We’re nearing the finish line of summer vacation with about three weeks to go until school starts up. This has turned me into a slightly more productive version of Jen as I try to get us back on a schedule and tidy / organize the house before the onslaught of homework and business returns.

Here’s what we’ve been up to lately:

Reading

The kids have made great progress with summer reading. MM has finished my challenge as well as the library’s summer reading program (twice). BB earned a bookmark on my challenge and about half of the goodies at the library’s program, though honestly she’s reading a ton – she just isn’t great at logging things.

I read five books in July which is a record these days. You can read more about my reading list here. Right now I’m reading My Plain Jane by Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton, and Jodi Meadows. I’ve also been reading Talking As Fast As I Can by Lauren Graham on my kindle and reading James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl to my kids.

Watching

DRAMA MAMA | I blogged recently about the shows I’ve been watching with the kids – we’ve also been watching Doctor Who and Lost in Space. Dan and I just watched the first episode of Castle Rock on Hulu and we’re definitely planning to keep watching.

FUNNY HAHA : COMEDIES | Last night we watched Iliza Schlesinger’s new comedy special, Elder Millenial. If you like her other specials, you’ll love this one. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, watching Freezing Hot first. We also started watching Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee because I’m very late to the party.

Planning

School starts in like three weeks so I’ve been kind of cleaning and planning like a madwoman, trying to get our life in tip top shape before the busy season begins. One of the first orders of business is to get the kids and myself used to getting up early again and I have big plans to get myself out of bed earlier than I did last year. Inspired by a podcast on The Lazy Genius Collective on morning routines, I mapped out this ideal routine for myself:

It’s a little on the crazy ambitious side but I’m starting now so that by the time school starts I might be almost used to it. And there’s a small amount of wiggle room in here for when reality bites. But if this goes well, it will make the rest of my day run smoother.

I’ve also been decluttering and organizing in small pockets of the house. One of my most recent victims was my tea collection. I’ve been evolving the perfect tea storage for awhile now but this is the current iteration. The drawered bins have tea organized by type: fruity, spiced, and traditional. I also have little tins of tea in a basket on top.

I’ve also been streamlining our dishes so that we have more of what we love and stop keeping things we don’t really use. I’ve purged a ton of coffee cups and most of the “kid’s dishes” because frankly we don’t need them anymore – I have big kids, guys. MM is basically a small adult now and BB is old enough to be trusted with a glass. Also if she breaks a glass, we’ll all live to kvetch about it.

Cooking

I made a bag of scone mix the other day and was like, “Wow, these don’t look anything like scones.” And my husband made this comment about how I could probably make scones from scratch anyway. I have this pretty scone pan that I got for Christmas a year or two ago and I decided it was finally time to teach myself a new skill. Guys, making scones is super easy. I used  this recipe at Craftsy and added a little vanilla extract, cinnamon, and dried cherries. Look how they look like scones and everything! I’m feeling a baking spree coming on in which I try lots of other toppings.

What kind should I make next?

What have you been up to lately?