choice advocate, I am learning more and more about it and the circumstances of it and it’s stripping away a lot of my ignorance and judgement.  At the very least it’s interesting to see the statistics don’t always reflect the irresponsible teen/young adult stereotype that I know a lot of people picture. (Meanwhile the US teen birth rate has hit an all time low which is awesome!) P.S. I’m a big fan of sex ed! Yes in schools! No it won’t get your kids hooked on porn!

Yikes sorry that got so serious but I have had a lot of feelings this month. Very looking forward to my vacation and hopefully a more calm and stable July. Goals for July include getting my online planning class completely ready to go, perfecting Reese’s ABC’s (she is SO CLOSE – she can get 20-23 in the right order lol) and counting to 10 (also close but she hates the number 4 for some reason? idk), and diving in deep with the huge stack of interior design books I checked out from the library – they have been so fun so far!!!

July has an Idaho vacation, visiting friends, holidays, a girl’s trip to see Mamma Mia (!!!), and our 6 year anniversary. I’m really dedicating July to calm, peace, stability, and HOME. With a dash of fireworks.