College football starts THIS WEEKEND! Whaaa? It feels like it should be June 7th, amirite!? With football comes chili and like I said, it came fast this year! If you haven’t yet entered my 13th annual chili contest, you’re in luck — 3 spots remain! Shoot me an email (preventionrd at GMAIL.com) with a recipe you love, whether it’s original or not, just be sure to include the original source of the recipe is not your own (and trust me, most recipes are not original and that’s totally, totally okay).
We’ve got our teacher assignments, we’ve shopped for back-to-school and have our backpacks packed and ready to go, and packages of back-to-school clothes (and shoes!) are arriving in droves. This kind of thing happens when you don’t live near retail stores. I mean…my kids had never been in a Target before last weekend. Yes, for real. And yes, our schools here start crazy late. I love it! September is totally summer, so as far as I’m concerned, I’d rather we started even later in the year! It’s nearly unbelievable to me that Shea is entering 2nd grade and Piper kindergarten. And not only that, but in less than 2 weeks, Piper will be 6 and Shea will be 8! I asked them to stay my babies forever, but…no such luck, I’m afraid.
We’re gearing up for U10 soccer (where I hear things get a bit more ‘legit’ with a goalie and all), as well as Piper entering U8 soccer. We’ll have 2 nights/week of soccer and games every Saturday. In other words, life between now and October 12th will be a LOT of soccer. Once that wraps up, I think we’ll enroll both girls back into swim lessons and into tumbling classes. But for now, we’re easing into the school year with soccer and only soccer.
My mom was inquiring as to when we can celebrate the girls’ birthdays as a family and there’s literally 2 weekends between September and October that aren’t accounted for in some way. I know I’m not alone in trying to navigate the craziness of fall, but yikes! It’s a lot! We’ve also go Mark’s birthday, as well as my sister-in-law’s in there! We’re going up north for a weekend, have 2 weddings, and of course, football starting.
Gina and I celebrated our 150th podcast episode. It has been 3 1/2+ years of podcast and that is just…mind-blowing, really! I’m glad we stuck it out and have gained some listenership along the way!
Summer hockey is wrapped up and our team finished 4th…out of 6. Not a stellar season, but considering we had 1 regular season win, I’d say we finished strong. I didn’t score a goal after my hat trick, but I did get my legs back (somewhat) having moved from defense to offense in the past few weeks of the season. I’ve played hockey a lot of years and I can struggle transitioning from offense to defense.
I was plowing through books for a few weeks there and I’ve finished a few gems, my favorite being Nora Goes Off Script. It was SO cute. The Love of My Life by Rosie Walsh was excellent, as was Between Two Kingdoms, and Lessons in Chemistry was cute, too (not my favorite ever, but solid). Reading while walking outside at lunch is my new happy time. I look forward to it SO much, even if I am walking in black scrubs in the blazing sun. That little break from the day is a gift! I’m still posting all my ratings and super brief reviews on my instagram account!
We have some fun on deck this weekend. Last night was date night and running late from playing tennis, I didn’t get a chance to publish Family Friday ON Friday, per usual. Oops. But we had a fun night of drinks on the river, a run-in with a few local dietitians, and dinner with a hockey friend. The girls get a hair cut this morning and then off to the pool before the Illini play at 4pm. Sunday we have a boat reserved and the weather looks amazing both days. The lake water is warm I hear and so perhaps we’ll tube! And…long weekend next weekend, woo! I’m considering taking Friday off to make it a super long weekend, but we’ll see how the week plays out.
We’ve been watching Big Brother (I know, we’re the last ones on earth), Below Deck, Virgin River (I know, I’m late to the game), and then The Bear has been recommended to us to start. So much TV I want to see but so little time to sit down and enjoy. My littles go to bed later and later and we’re lucky to squeeze in an hour and that’s if there’s not something else going on for the evening. With football starting and rolling right into basketball season, there’s sports to enjoy on the tube, too! 🙂 Gotta look for the silver lining in summer’s end 😉
Have a super weekend and GO ILLINI!
Be well,
