I had hoped to go to Longwood Gardens on Saturday night, but all the kids had done stuff during the day (playdates! skiing! tech rehearsal for a play!) so no one wanted to go. Rather than fight to drive an hour and walk around in the bitter cold (the wind chill was something like 11 degrees) my husband and I elected to go out to eat instead while the big kids babysat. We went to a tapas place — it was really good. Maybe I can add that to the list of first-weekend-of-January traditions!

Something I don’t hope to add to the tradition list: We just got the robo-calls from the district that schools are closed tomorrow. It doesn’t really look like we’re getting that much snow, but we shall see. There will be a lot of screen time, but if it does really snow, maybe there will be some sledding too…

In the meantime, here’s a little sonnet on singing Bach’s B-Minor Mass…

For this, I leave the house by six-fifteen.
For this, I sit in traffic near downtown.
For this, I work to make melismas clean
until the notes sound as they’re meant to sound.

For this, three hours on a Monday night.
For this, some ninety minutes in the day.
For this I’m testing out the parts, the tight
chromatic harmonies, the rhythmic play.

For this he labored centuries ago.
For this he pulled a life’s work in a piece.
Did he imagine how we’d get to know
such genius that with time does not decrease

in beauty? When it strikes we stand in awe.
Whatever cost, it’s worth it — worth it all.

Anyway, I hosted Thanksgiving this year, so much of Thursday was filled with cooking. My sister-in-law who makes the magnificent rolls was not with us this time, but my little brother made some sourdough rolls that were different but also excellent, so it was all good. He and his wife stayed overnight, and later in the evening we broke out some ice wine from the wine collection we got with the house (the previous owner was downsizing significantly, and also didn’t really drink, so it was a reasonable thing to throw in). My husband and I aren’t big wine drinkers either, so when we have parties we go down there and find something random. It was ice wine from Virginia this time. It was actually good!

On Friday we got our (live) Christmas tree in the morning from the local fire station’s fundraiser. Then, shortly after we got it into the stand, it was time for Sarah and her family to visit, so their kids helped decorate the tree (I checked to make sure this wasn’t problematic; I was assured it was fine). Then we did gingerbread houses and my husband made his oyster soup for the adults. Yum!

My husband and the two older boys then took off for Texas — they went to the Texas/Texas A&M game in College Station. Alas, the game did not go the way my Aggie husband was hoping, but they had a good time visiting the old haunts, including his childhood house (they know the people who bought it) — which was remarkably not that changed.

Meanwhile, I was entertaining the younger three. On Saturday, when I had some babysitting hours for the littlest, I took the next two oldest to the Brandywine River Museum of Art to see the holiday train exhibit, the critter tree, and the dollhouse. We drove 45 minutes to only be there 30 minutes, and I didn’t actually get to see any of the art, but hey. The kids were happy with this accelerated version of a museum visit, especially when we stopped at Wawa and then Starbucks on the way home. (I also had a really good time doing art with these two after the 4-year-old went to bed — with five kids it’s often fun to have different combinations of kids at different points and see how things play out…)

Given that my husband and older two sons (i.e. the people who will eat real food) were gone, I was really on my own for getting through the leftovers. I ate five straight meals of leftover turkey this weekend. I was also running the dishwasher multiple times per day until the kitchen was finally clean (I still haven’t dealt with the placemats in the dining room…on the list…). But I came up with a creative way to use the rest of the cranberries: Cranberry cookies! There’s a recipe on the back of the children’s book Cranberry Christmas, so we made that. There’s a lot of sugar, but it’s balanced out by the tart cranberries.

I did a lot of online shopping and I’m happy to report that a lot of the kid stuff is taken care of. There is more to be done still, but I’m feeling a bit more like there is a plan. I’ll probably wind up taking a half day Wednesday to go to the stores when they’re a little emptier. There are some upsides to self-employment…

I didn’t do a content round-up last week, but a few to check out:

At the Before Breakfast podcast I interviewed Joel and Matt! The hosts of the “How to Money” podcast came on to talk about staying financially sane over the holidays. For the shorter episodes, I suggested that you “Text your response” — even if you’re not sending holiday cards you can participate in the cheer. I also gave my number one tip for more peaceful travel: “Be ready to block out the world.” It can be frustrating to be in a hotel by the elevator or ice maker, or in a train car with someone who wants to share their phone conversation with the world. But as long as you have the power to block out the world, sound-wise, you can be much more calm. Of course if you are traveling with small kids and can’t block out the world, this is a different matter, but…

At Vanderhacks (my Substack newsletter) I reminded people that “All magic is just labor, hidden well.” I noted that “You have as much time today as you’ll ever have.” Then there’s the insight that “You can try again.” There are many reasons things don’t work the first time, and sometimes the answer is not that the thing is a bad idea! Please consider a free or paid subscription, and thanks for reading!

Five kids generate a lot of activity, rain or not. Some fun news: The 4-year-old is really, truly riding his bike. He’d been doing it balance-bike style for a while and had figured out how to glide around that way. Then he started experimenting with putting his feet on the pedals, and now he’s got it. I am very proud of him!

On Friday night we hosted a gaggle of 14- and 15-year-old boys, who ate pizza and cake, played pool and ping pong and hide-and-seek out in the yard. My husband and I sat by the fire pit while they were racing around. They were all quite polite and well-behaved, which was nice.

On Saturday I got up and went to the same local nature trail where I’ve been doing my long runs in previous weeks. The forecast said the rain would be over by 9 a.m. but it really wasn’t. There was a drizzle the whole time. And it was a long time, because I ran 12 miles. I’ve decided that my previous half-marathon strategy of doing long runs up to 10 miles is just not working. I get to 10 miles during the race and fall apart. So I wanted to do at least 11-12 miles during a training run, and I did. I was oddly tired at around 3 miles, which made me wonder how on earth I was going to keep running for another 90 minutes, but then I got a bit more pep in my step. The fall colors were quite pretty in the rain; yellow stands out more against a gray sky. I think I will try to do one more long-ish run before the race (but probably not 12 miles again).

In the afternoon, my husband took the 9-year-old to his first swim meet. I took the older boys to get hair cuts, and then I drove the 17-year-old to a vocal practice and off to the Devon Horse Show’s dressage event, where he and 5 other kids sang the national anthem together. I had never really watched dressage, so even though I didn’t see much of it, this was an educational experience. And hey, I got to watch from the VIP hospitality suite, since that’s where the kids needed to wait before going out on the field (or whatever you call it…I’m not familiar with equestrian terminology…). They sounded great! We made a quick Starbucks stop after (right before it closed) and then 6 out of 7 members of my family went in the hot tub, which turned out to be too many people in the hot tub. This was not relaxing. I think I need to just find a time when no one is watching and go in on my own.

Anyway…Sunday was church and then off to a studio in West Chester for family photos. I know I have written here before that family photos are one of those things that I’m glad to have done even though it is very little fun at the moment. My future self will be happy to have the photos…so experiencing Laura needs to steel herself for the complaining and misbehavior during the photos themselves. It could have been worse. The kids looked nice. Hopefully they turn out well!

In this episode of Best of Both Worlds, Sarah interviews Sam Kelly, a therapist who runs a course called Little Cycle Breakers. She shares strategies for getting kids to see what needs doing in a household and help in a way that lightens the parents’ mental load.

In the Q&A we talk about how to manage the situation when teens don’t want to participate in as many family activities because they are busy with school and other things.

Please give the episode a listen, and as always, we welcome feedback and reviews!

I love living somewhere with four seasons. Winter is an acquired taste, and spring feels like winter for quite a while, but fall is often lovely. There are summery days but cooler mornings and nights. Then, in late October, all the overgrown greenery turns bright yellow, orange, and red and the world is just extravagantly colorful. I’m also a big fan of fall flowers: Sunflowers, asters, zinnias, mums. There’s something so unexpectedly beautiful about blue asters or violet zinnias against the red/orange/yellow scheme of fall.

Of course, while fall is beautiful it is also fleeting. By mid-November, the leaves will be on the ground, leaving just the silhouettes of trees — visible for vanishingly few hours of the day as the sun sets by 5 p.m.

So…with that somewhat dreary thought in mind, here are a few things I want to do to really enjoy autumn while I can.

Visit New England…twice! I’ll go to Maine in early October for work. Then in later October my husband and I are going to a destination half-marathon. In both cases, the leaves should be about at peak. My running time may be atrocious if I’m constantly pausing to take photos of leaves! Of course, given the half marathon, I plan to…

Run long. Now is the time to be doing it, with the temperatures in a range that makes miles feel good. I hope to scope out a few new places to run (like within a 5-10 minute drive) as my neighborhood is non-ideal in some ways.

Bike. At least solo, but hopefully as a family at some point since we bought the extra bike.

Hike. Also, at least one longer walk in the fall leaves.

Visit a botanical garden. Possibly Chanticleer or Longwood, or both. People think of going to gardens in the spring, but professional gardeners can really make the fall flowers shine, and with the trees being colorful the visuals should be even more spectacular. I also want to do a picnic at Stoneleigh, given that it’s not that far from my house, and is free and open to the public during the day.

Go apple picking. We need to get on this as the kinds of apples I like (like Honeycrisp) tend to be best now, rather than during the usual October/Fall Fest times. I feel like apple cider donuts should also be involved.

Watch a football game. Probably just on TV, though other members of my family will be going to some live.

Take family photos. We’re actually doing this in a studio in late September, so it won’t be autumnal themed, but it’s something I like to do in fall so we have photos available for our Christmas cards. Doing this will not be “fun,” but I want to have done it. So, onto the fall fun list it goes.

Enjoy BLP Live! I’m headed to Ft. Lauderdale in November, and co-hosting this year as lots of us plan 2025 together. I’m looking forward to yoga on the beach.

Listen to Vivaldi’s “Autumn” part of the Four Seasons. Also, I will write some autumn-themed sonnets.

In other news: A little content round-up for the week….Over at Vanderhacks (my Substack newsletter) my piece behind the paywall was “Laura’s list of easy thrills” — 31 quick, cheap ways to add joy to your life. One of the freebies was to “Build a time emergency fund.” If you enjoy this blog you’ll probably enjoy the newsletter as well, so please consider a (free or paid) subscription.

Over at the Best of Both Worlds Patreon community we’ve been discussing managing household employees’ time, how we’ve spent anniversaries (I celebrated my 20th wedding anniversary this week), and task management tools. Membership is $9/month, which gets you access to the discussion forum and monthly Zoom meet-ups (always recorded for folks who can’t make it).

The Before Breakfast podcast covered “How to keep your summer spirit,” and I recommended that you “Don’t decorate with cereal boxes.” Basically, anything someone can see is part of the decor, even if you don’t always see it!

In this week’s episode of Best of Both Worlds, Sarah and I provide a guide for surviving and possibly enjoying long weekends (like Labor Day weekend coming up soon). From making plans (and getting out of the house) to trading off, to having something to look forward to, there are lots of ways to make the most of this time, and maybe even have some fun too.

Please give the episode a listen! In the Q&A we address the topic of whether to get a minivan when kid #3 is on the way.

If you’d like to join a community that discusses these and other topics related to work and life, please consider joining our Patreon community. Currently we’ve been talking about how couples manage their finances (including joint vs. separate accounts, and expense tracking/budgeting software). Next week we’ll also be doing a time management seminar as our official August Zoom meet-up. Membership is $9/month. Hope to see you there!

I think I succeeded. July was fun and relaxed and I wasn’t even on vacation! I did a lot of work — running a survey for my next book and doing several interviews for it, doubling up on a lot of podcasting so I don’t have to record much in August, giving speeches, etc.

But there were also a lot of family and personal life highlights. July opened with that epic long weekend (basically July 2-7 for me…) during which we helped set off a lot of (safe and sane!) fireworks at a friend’s house, went to the beach, went on a family bike ride (almost all of us) and SHU and her family came over for recordings, swimming, and an adults-only dinner out featuring margaritas.

After that we sent various older boys off to camp at various points. My husband and I went to Longwood Gardens for the beer garden and the flowers. My daughter and I went to see Olivia Rodrigo, which was definitely a summer highlight. I enjoyed getting to know her music and the show was great! (My daughter was an excellent concert companion — I’m so glad she’s willing to hang out with me.) That weekend also featured the York State Fair where, among other things, I got to see the Flying Cortes act, with Commander Alexander getting shot out of a cannon. I was so fascinated that I reached out and was able to do a short phone interview with him this week. I have interviewed a lot of people about their careers and how they spend their time over the years, but never someone who works as a human cannonball. So look for that in my upcoming content.

There have been solo several bike rides, and lots of swims. As I wrote yesterday, we’ve gone in the pool most nights. I went in last night by myself for a while, then chatted with my 17-year-old in the hot tub until it was pitch black dark. (Theoretically the pool lights have been fixed, finally, but I don’t have the app to turn them on yet…) There have been a lot of strawberry acai lemonade refreshers from Starbucks, and evenings where I open the windows.

So there’s been a lot of summer already, and now it’s on to August, which is a full summer month for us (the kids don’t start school until after Labor Day). I just got an ad from Scandic Hotels this morning informing me that summer isn’t over yet. And it’s true! Just like on Sunday the weekend isn’t over yet. Unlike with July there actually will be vacations this month — both a more relaxing one and a more adventurous one. I’m hoping to use the fact that I’m ahead on some of the day-to-day work to open space for thinking deep thoughts. But we shall see.

I hope you have much to look forward to this August!

So this week we’re devoting an entire episode to that question! We obviously can’t answer for anyone if they should have a third (or fourth, or fifth…) kid. But there are some things to think about. Some expenses won’t necessarily rise (you might not need new baby gear or clothes, for instance), but others will (more years of paying for childcare; possibly needing a bigger car). Some lifestyle choices become more complicated — lots of hotel rooms fit 4 people; few fit 5. That 2-bedroom urban condo lifestyle becomes harder with three kids. Women with three children are less likely to be in the workforce than women with fewer children, though we suspect a lot of that is preference. If you’ve kept successfully building your career with two kids, we don’t think the third is going to be the thing that changes that.

Another baby means more years in the baby stage…which is hard. On the other hand, if you’ve got two kids already, you know how cool those little people are, and there would be another one in the world! We both love the “full table” feel of having lots of family gathered (though I can’t necessarily keep my two little ones sitting for dinner, ha ha…).

Anyway, please give the episode a listen, and if you know someone who is considering this question, please share it with them!

(Side note: Not so many mom-son pairs in the audience! We joked that they really needed to re-purpose some of the men’s rooms in that football stadium for the evening!)

It was a gorgeous night (75 degrees) and a great show. It was also incredibly long — about 3.5 hours, and 44 songs. It struck me that in an era when you can get individual songs whenever you want, and watch the music videos for those songs whenever you want, one thing live entertainment can provide is to be a real experience. Requiring some serious stamina of the audience could be part of that.

To say nothing of the stamina of the performer. Whoa. She did that show three nights in a row after doing it three nights in a row the previous weekend, and so forth. I really appreciated that Swift acted happy to be there, and you didn’t get the sense that this was just another day on the job, which one could imagine happening somewhere in the middle of dozens of shows. She seemed very aware that some people had waited hours to log on to score their $99 Verified Fan tickets, and others had no doubt spent insane amounts on the secondary market. At one point she said something to the effect of “whatever effort you went through tonight to get here, please know that it is very appreciated.”

As for my effort — it wasn’t that bad on the ticket obtaining front. I bought my tickets on Stubhub six months ago and paid what I felt was a very reasonable price considering what I saw tickets going for later.

The logistics of getting to and from Lincoln Financial Field, on the other hand, felt more intense. We took off at about 4:40 p.m. from my house. In light traffic, you can get there in less than 30 minutes. We didn’t pull into the far parking lot until about 6:10 p.m. (to be fair, this turned out to be more Friday rush hour traffic than Taylor traffic). Then we hiked about 15 minutes to the stadium. And that was better than the departure! We stayed until the end of the concert, because, well, we wanted to hear the Midnights songs. But after arriving at our car at 11:55 p.m., I didn’t even bother starting the car until 12:55 a.m., because no one had left our parking lot in that time. I finally got onto the highway (about a mile away) around 1:15 a.m., at which point it was the 30 minutes home it should be.

So, into bed a little after 2, then up at 6:50 with the toddler, but back to bed a little after 8 and I slept until 11! And now it is a memory that I think will stick with me — more so than many Friday nights. I imagine that is so for lots of people who were in the stadium — something that live entertainment can do that you don’t necessarily get from just listening to an album.

In other news: As for a little adventure…my husband and I wanted to go to a party one of his colleagues was hosting Saturday night. We didn’t manage to get a babysitter, but then I had a realization that some of the young women posting on the babysitter list where I look are 17-year-old students at my son’s high school. (Note: when we hire sitters, they are not generally charged with supervising the older three kids, who tend to hang out in their rooms or watching movies. They are there to watch and entertain the 8- and 3-year-old.)

So I put my two older boys in charge, each splitting the time, an hour and 15 minutes apiece at what I felt was a reasonable rate. And then I left the party early (my husband stayed) to make sure all was good. And it was. When I got home, my 13-year-old was playing a game with his little brothers wherein he dressed up in the inflatable dinosaur costume and chased them and they shot at him with Nerf guns. Good times.

I will be careful not to abuse this (and I pay!) but the prospect of not having to hunt for a sitter for “peak” times when it’s hard to land one really has me giddy…

Reader Lori Croall wrote me a few months ago with a genius idea for Mother’s Day, which is May 14th this year (in the US).

She noted that “Mother’s Day felt like a dilemma to me. People around me wanted to celebrate one way and I had a different idea of how to celebrate.”

[Laura’s note: If mom is having to chase the toddler around the Mother’s Day brunch, it’s not really a relaxing celebration for her.]

Lori reports that “A couple of years ago, I came up with the idea of Mother’s Day (observed). I schedule a day off from work the week after Mother’s Day. On that particular day, I do whatever I want. I usually get up early, get a coffee from Starbucks, and go for a long walk or run in a nearby park. Last year I painted my toes and read a book on my patio.

“It doesn’t really matter what I do, the point is that I get to have a day to myself. I find that I start looking forward to this day every year… It also really takes the pressure off of Mother’s Day, as I know that I have a day that week in which I can do whatever I want.

“I wanted to share this with you so that you could pass it onto other moms as a creative way to really embrace the Mother’s Day holiday!”

I love this idea. If you’ve got some PTO built up, or if you run your own schedule, consider acting like the Postal Service, which will observe a holiday on a Monday if it falls on a Sunday. You can observe Mother’s Day on some other day in May and do what you’d like while the kids are at school or at daycare. Then you can just roll with the experience of whatever the family has planned (or doesn’t have planned) on Sunday. Best of both worlds!

Do you have Mother’s Day plans this year? Has anyone ever brought you breakfast in bed? (Pro tip: Remind the children to bring you your coffee first, and if you have a partner, remind this person to remind the children about that. Then it’s a little less critical how long the breakfast prep turns out to be.)

In other news: Looking for a gift for the ambitious mother or mom-to-be in your life? Check out I Know How She Does It, my book on how real women manage big careers and families with time for fun as well. The Chicago Tribune called it “A refreshingly optimistic take on a topic rarely approached with a sunny outlook: having it all.”