As I look outside my window: It’s lovely and bright outside. I’m actually watching our backyard neighbor work on building a swing set for his kids.

Right now I am: Finishing my cup of coffee before I have to go get brunch started.

On my bedside table: The Drowning Kind by Jennifer McMahon; Swamplandia by Karen Russell

On my tv this week: J and I finished the one and only season of Running Wilde with Will Arnett and Keri Russell. He had seen it back when I aired, I never did. It was a nice light show in between more serious things. Plus, Loki started and I am so incredibly in!

Listening to: Mostly politics related podcasts. I’ve been really enjoying What a Day from Crooked Media. It’s a nice little daily news roundup.

On the menu for this week: Umm…. I have a ton of possibilities, but am still formulating a plan. Possibly we will be eating -

• Monday - Broccoli beef with rice

• Tuesday - Red Curry Noodle Soup

• Wednesday - Buffalo Chicken Sliders

• Thursday - Balsamic Pork Roast

• Friday - Leftovers

• Saturday - Chili Verde

• Sunday - Baked Cod with Fennel and Lemon

On my to do list: I need to update my big to do list. I knocked off a ton in preparation for book swap. I need to do a brain dump today and get it all down…

Happening this week:

• Monday - Normal school day

• Tuesday - Park Playdate; Trivia night (My team won last week and had so much fun, we’re doing it again. This week’s theme is Disney Princesses.)

• Wednesday - Grocery and library?

• Thursday - Zoo or State Park Day (haven’t picked yet)

• Friday - Normal school day

• Saturday - The usual

• Sunday - The usual

What I am creating: Future plans. I really want to get back to crafting, but for now, I’m just making plans for all our fall events (book retreat, family road trip, 2nd year of homeschooling, and potentially a kid birthday party).

My simple pleasures: Good conversation with friends, sitting on my back deck in my new patio furniture with a cup of coffee and a book, not 90 degree days…

Looking around the house: Because of the book swap yesterday, my downstairs is looking really good! I went on a cleaning binge and it was well worth it! Today I need to tackle the clean clothes in various bins upstairs and do a general sweep up of random things.

From the camera: My book club finally had our Christmas 2020 book swap get-together yesterday. I hosted and we had lovely conversation, yummy food, and great books! Can you guess what one of our upcoming book club reads is? Trick question: there are two on the table. For July we are reading Malibu Rising (which I won!) and for November we are reading Code Name Helene! June’s selection is The House in the Cerulean Sea, so a friend gifted TJ Klune’s earlier book. I gifted Let’s Pretend This Never Happened because I just finished Jenny Lawson’s newest book (Broken) and had to share my love for her. (J made a strawberry pie and a strawberry-rhubarb pie to go with our meeting)