Hello! Happy Friday!

Thanks for all the sweet notes about my skirt project this week – was a nice welcome back to blogging after taking a bit of a break. I appreciate your being here more than you know.

It’s been a kooky week around here. Husband was gone for work for the second week in a row, BG was sick at the beginning of the week, and we are still adjusting to our new schedule. I wake up at the crack of dawn, but for some reason, we CANNOT get out the door on time in the mornings. Hoping next week is a little easier.

But for now, we’re making plans for our glorious 3-day weekend and soaking up these last little bits of summer. Speaking of summer,while I didn’t do very many Five Things posts these last few months, I kept a running list of good stuff on my laptop, so here are a few things I found noteworthy this summer:

1. I finished this book this week, and I loved it. Great information and ideas, and it also referenced a bunch of other books I’ve enjoyed this year (like this and this and this and this and this). I feel it is a little more geared toward parents of high schoolers, but there’s plenty of inspiration and ideas for parents of younger kids, too. It didn’t reference this book (which is the parenting book I use most – I took a class on it that was so helpful), but I felt like it could have – lots of similar ideas on how to help our kids be independent and solve their own problems.

2. This was interesting. Are you a wine person? What do you think about this?

3. The Key Jar. I found this last spring from Momastery, but I didn’t print it out and start using it until summer. I’m finding that it’s even better now that school has started and BB is making new friends in a new class. We get much deeper conversations than the “How was your day?” question draws. Both kids beg for more and more questions every day – it’s like a game for them.

4. This makes me SO ready for fall.

5. This cracked me up. I still feel like a newbie on Instagram, but I love it – avocado toast, rosé, fancy designs in lattes, and all.

So, apparently, I have parenting and wine on the brain. Must be back-to-school time! How about you? If you’re in the States, do you have big plans for Labor Day? Husband and BB started a go-kart last weekend, so more of that will be happening, we’ve got plans to BBQ with friends, and then we’re going to escape for a little daytrip (destination TBD). Hope you have a wonderful weekend!