Happy New Year!🎉

Happy New Year

Turning over a new leaf in covid times.

I don't know about you, but for pretty much forever, September has marked the start of the new year for me. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that for most of my life, I've been on the school calendar. There was a brief time, after I graduated from college until my oldest started preschool, where the impulse to stock up on pens and notebooks waned and the end of summer melded into fall with no big plans to change my life. But now, Labor Day signals the end of one (endless) chapter of the year and the start of another. I turn the calendar from August to September and see before me a crisp, blank page.

When I was younger, I based my life changing plans on Seventeen magazine's back-to-school issue, that 500-page tome that would arrive in mid-August, jam packed with advertisements for Tickle deodorant and Bonne Bell Lipsmackers and articles about turning tablecloths into skirts and whether you can remain friends with ex-boyfriends (oh, to have a boyfriend). But it was the fashion spreads that really made my imagination soar. I dreamt of channeling one of those skinny girls on the glossy pages, with Marcia Brady, pin straight long hair sporting corduroy gauchos and a jaunty boho hat. That was just how I wanted my life to go, circa 1980.

Sadly, the reality was that I went to a Catholic school with a hideous uniform and little room for personalization, much less jaunty hats. 

But as the years progressed and I became a mother, the end of summer meant less the time to start a new life and more time to get back to the old one (the one I liked where kids spent most of their days at school and not lying on the couch watching Vampire Diaries).  

This year is no exception, despite it being covid times when all the other markers we'd use to delineate months, seasons and social mores in general, seem to have been tossed out the window. My older children must have sensed that it was time for them to return to their grown up lives as well and fly the coop we've all been cooped up in for the last five months. 

My oldest has moved back into the city, where he's in the office a few days a week. And my oldest daughter has packed up her one kidney (well, not really since she kind of needs it) and moved to Raleigh, NC to work remotely while living with college friends. My sister and other daughter moved her in last weekend and don't think I haven't been checking real estate listings down there since our return. It's very charming.

Since my return on Monday, after recovering from the almost 8-hour car ride, I have been all about clearing the proverbial decks and making way for fresh starts this fall after having a houseful through the spring and summer. I've scheduled to have the rugs and windows cleaned and am in the middle of washing all my slipcovers AND throw pillows and letting them sit in the sun to dry.

I've slogged through mounds of paperwork that has been piling up on my desk all summer and most exciting, busted a move to refinance my house (which is what I've been doing all morning and forgotten how much paperwork was involved). 

All of this is to say, after a long quarantine filled with lots of highs (and a few lows) with my four kids, I am ready to move on. 

Happy Labor Day weekend to all and I look forward to chatting with you in the new year. 
xoAmy
 

The original Krispy Kreme is a few blocks from my daughter's new place and if you need a LIFE ALTERING EXPERIENCE, get there at 7am while they are making glazed donuts and grab yourself a warm one. 

Friday Faves

•  See those tomatoes up top? I made them. Actually, right before we left for Raleigh I harvested a lot more than that and then frantically searched the internet to find something to do with them so I didn't have to give them away or let them go to waste. I ended up making this sauce, which was delicious albeit slightly watery (but my tomatoes were very watery so ... ). I put over a big bowl of zoodles when we got home and it was quite yummy.

• Another dish that's good for using up this season's tomato harvest is this take on the Martha Stewart one-pot pasta that swaps out the spaghetti for farro. Super delish with some fresh basil from our garden.

• My sister, Meghan, is like a shopper/retail junkie extraordinaire. There is no store/fast food place she has not heard of and is never at a loss for something to recommend. This weekend, while we roamed around Ulta while the girls hit up Trader Joe's, she convinced me to buy this brush for wet hair that totally lives up to the hype.

• While we're at it, she also is into these Target leggings. 

• Finally, it would be an honor if you would forward this newsletter to someone who you thing would enjoy it!