First, a catch up
Josh was on call over the weekend, so I took over and tried to keep the kids busy with things. On Saturday we met up with G’s friend at the beach (FL-style playdate — C came with me since he’s friends with G’s friend’s brother; A chose to stay home)! There was a ton of seaweed but that did not stop these kids. The waves were calm and all the kids swam/rode the baby waves for quite a while.
Her friends’ dad went in and I watched from the shore with an elevated heart rate (honestly, I can only relax at the beach if Josh is there and officially in charge of the kids’ lives). After lunch (at a little beach shack) I decided to call it a win and we headed back to relax.
On Sunday, we had a slow start. I took a walk with G (we ran into Josh who captured the moment, ha). Nothing like repping two of our favorite places:
Then G proudly made lunch. Don’t even ask what’s in the bowl. I was pretty impressed with her ants on a log though!
It was a “regular” weekend and I wasn’t in the best mood, but looking back there were definitely some sweet moments. Oh, and I started this (read while the kids jumped around at Urban Air)!
Finally, I want to give tribute to Josh’s great-aunt Marilyn, who passed away at the age of 104 over the weekend. Marilyn was an amazing woman who remained sharp into her 100s (seriously!) and was always eager to talk to me at family gatherings. Despite the fact that Josh has a large family (so there are lots o kids in our generation), she knew the kids’ names and all kinds of details about them. She was caring and truly was interested in the details of our lives. She also exchanged knitting notes with my mom over email well into her 90s.
I believe Marilyn really enjoyed her time on this planet and am really glad I got to know her.
A centering moment
THE PAST ~7 WEEKS
This summer has been . . . a little weird, I feel like.
I really did slow down, and overall that felt good and right. I chose not to push as hard in my creative work, and even parenting has been easier with the kids not having late night activities (or homework!).
I have gotten to connect more with friends, which is awesome! I went to book club, out to dinner with my running friends, visited a running friend who just had a baby, and last week had dinner with my good friend who lives in Miami Beach (we did lots of speculative vacation planning together as our families enjoy hanging out on trips). Josh and I got more date nights. I probably got some more sleep.
(And, the friends theme is going to continue as I hang out with my college besties this week and then head to a ballet performance with another friend — and A — this weekend).
On the flip side, I have this nagging feeling like I didn’t use the time “in the best way”. There were some days where I just didn’t feel motivated to get much done (and because deadlines weren’t pressing . . . I just didn’t)! That’s totally okay, but I would have been better off just designating them chill days vs squirming around feeling like “well, I COULD be doing productive things, but I don’t really NEED to so I’ll just spin my wheels and plan our Hawaii vacation for 2026.”
(That is what I did for a lot of yesterday! Which I guess isn’t the WORST use of time!)
Honestly, objectively speaking things were fine so I should probably just ignore my sense of unease. Maybe this WAS my version of productive this summer.
WHERE ARE WE NOW:
There are less than 2 weeks left before school starts and the hustle of all of the activities begins. I am both looking forward to it, and not. I did get started on the “must do” list with uniform ordering over the weekend — this felt like an admission that we’re getting close! I think I am ready to shift into a slightly more productive/focused gear myself, though. There is plenty to get ready for and the life admin will come for me if I don’t proactively deal with it, anyway.
More tomorrow! I am going to miss this AM blogging time, I have to say. I don’t have to leave for work until the luxurious hour of 8 AM, and that’s going to snap right back to ~7:30 (PLUS with kid-wrangling/cajoling complicating the whole “getting ready” process) before I know it, eliminating this nice quiet little segment. (Maybe Josh and I will do a better job of dividing + conquering the mornings next school year – this remains TBD!).
10 Comments
We are so wired to be productive, I know I struggle the same. The way I’m shifting my perspective is the finite time I have with the girls which is just few years left before they leave living with us. With kids especially Lizzy, simple things are what ground me the most like a walk after dinner around the block, just as you are doing with G, having silly mundane conversations. By all productivity means it was not productive 30 min that I could have done like planning or reading, but I enjoyed it more than 10 years younger me would have.
YES to feeling like summer wasn’t optimally productive. I am also struggling with this. DID I SPEND TIME THE BEST WAY? Ugh. Probably not. But is the best a good frame? I don’t know…
I am a big fan of revealed preferences. You did what you wanted to do, and that is valuable! After all, what’s the point in productivity? I think it’s to allow you to do the stuff you need to with enough time for the stuff you want to do. The other stuff will either get done or it will turn out that it didn’t need to.
I think we’re exposed to so many options for how to fill our time and competing ideas of what we should fill our time with.
For me, it tends to end in guilt. Like if I feel like I’ve squandered time, I feel guilty. I would say I’m 50% better about these feelings after my Year of Shmita, but I really should go back and revisit those posts for a refresher and a good reminder that it’s okay to do nothing sometimes.
I struggle to remember that I’m generally MORE productive overall if I have adequate rest and downtime. But that’s counter to what our culture tends to preach…
Reframe: Investing in self care in the form of downtime and family relationships IS productive.
It’s fun to dream about future vacations – we just got back from Hawaii (3rd trip). Note: We go in the summer and it’s 2 of us, but we’ve never booked anything in advance besides air travel and AirBnB. We’ve still gotten to do everything we want, and it allows us to better accommodate energy/weather changes better. Might be different in winter depending where you are going. What island?
We are going next summer!! Maui (we have been before, for honeymoon 20 yrs ago) and Kauai (have never been). This time w the kids 🙂
I got my mom The Correspondent for her birthday but haven’t read it myself yet. Glad to hear you’re enjoying it! I’m really hoping to do Hawaii in 2027 (to celebrate the big 4-0), so I hope you’ll keep sharing about your travel planning! It’s totally productive!
We just went to Maui this year with kids- happy to send any recommendations if you’d like!
OOOH! I read The Correspondent and loved it. I hope you like it too!
Yeah… I’m starting to think I just shouldn’t make any grand plans for the summer. “Summer of Strength”, “Summer of Speed”, “Summer of Reading”… it never pans out the way I want it to. I know what you mean about a vague sense of dissatisfaction, now that it’s coming to an end. I guess the key is to do some reframing. We can’t be “on” 100% of the time.
maybe you and I just need to embrace . . summer of lassitude!!!