Hello, friends! Summer is in full swing over here, going too fast as always. (Why is summer only two months and winter is like five?) Our kids are finishing up their second of six weeks of camp, so for us it’s largely a NYC summer. Summer in the city gets a bad rap, but we love it. The city empties out (easier to nab reservations!), and we clock in plenty of time at the absolute kids’ paradise Governor’s Island and our nearby Brooklyn Bridge Park, where we just visited friends who were staying at the 1 Hotel–can you believe this view?
(Not shown: A rooftop meltdown that my husband handled via phone)
I’ve marketed this summer to my children as THE BEST SUMMER EVER, something we all deserve after the past two years, do we not? They’ve been adding to the summer list I started months ago, and we’ve been doing a fairly good job checking things off. Here’s that list, in case it inspires you to think up local adventures in your hometown.
SUMMER 2022, AKA BEST SUMMER EVER
Get dim sum in Chinatown✅Visit the Ormson family in the burbs
✅✅Take the ferry!
✅Far Rockaways/Long Beach/other local beaches
Slices of Joe’s Pizza
✅Yankee game!
August vacation!
Celebrate Charlie’s birthday!
Natural History Museum + Central Park
✅Dinners on roof
Go on adventures in the Berkshires
Rug picnic (on a rainy or steamy day)
A day of dream breakfasts
Ha: That last one was my nearly-six-year-old’s. He wanted us all to share our dream breakfasts and then spend the day eating those foods. Both boys named Special K as their dream breakfast, so, cool. No offense to any of us who make them pancakes, eggs, crepes, banana quinoa muffins, cornmeal waffles, bacon… It’s fine. Special K it is.
I’ve been busy preparing for my sister’s baby shower this weekend, and I wanted to share a few ways we are making it special.
For favors, I ordered these pretty seashell candles, harvested and poured on coastal Oregon. We wrapped them up in little linen bundles along with these handwritten instructions: “When Brigitte is in labor, please light this candle and send along your support and love as she transitions into motherhood.” Adding some of these gorgeous cookies to the party favors for good measure!
Guests are encouraged to bring their favorite children’s book to make my sister and her husband (great book lovers) a library, so I sent out a spreadsheet for guests to fill out their books, so we don’t repeat. (I got three copies of Pat the Bunny at my shower! Honestly it’s good to have more than one copy of that one, though, as my kids ended up ripping all three.) I’m bringing I Am a Bunny, The Gruffalo, and Happy Birthday, Moon.
This one was inspired by a Zoom shower for my dear friend Mari’s second baby. Guests filled out a “wishes for baby” sheet before we all met virtually, and it really made the gathering special. Here is the questionnaire I am about to run to Staples to print out and bring to the shower. (Shoutout to my VA, Mercede, for designing this so beautifully! I tried to do it myself in Canva, but she really nailed it.)
In case you’d like to visualize this shower, which I’m so excited for, we are gathering at an outdoor spot in this gorgeous Japanese restaurant in Greenpoint, and I am bringing this amazing matcha crepe cake. Super excited for my mom to arrive tomorrow–kids haven’t seen her since we visited California last August!
If you have more ideas for making showers special, I’d love to hear!
Last week was the 10-year anniversary of the wedding of our dear friends Melissa and Jon, which was so special in part because my husband, Jake, and I officiated! What an incredible life honor. They reminded us of the anniversary by texting this picture.
Before writing out their ceremony, we asked them to fill out a list of questions (hmmm… let me know if you’d like me to find those questions and include in an upcoming email!) and write a letter to each other, which would be sealed and opened in ten years. Melissa said, “It was so special to revisit these! We are sealing them up and rereading in 10 more years!”
I should say, I completely forgot about this last part, but it does sound like me, does it not? This “write now, open later” move was inspired by my fifth grade teacher, who had our class make time capsules to open 15 years later. (More on that, and her, here.)
If only I’d thought to do this for our wedding! Our 15-year anniversary is coming up in September, so perhaps we should write letters for that, and then seal them up and read again in 10 years. (Jake, this is a test if you read to the end: What do you think?)
Happy summer, everyone. If you call it the best summer ever, maybe that’s what it’ll be?
Xoxo
Gina