Wow… Summer is now over (summer break at least, the triple digits in Phoenix are rather harshly asserting that the season is not…) and August was a weird month of transitions, but here’s a recap of the work I did towards my goals and a peek at what I’ll be focusing on in September!

As a reminder, here was what my tending list looked like in August…

Bonus: I met my original goal for how many books I wanted to read in 2019. Interested to see if my paces stays slower now that I have or if it picks back up in the fall…

August Monthly Goals:
*End of Summer Memories & Fun: YES! We squeezed as much fun with the kids as we could into August- fun eating out times, a trip to the aquarium and a big indoor play place with their grandma, water balloon fights, new books from the summer reading program, lots of great stuff before the school year started.
*Establish School Routines & Re-Set the Rhythms: We only had one week of school in August so we will continue to work on this next month. A lot of thought is going into what needs to happen to make our house run smoothly though and their first week of school plus back to school night reminded me how grateful I am that we can send them to a school with such a wonderful environment and involved community.
*Research car options: We did this and came to the conclusion that we are going to wait and revisit this closer to the holidays when we can hopefully find some black Friday or Christmas/New Year’s deals. We have a good idea of what kind of car we want though and have savings goals in place for the next few months.
*Date Night!: Book of Mormon was SO GREAT. And BONUS- turns out we knew someone in the cast! It was such as special evening filled with some much needed laughs.
*Read 4 Books or More: Did this. My number of books slowed down this month because I have been reading hugely long books thanks to the Outlander series and the Wheel of Time series.
*Finish Lunchtime Theater Script: YES! The script is finished and we are almost done editing a second draft to send out to our actors within the week. Yipee! I’ll be writing about this more in October.

August Weekly Goals:
*Budget Check in & Family Meeting: Did the budget eat week at least. some of our family meetings went to the wayside but we’ll get back on track.
*Family Friday: Yes! Final family movie nights of the summer and lots of quality time.
*Photo Routine: I am SO CLOSE to caught up on this thanks to making this a weekly goal. Still have some Project life pages to catch up on but have been backing up photos and organizing/purging them weekly.
*TV free night: YES. this truly makes such a difference and we’ve been turning off the TV more and more in favor of reading and getting other things done. Can’t say it will remain this way when This is Us and The Good place come back this fall…
*Write Blog Post: Hit and miss here but getting back in the swing of things!

August Daily Goals:
*Hydrate/Take care of my body: Was not great about this but going to focus on it again next month.
*Morning Routine/Evening routine: With so many end of summer special days and some sickness that we had to deal with, these routines got thrown off a lot. hopefully September will be a great reset for this area where I was making good progress.
*Fresh Faith Challenge: Hit and miss here, but something is better than nothing. Trying a new approach next month.
*Sleep Hygiene: Very little to no progress here. Can’t do it all and do it well and I just had a strong bout of insomnia, plus I stayed up way too late reading several nights.

Here’s what this month looks like:

September Monthly Goals:
*Settle into School and Household Routines: Now that we have the first week under our belt, I’m excited to really slip into this new rhythm and season. I signed up as class librarian for both my kids so I’ll also start finding a rhythm of library time each week to find books to bring into their classes. I CAN’T WAIT for my first volunteer day at the school the end of this week.
*Time Block Schedule/Batch Write: Now that I have a few hours a week with the kids both in school, I can actually try out time blocking and batch working since I can plan on times to myself in more than ten minute increments! I’m looking forward to seeing how this goes.
*Finish Planting Fall Garden!: We planted a few things but I honestly don’t know that they will make it given how hot it has been recently. We will be planting (and possibly re-planting) more in weeks to come.

What our kitchen looked like when we ran out room in the pantry due to bulk cooking and it being our turn for co-op snack in the same week…

*Begin Fall cleaning/minimizing: I know the rest of the world does Spring Cleaning, but in Phoenix I’ve always found fall cleaning to be a better option. As soon as the weather cools a bit I feel the urge to start cleaning things out and reorganizing for the upcoming holidays. This will get started the end of this month and run into next month.
*Bulk Cook: We are a little mentally burned out right now, so we thought it would be a good idea to take some time and bulk cook meals to go in the freezer to help our weeknights go more smoothly. We also plan to bulk make and freeze some lunch options for the kids.

September Weekly Goals:
*Random Re-Set Area: I’ve made a list of small areas of the house that I can tackle during the times I have to myself with the kids at school. These are the areas like hall closets that get pushed really far down he to-do list if you aren’t intentional. I think for October I’ll also plan a “30 minutes or less” list of random unfinished tasks that aren’t urgent but that take up mental space because they never seem to get done.
*Move my body: It’s been so hot I haven’t even wanted to step foot out of the house to go ANYWHERE, let alone the gym. Hopefully that will change this month and I’ll get some motivation back to get my blood pumping a few times a week.
*Family/Household Management Meeting: I’m kind of changing the structure of our weekly meeting now that school is back in session. It used to focus on budget, meal planning, and any random events we needed to plant for. now it will include what we need to plan for school stuff each week (including the days we have co-op responsibilities like volunteering or providing snack), speech therapy work and other homework/reading activities that one of us needs to be sure we go over with our son, etc.
*#onsundayswebake: I used to use that hashtag all the time and we’ve fallen out of the habit. I’m ready to get the kids with me in the kitchen again to make some bread or tasty treats or other fun things. I want to make wonderful memories in the kitchen with them.
*Kid quotes/observation journal: I keep a family yearbook with our pictures from the year and I do a bit of journaling in there (like birthday interviews each year and recapping what the photos are about), but I want to start a journal specifically with memories of the kids and cute things they say because I know those words and phrases won’t stick around forever. I’m hoping to note things as they happen on my notes app on my phone and then transfer them to a physical journal once a week.

Looking forward to weekly library trips to bring fun books into the kids’ co-op classrooms!

September Daily Goals:
*Morning & Evening Routines: Time to get back in the habit!
*Pre & Post School Routines: These are new and are things I’m discussing with the kids to try and train them to make it through the school day in a smooth way. these routines are simple, but will hopefully keep us from yelling about getting shoes on two minutes before we have to get out the door.
*Hydrate/track step count: REALLY need to get better at this. Plus, my Fitbit broke this summer and we finally are able to get a replacement band for it, so that should help.
*Sleep Hygiene: I really need to go to bed at a reasonable hour if I want to accomplish the routines mentioned above. Insomnia is one thing, but self-sabotage is another.
*Novenas: I really enjoy writing the word and still want to get into some bible journaling at some point (maybe advent?!) but recently I’ve been feeling a pull back to the rosary and to starting Novenas which are  a series of nine days of prayer and meditation. I’ve been scared off them before because traditionally you are supposed to pray them at the same time each day and that is really difficult with my not so steady schedule. But I don’t think that’s truly the most important part of the novena and I’m ready to get into the habit. If you have any special intentions you’d like me to pray for as I go through these novenas, please let me know either via comment on this post or through instagram message/direct contact.

And that…. is probably more than enough for September. Do you have any big goals as the school year winds up and we start entering the cooler seasons? I”d love to hear about them and cheer you on!