Comin atcha on a Tuesday, because yesterday was a holiday, and I spent the whole day with my dudes, without a computer in sight. I’ve been trying to disconnect more on the weekends, both from email and from social media. It’s not a clean cut, and I’m definitely still active on my InstaStories, but it’s significantly less. As Jack gets older, we’re interacting more as a family, and I don’t want to miss any of it. We’ve been going on a lot of weekend “adventures,” so that takes my focus, and I want to be fully present. But I’ve found that disconnecting from the digital is helping me to reconnect with my loves, and that is bringing me so much joy. More on that now…

1. Church Sermon. Our church has slowly been reintroducing in-person services, but we’re just not there yet. Right now, we’re more comfortable watching from the couch with Goldfish and snuggles. Our sermon last Sunday was so good that I watched it again on Monday morning. I needed to hear the message again, and I needed to start my week hearing those words. In particular, our pastor touched on assuming positive intentions of others. We’ve all been on the receiving end of being misunderstood, and it doesn’t feel good. The message came just when I needed to hear it, and so good I listened twice.

2. Fashion Show. Well kind of. Like everything else in the world, fashion shows are being cancelled and/or moved to virtual. Kansas City is home to an incredible jewelry designer, Georgina, and she filmed a virtual fashion show for her new Fall line. Last week, she hosted a small private viewing at Verdigris, and I was invited to attend. We go to see the show before the public, and we got to see some of the new pieces. It was wonderful to meet the designer, and she is one of my new favorite people in the whole world. She has this incredible ability to make you feel like the most important person in the room, even at an event that is all about her. It was an honor to attend, and I had a great time.

3. Barre. So I started a new thing. The owner of Pure Barre reached out to me a few weeks ago about collaborating, and I was all in. For the month of September, I will be attending 10 classes and will be sharing my experience along the way. My first class (first 3 classes actually) was last week, and so far I’m really liking it. I have taken a couple of barre classes in the past, but I’ve not attended in any regular cadence. As a cardio queen, this slower paced class is a test of my patience, but dang it puts me to work. I can feel my muscles shaking, and I kinda like it. Plus I’ve already noticed a difference in my running, so I’m excited to keep going the rest of the month.

4. Grocery Shopping. Are you still there? Okay, okay, that seems super lame, but hang with me. First, I actually do love grocery shopping. I love food, I love new products, I love people, I just love it. And I have a special place in my heart for Trader Joe’s. It probably deserves its own blog post, but another day. I haven’t been in over a month, which is rare, but I went back this weekend, and did some major damage. We don’t need to talk about the receipt total, but I got some new products, some classic favorites, and I just had so much fun being back in the store. Currently eating my way through my haul…

5. Apple Picking. My poor husband, y’all. I randomly texted him last Friday and said, “I want to go apple picking,” and three days later we were standing in an orchard with a bag of apples. I’ve never been in my whole life, and it sounded fun. And it really was! We found an orchard that is only 20 minutes from our house, and it has a lot of other activities and attractions, and most importantly, they have fresh Apple Cider Donuts. Everyone was masked up until they got out in the open orchards, everything was super clean, it wasn’t crowded at all, and the entire staff was super nice. We’re thinking this is an annual thing. But in the meantime, I’m researching how to use all these apples.

Today is the Mondayest Tuesday ever, and I’m walking into a really busy week. But here’s the creating more happy moments and looking out for those bright spots.

XOXO,

Molly B.