I haven’t really been in the mood to blog this week! Which is weird, and I’m not sure why. All is well- just maybe needed a little break, I guess. 🙂
I have been pretty busy with a work project that I NEED to have wrapped up before we leave for Florida in just over a week now, so that has me a little antsy, too.
Today I have a lot of work stuff on the docket, so I’m going to try and make this quick. I need to get an early start!
Last weekend:
Asher and I were in the Milwaukee area Saturday-Sunday for his Regionals swim meet. He swam so well!! All best times. I mentioned he hasn’t done many meets this summer, so it was great to see him have really strong swims.
I realized how much I miss watching him swim more often!! I’ve been a “swim mom” for so long now that it just feels like part of what we do, you know? It also made me realize that I’m kind of missing the boys’ sporting events right now, in general. Neither one is doing club soccer anymore, and that used to take up SO MUCH TIME- games, tournaments every weekend, for so much of the year. It was also really fun…. Loved sitting out there on the sidelines, getting lunch after, chatting in the car…. Makes me a little sad (in some ways; obviously there are some perks to this being over) that our peak days of youth sports have dwindled.
Anyway, I enjoyed this big swim meet weekend with Asher and we had some great quality time.
I also enjoyed some quiet reading time! More on this another time, but I’ve had all social media AND all email deleted from my phone for almost 2 weeks now. It has been glorious. My brain and nervous system feel like they’re finally just… settling down. (More later, but I was really struggling with “over-checking” my phone constantly and just feeling bad, mentally, as a result. This is helping me immensely right now.)
We stayed at my parents’ house Saturday night and went out for pizza with them after the meet, then took a short walk in a pretty nearby park at dusk.
Sunday we had to be back at the pool by ~10:45. I had enough time to drink tea on my parents’ patio and chat with them for a while, which was so nice. 🙂
Asher drove us to the pool, which meant driving through the downtown Milwaukee freeways! Fortunately, being a Sunday mid-morning, traffic was super light. He did great.
He was being funny about standing and posing for a swim meet pic, but here he is stretching before a race:
We headed home from there Sunday afternoon, with a stop off at Chipotle on the way home. 😉 A super fun weekend and bonus to get some time with my parents!
On the downside, I was gone all weekend and started the week feeling rather disorganized, but I guess oh well.
A few other random things from the week:
*On Monday I pleaded with the boys to PLEASE clean up the garage. Those cabinets below had misc. stuff piled all on top of them, the shelves were loaded with old things no one used anymore, and the bikes/ scooters/ golf clubs/ fishing gear situation was a mess.
Look what ASHER did!!! He did this all by himself, too. Even swept and hosed out the floor, vacuumed the rugs, decluttered a TON (*I still have to deal with donating/disposing of those items)… Ahhh. It’s like a breath of fresh air now when I walk in the garage!! Seriously, I am so grateful he did this.
* It’s been hot + summery (currently storming, but highs in mid-90s here today!). I took a long morning walk with Charlie the other day and it was so pretty and so wonderful. I adore and am so thankful that I can walk to nice places right from my house.
*We had breaded fish, jasmine rice and this zucchini mix for dinner on Monday. I then repurposed the leftover veggies for an egg + egg white scramble yesterday! Yummy.
*We bought a new table for our sunroom, and I picked it up from the furniture store on my lunch hour yesterday.
This is not our dining table, just a little bonus table in the sunroom. (The 4th chair is stored; doesn’t really fit well there and we never all sit there together, anyway!) But I like having a table here for random times. Sometimes I’ll sit here to make a meal plan or list, or work on something on a nice day, or occasionally I’ll eat my lunch here!
This upgrade was so long overdue… the table we had before was – get this- my childhood dinner table! Meaning, my parents must have bought it in the early 1980s?! (It’s honestly an amazing table, though. It has a laminate top and the base is heavy oak and it is literally indestructible. Still looks the same as it did when I was 10. They don’t make furniture like this anymore!! But, it was time. Lol. It did look a bit dated. 😉 I wanted something more modern looking now.
This old table has an extender leaf, which is currently in my attic; when I was a kid, we had it expanded to the large size, with 6 chairs. Hopefully we can pass it on to someone, because it’s honestly still a super great table with lots of life in it. And as I said, it’s literally indestructible. (I feel weirdly a little emotional at the notion of getting rid of it!!)
Okay, gotta run. Happy Wednesday!
Daily Gratitude:
I am grateful that Asher cleaned out the garage. Seriously, SO NICE that we adults didn’t have to do this, and that he actually (and, surprisingly 😆…) did an amazing job.
GRATEFUL KAE 
I was JUST looking at a drop-leaf table my Dad made us for our wedding. We have it in our laundry room but it’s not really an efficient use of space and it’s too big to go elsewhere. But, it also feels wrong to get rid of it and it is indestructible. Maybe somewhere down the line I can donate it to a family who’s looking to set up their house for the first time. It’s not big enough for us to really use anymore in our current house, but we used it for almost a decade during our apartment living stage.
As my Dad would say, they don’t make things like they used to! Furniture was built to last in the good ol’ days 🙂
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I know, it’s really remarkable how different the construction is these days! We have an old bedroom set as well which is made of VERY heavy, solid wood- it’s nothing like the newer ones in the boys’ rooms!! I wish we could keep the table somehow but I really don’t have space to store it long term…
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My grandparents had a very large table with multiple leaves that was sort of similar. When my grandma moved into assisted living, we could not find anyone to take the table within the family since that style is just not in vogue anymore! But they were able to take it to good will. Phil used to have a similar dining room table but we got rid of it and used my Ikea one that has a more modern look to it when we merged houses. We did keep the chairs because he only had 4 and it is nice to have some extra chairs when we host people. But they were made in Yugoslavia which is obv no longer a country so you know they are quite old!
We need an update on Ethan’s car situation – are Ivan’s friends able to fix it up? I’ve been wondering about that! The garage looks so great! I’m envious of your big suburban garage! We have a tiny alley garage that barely fits 2 cars in it and has very very very little storage since it’s built into a hill! I can’t wait to get rid of our stroller because we have to move it around to fit the 2 cars in. I’m waiting until the end of the summer to see if we can get rid of it. I think we can but it’s an expensive bob stroller so I don’t want to get rid of it and regret it.
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That’s funny about chairs made in Yugoslavia!! Ha- definitely old!
And yes, I’ll have to do an update on the car! Short version is that the car is still in the shop. Hopefully will be done sometime relatively soon? The big issue right now is that the passenger seat needs replacing (the air bag blew out of it), and it has proven challenging to find a replacement…
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I just read Lisa’s comment and I too was wondering if I missed something- what happened with the car? ANYWAY, Asher’s swim weekend sounds really, really nice. Perfect, actually- you got to see him swim, spend time with him, spend time with your parents, AND have to reading time! Asher also deserves a medal for the garage cleanup. How did you get such great kids??? I can’t even get my daughter to take a big pile of clothes (all hers) our of the living room.
I love the new table! I actually like the old one as well, but it is a little dated. Someone will be happy to get it though!
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No, I haven’t updated about the car! See response above to Lisa- I’ll hopefully have a better/ bigger update soon!! Ivan was going to see the car guy last night at a soccer game and was going to get an update on how it’s going but I went to bed before he got home.
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Why not save the table? Your boys might need a good table when they go to college/get an apartment. Wouldn’t it be nice to pass on something so useful? Of course schlepping it up flights of stairs wouldn’t be fun (that looks sturdy!) , but they’re young and athletic – they could handle it.
I have my husband’s grandmother’s dining room table downstairs in the basement. We used it for quite a while (until we had too many kids to fit even with the leaves), but I love it. It has drop leaf sides as well as the leaves, so it can be a table for one or one for many. My son used it for his first apartment. It was also one of the places the kids did virtual school during those years. We now use it for miscellaneous basement things. Someone else will need it soon! (Only one of her chairs left – we are very hard on dining chairs. Sorry Grandma Harriet!)
Did you get the car fixed?
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Gosh, I hadn’t really thought of keeping the table… it’s such a good idea, though! The big issue though is I don’t have the best place to store it! I mean we do have a storage room but I’m not sure I want the table taking up a bunch of space in there for the next ~3-4 years or more…Our basement doesn’t (If we didn’t already have the piano and a treadmill down there, I could totally see it being a nice “misc” table, as you said.) But I will have to think about it! It definitely would be a great table for in an apartment!
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I miss watching Sofia swim too! I miss swim meet up too!!! I love that pic of sunset, so peaceful.
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I can’t remember- did you find a new team for the girls yet? I remember you saying they did some lessons or private coaching recently, I think?
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Yes they are in a local swim team. Haven’t had any meet up yet.
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Sounds like a full and meaningful week, even with the work crunch! Love the swim meet updates, unplugging wins, and wow, go Asher on that garage cleanup!
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Yes, it was! Nothing too extraordinary overall but the weekend away definitely mixed things up a bit. 🙂 I hope you’ve had a great week!
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Sometimes it’s those low-key weeks with little wins and a change of scenery that feel the best! 😊 And yes, my week’s been good too, thanks for asking!
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He did a great job with the garage!
I know about those old pieces of furniture… so sturdy and high-quality but at some point it’s time to refresh.
I’ve deleted almost all traditional social media (and I mean really deleting the accounts). I “should” use it for business but with today’s algorithms and 100% push for video I just don’t see any benefits anymore, and while I had it I always felt some kind of stress over what to post and about the boring feeds (all reels and stupid ****). I deleted Twitter/X last year, Instagram in January and will never look back. I still have a Facebook account but only look in there maybe twice a week so I don’t count that as using it.
After quitting social media I worry less and feel more free to do what I want. Working on my business is more inspiring, there’s nobody telling me I’m doing everything wrong!
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