Good Morning! I hope you are enjoying a delicious coffee this morning and getting a moment to yourself. Sometimes I’ll crawl out of bed a few minutes early so I can have a few sips of my own before I’m thrown into the morning routine of all hands on deck.
I think these coffee reads have become my new favorite posts to write. They’re little catch ups on all sorts of things and I really enjoying sharing the random thoughts and ideas I’ve had lately. I have a lot to share today!
Summer has been in full swing and I’m kind of proud of myself for the way I set up our summer routine. There is a lot of time for rest and creativity and also time for adventure. I also have weekly babysitting that allows me to divide and conquer activities with my children as well as schedule a little time for me. My older two are actually little more self-reliant and it’s been awesome hanging out with them this summer. We just made ice cream as a science experiment and it actually tasted pretty good! I was surprised at how simple and quick the recipe was. It’s a great activity for young kiddos! (literally a 15 min experiment!)
I took the kids down to Sea World a few weeks ago because I LOVE animals and my kids are really into them too. They love the show the Wild Kratts and can riddle off a zillion facts about animals so it was kind of fun to see these creatures in person. We got to meet a dolphin, sea lion, and get some behind the scenes action on how animals are rescued and brought into the park. San Antonio is about an hour and a half from Austin. We have never road tripped with our kids except for a 4 hour stint from my parents house to Steamboat, so even an hour and a half car ride can be a little much with my kids requesting “Chicken Wing” and “Peppa Pig” on repeat. So I decided to pull out an old trick that my parents did when we roadtripped as kids and we listened to Harry Potter on Audible! Holy nostalgia. My kids were silent for the cumulative 3 hour ride and we got really into the book. If you haven’t done it before, I highly recommend! I roadtripped with my family every summer for years and these books were the a highlight. We would have a hard time getting out of our car to see a cool tourist destination because we were so captivated by Jim Dale’s storytelling. 10/10 recommend!
I actually wrote a post back in 2015 about our road trips! (I can’t believe I’ve been blogging for that long). Anyway, if you’re interested in how we accomplished 50 states, it’s kind of a fun read. One of the things that I think was really cool about our trips is that our parents made us pay for them! Well not pay a LOT, but contribute. I know it sounds kind of crazy (how much $ does a 9 year old have for a trip?) but we had no shortage of jobs we could be doing. I used to wash cars, pull weeds, babysit as a mother’s helper, paint rocks as paper weights: anything that brought a few extra bucks home. I think I was asked to pay $100 for that first road trip and my mom had us use that money towards one of the experiences. It was actually quite empowering because all of us felt excited about what we were doing the whole time. And we appreciated the experience even more! This is a strategy we plan to adopt as we plan our future adventures with our kids. A great follow on Instagram is @imscottdonnell who has a ton of great ideas and tools for teaching kids about $$! We have learned a lot.
Okay so let’s talk about our Santa Barbara trip! As you may know, we travel to Santa Barbara quite a bit. Every year if we can! It’s our happy place we discovered when I was pregnant with Charlie. From beaches to hiking to wineries to incredible meals, views, and activities for kids- there is endless adventure. My cousin got married in Malibu in June so we decided to take our kids up there and head to SB for a week after! My sisters and my parents were able to join and we really loved showing them our favorite place. They had airbnb rentals across the street from us which was pretty awesome. However, there were a few things I would do differently next time we go because the trip was actually kind of hard with our kids this year.
First, we would go later in the summer. June is known for “June gloom” and it was unseasonably cool while we were there. I don’t mind cool weather, especially coming from Texas, but it was the first time it was mostly overcast and I didn’t pack properly. We were shivering on the beach. Also, school goes through mid-June there and we were a week early for zoo camp! With our kids ages, camp on a vacation is kind of crucial to break up the day for us. And the Santa Barbara Zoo camp is MAGICAL!
So those are really the only things I’d change! I have a full post on Santa Barbara with kids that I wrote a couple of years ago and I’ll probably do an updated version next time now that our kids are older and we know more!
Alright, so I’ve finally been on a great reading streak lately and it’s thanks to these awesome recommendations from @_thelibrariansdaughter_ that a friend sent to me! I just started The Hunt but the other 3 books I have finished and each were phenomenal and thought provoking! I gave each 5 stars.
Wow, I can’t believe it’s July! Eric and I will be married 10 years this October so we’ll be celebrating a bit early with a trip to Portugal! I’m a tad anxious leaving the kids for a week but I know that it will be a great experience for us and they will get some quality time with their grandparents and cousins!
I’ll have lots to share in the upcoming month!
Thanks for reading!
