Hi, how are you?

Are your kids in school? Around here, in Louisiana, kids have started school. When I was a teacher in New York and Washington DC, we started either end of August or early September. Then again, we also got out of school in mid June, I believe. Around here, they get out some time in early or mid May.

Cam and I were chatting about this, and I don’t really get why the school calendar doesn’t just follow the regular calendar. School starts at the beginning of September and ends at the end of May. Then you’ve got June, July, August for summer. Or something like that. Why is the first day sometimes like, a half day on a Thursday? (My mama said that’s what she remembers from the 60s and 70s, that summer was June, July, August, and school was the rest!)

If you’re not in the USA I’m curious what it’s like for you. I’m especially curious about the southern hemisphere where your seasons are different from ours!

NOTE: We were out of town for a few days!! My mom’s sister and brother were both in the hospital, unrelated reasons. I went down to visit them, with my mama, and of course the whole fam came along. We turned it into a 3-night getaway. This email would have gone out on Friday, but I didn’t have this quite ready🥰

Starting School

All that to say, we’re going to start back up our homeschool year next week. Luckily I’ve got most of the curriculum already - the end of the last school year, we’d moved on to the next grade level. So I’ve already got the books for math, language, and science.

I bought a few new things this year:

• Financial literacy

• Geography

• Morning Time (it’s got Bible, art, music, poetry…)

• Playing Preschool (for Charlie)

I’m still not sure about History. I’ve got some old editions of Honest History magazine, and we have one more unit in the Ancient Civilizations curriculum from last year. But after that, I don’t know what to do. I enjoy history, personally, but teaching it has been soooo boring. It is just a bunch of reading and vocabulary. The Evan Moor one (same folks as the financial literacy and geography links) we did last year was pretty good - you read a little, do a craft, then put it all together in these big pockets. If I can’t find something better, I’ll just get a new one from them, I think.

So here is our weekly plan!

• Math, daily

• Language, daily

• Reading, daily

• Bible story, daily-ish

• Writing, daily-ish

• German and Spanish, 4-5x

• History, 2x

• Science, 2x

• Geography, 2x

• Financial literacy, 1x

• Arts and crafts, 1x (that happens naturally most days, but at least once a week, I want a planned craft)

• Field trip, 1x

Tri update, and new workout plan

In case you missed it, my sprint triathlon was last Sunday. My goal was to finish in under 3 hours, and I came in at 2:44. They shortened the swim a little bit, but even if it had been the original length, I’d have finished in under 3 hours.

Out of 178 finishers, I was 174th place. Next year, I’ll definitely finish higher than that. I kept telling myself, my only competition is me. Maybe one day, I’ll actually be able to reach 1st, 2nd, or 3rd, but for now, I’m not worried about it. It was a lot of fun, and I plan to do more races!

For now, though, I’m not totally sure if I’ll do a new race until next year.

I decided to plan out a month of workouts for myself. The goal is to be ready for another triathlon next month, but I’ve not signed up for it. The other goal is to get stronger. My speeds on the swim, bike, and run are all VERY slow. A lot of the speed and endurance come from just doing them more. But I think getting stronger and working out in other ways will help too!

My new workout plan is basically this:

SUNDAY - rest
MONDAY - upper body weights
TUESDAY - run or brick (brick means bike + run)
WEDNESDAY - rest
THURSDAY - swim
FRIDAY - lower body weights
SATURDAY - bike or brick

I’d like to swim more than that, so I may swim another day as well, if I happen to wake up early.

S’mores cookies

I saw these cookies on TikTok, and I HAD to try them. They were delicious but soo sweet! Someone messaged me on IG saying to use semi-sweet chips, so I’ll have to try again and use that instead of milk chocolate.

Here is the video recipe!

And here’s the typed recipe! I looked around online and could not find a link to the recipe anywhere. (I don’t like typing out someone else’s recipe - I’d rather link to their site, you know?) NOTE: I did half of the recipe below, and it made 6 big cookies. As written, it will make 10-12.

1. Cream together 1 cup brown sugar, 1 cup white sugar, and 1 cup butter.

2. Add 2 eggs and 1 yolk, mixing after each one, plus 1 tbsp vanilla extract.

3. Add ½ tsp baking soda, ¼ tsp baking powder, 1 tbsp corn starch, and 1 cup of flour. Mix.

4. Add 2 more cups of flour plus 3 cups of chocolate chips. Mix.

5. Stick in the fridge while your oven preheats to 350F.

6. Assemble: place 6 graham cracker squares on your baking sheet, 1 layer of chocolate (like half of a Hershey bar), and 2 big marshmallows. Then scoop out some of your chilled dough, flatten it out a bit, and place it on top of the marshmallows.

7. Bake for 12-15 minutes, until it’s just barely cooked through. It cooks a little more as it cools.

Speaking of TikTok…

Here are some videos I liked recently!

• Awkward dog does not like his owner staring at him 😅

• This guy gives water to a thirsty rattlesnake. I’d never seen a snake drink water before!!

• Love these outfits. She is making me want to buy a few power suits!!

• Must. Make. These. Cinnamon rolls.

• Another trivia style- Guess the year based on 1 song, 1 movie, and 1 video game released in that year! I’m terrible at this game😆

I need to read more

I go through these big ups and downs over the years. Sometimes, I’ll read a few books a month. Then I’ll go a whole year (YES A YEAR) without reading an entire book. Or, I might read 1-2 for the year.

How do I get out of this slump? I do like audio books sometimes, but I get very distracted. I feel like it can’t have a heavy plot at all, or lots of characters, or I’ll get lost. That’s why I like reading physical books usually. Do you read a lot? What motivates you? I want my kids to read a lot, but I want to lead by example!

Random: favorite fast food orders

To be honest, we don’t eat fast food often at all. But I found a new favorite Starbucks drink, and instead of JUST sharing that, I wanted to make a whole section out of it.

• Starbucks (or any coffee shop, it’s not that special!) - Cold brew, 2 pumps of simple syrup, topped with a little heavy cream

Now, on to a few other fast food places I do like to eat maybe 1 time per month! Our main eating-out food is pizza, once a week. And I’m a thin crust pepperoni girl.😏

• Taco Bell - 1 cheesy gordita crunch, 1 Mexican pizza

• Arby’s - 2 beef and cheddar sandwiches, no red sauce, crinkle fries

• Chick fil A - 8 count nuggets meal with a frosted coffee

• Raising Canes - 3 piece strips, sub another piece of toast for the cole slaw, and a sweet tea!

• Sonic - medium mozzarella sticks and a Cherry coke (they add cherry juice to the soda, so it’s SUPER cherry-y, and I love it)

I’m not a big burger fan, so McD’s and BK and Wendy’s and all that, I don’t really enjoy much! What about you?

Pushin’ 40

This is my birthday month! I’ll be 39 in about 2 weeks. Whenever someone asks, I just say I’m “almost 40”. It is easier than remembering how old I am now. Cam will be 40 in January. Neato🥰 I think getting old is lovely and a privilege. Maybe when I hit 50 I won’t be so welcoming to growing older. Time will tell!

I feel like I’m a lot less concerned about what people think. I remember in my 20s, if I walked past people whispering, I just KNEW they were talking about me. Now? I don’t give it a second thought either way. If they’re talking about me, I don’t really care - I don’t know them. But chances are, they are talking about something else. 🙂 

I’m debating throwing a birthday party for myself… it wouldn’t really be a Bethany-focused event. I’d just use my birthday as an excuse to get people together, you know? If I do it, I’ll have to have a theme. And people would need to dress up. Nothing over the top. Just like, “wear something green” or “wear a hat.”

Another thing just happened - Cam and I celebrated 12 years of marriage! We actually celebrated the day before because our anniversary was the same day as my triathlon. We got each other a couple of gifts but mostly hung out at a coffee shop and chatted. It’s nice to chat without being interrupted. ❤️ He’s my best bud, and I love hanging out with him.

Shoutouts

Thanks to Edwina for buying me a coffee, to Alicia for contributing to my sports watch, and to Tiffany who bought me a few coffees!! Thank you to everyone for the tremendous support before, during, and after my race! I really appreciate all of you so much.

TTFN!

That's it for this week. Have a good one!❤️ Bethany

If you like my content and want to support me, click the coffee cup below to go to my virtual tip jar or you can check out my Amazon wish list! Thank you SO much for your continued support, in every way.