My husband went out last night for a beer dinner with a couple of buddies, so after the kids and I had eaten, I decided to make a fire. The nights are still cool enough that a bonfire feels good, and it was fun to sit outside by my fire as darkness fell. My husband came home around 9:30, and we prayed our rosary by the fire, which was lovely as well.
Dora waiting for me to throw her tennis ball again, from my chair:
Yesterday's purple bamboo swing dress got pretty smoky, but when I took it off, I hand-washed it and hung it on the rack to dry, so it'll be good as new in no time. We still have no washing machine; good thing I have a hand-washing groove and a rack to hang things on.
Wearing today:
The purple dress's blue twin, also purchased on either Poshmark or Ebay (can't remember which) at the end of 2021. Slipped my feet into my Birkenstocks, so that's what I'm wearing; otherwise, this is the uniform. Green bike shorts underneath again --- I just air them out between wearings, but I'll probably need to wash them soon.
Freshly washed hair, again using my Vida shampoo and conditioner bars, with which I continue to be VERY happy.
I'm not using any kind of styling product or techniques, just literally washing, conditioning, and air-drying. These products make my hair very soft, which means my curls are a little fragile, but that feels better to me than feeling heavy and weighed down, or else stiff. My hair is shiny and not residue-laden at all, even though I used the conditioner bar pretty lavishly this time.
All in all, this is a very Team Basic outfit, but that's okay. I can move in it, be cool in it, feel put together in it --- this last really because it is a dress, not something like shorts and a t-shirt. Somehow the very fact of a dress says "instant outfit," even when you honestly have not tried. It's just cute, as if you had tried.
I haven't been talking much about homeschooling, largely because I'm no longer homeschooling myself: it's been almost a year since I laid down that burden, which is hard to believe. When I say burden, I don't mean that it was bad, just that it was WORK, which is right and proper. Being an educator is WORK (and if you don't want to do it, don't undertake to educate your children, but I'll spare you that whole rant). BUT I still talk every day with my three longtime good friends with whom I've worked in the Mater Amabilis program, and am pleased to announce that MA now has a YouTube channel. The one video that's up right now is a tour of the admittedly kind of overwhelming MA website, narrated by my marvelous friend Amanda. More is in the works. Trying to reach as many people as possible!
Otherwise, just trying to keep up with stuff at the Sun, give our anthology galley a final read-through, write some stuff . . . the usual.
Oh, in other news, my daughter wanted to go to Goodwill, so I bagged up my entire outbox, which has been sitting in my room since last fall sometime, and sent it with her. I kept out one pair of jeans and one pullover sweater, provisionally, but the rest: GONE.