It’s the end of the month, which means it’s time for a monthly wrap up post of some sort! I think I mentioned at some point that I wasn’t sure I wanted to continue with the What’s Up Wednesday link up, because I felt like it was getting repetitive. I have been searching for an alternate way to wrap up my months on my blog, but so far I haven’t come up with anything! I keep trying to search for monthly wrap up type posts and keep coming up with reading wrap ups – I guess Google knows that I have been writing more about reading, but I’m not ready to wrap up this month’s reading yet! If anyone has any ideas, let me know. For now, I’ll just wrap up my month in a variety of areas!
Daily Life
We started out the month with snow on New Year’s Day. The kids went out and shoveled and built some snow people. (You can see them in my last Random Friday post, which is where I tend to show some random life updates!) The kids were all doing school virtually the first week of the month, and then the boys went back in person for the second week. In fact, Simon has been in person for three weeks in a row! It’s been a new readjustment for him.
After watching the news of the insurrection at the Capitol, we watched the inauguration with hope. I got chills every time I heard “Madam VP!” My favorite parts of the coverage included the amazing Amanda Gorman and the fireworks show at the end of the night. It was also fun to see Tony Goldwyn hosting the Parade Across America segment of the day!
[source – Jessica Yellin on Instagram]
And who didn’t love the rainbow of outfits?
[source – The Home Edit]
I want all the items sold here!
Holidays
We remembered Martin Luther King by supporting our community. Our friends had a hot cocoa stand and gave donations to the Midwest Center for Holocaust Education.
Today is the Jewish holiday of Tu B’Shevat, which is the New Year for the Trees and a celebration of nature and ecology. I plan to share more about it in today’s Instagram post!
School
As I mentioned, Simon attended in person school 3 weeks in a row. I don’t know what the school is planning for next week (as of the time I’m writing this…). This week, Gabbie started second semester and her school went back to hybrid. So this week, I had my 2nd day with all three kids at school, and if all goes well, they will all be at school tomorrow too. I am lucky that when they are on virtual, they are mostly able to handle it on their own. I know that the going back and forth or doing virtual school at all does not work for everyone.
For second semester, Gabbie is no longer in Art or Fashion Design, and instead is taking Sociology and Health. Zachary is now taking Forensics instead of Drama and Jewish History instead of Health.
Activities
We got to go to Gabbie’s Competition Showcase! She also danced at a basketball game last week.
Local Adventures
We didn’t go on any, did you?
Feel free to link up with Lauren and me here!
Save our image and share it in your blog post so others can find the link-up!
Health / Fitness
This week I decided to restart my diet. I need to start losing the 10 pounds I gained last year! I hope I won’t have to be super strict for too long, because it’s hard! This month I got to run outside 3 times. I did 8 treadmill runs (so far).
TV
This month I watched new episodes of This Is Us, 9-1-1 and 9-1-1 Lonestar, all three Chicago shows, All Rise, The Good Doctor, and The Resident.
Books
As you know, I’m always reading. Just because I read a lot doesn’t mean anyone else should feel that they don’t read enough or compare yourselves to me! I like to read and I like to share what I read, not to make anyone else feel jealous or upset. So far this month I shared 2021 books with Jewish representation on my radar, a list of antiracist books, part 1 of my January book reviews, and a few new-to-me authors I loved in 2020. I think what I’m going to do is share my favorite books of the month (so far) tomorrow, and the rest of my January book reviews in early February.
Earlier this week, Instagram randomly gave me a huge amount of extra followers, so I had the swipe-up feature for a day. Now my numbers went back to normal, so I’m still working on getting to 10k! In case you don’t already follow me there, I mostly use it to share the books I’m reading and to talk about books!
Photography
I usually share my 52 Frames Challenge pictures in my monthly wrap up posts. This year, I made a small challenge to myself to include books in all of my weekly photos. I wasn’t happy with what I went with last week! This week’s theme is proving to be hard as well, so we will see if I can keep up with it. Here are my photos for weeks 1-4:
[self-portrait]
[leading lines]
[get low]
[water] (the background is a book)
Blog Posts
In case you missed it, check out my posts about Exploration Place and the Sedgewick County Zoo, the Cosmosphere, getting cozy, lessons from 2020, and how we bake challah.
Coming Up
My nephew turned three this week and on Sunday we are watching him get his first haircut over zoom. In February, we are looking forward to seeing Gabbie dance even more. The end of February brings the holiday Purim, so I’ve just started working on helping my synagogue plan the gift packages we give to all the members.
While it definitely isn’t going to be like last year, we are so excited the Chiefs are going to the Superbowl again!
What’s up with you lately?
