The high of my week was getting more tattoos! You can see what I got on the photo above. These tattoos are for my mom—tulips are her favorite flower so I got two tulips on one stem to symbolize our relationship, and the anchor is because she is my anchor in this wild, messy world. I love these tattoos so much. They came out so beautifully! And now… let the tattoo healing process begin!

The low of my week was the unexpected departure of a colleague. I’m always pretty shaken up when people leave our organization—I don’t know why it affects me so much! I guess I just really dislike change. Bah.

I’m currently reading The Uncommon Reader by Alan Bennett in print. I just started this book yesterday and didn’t realize it was so short! (120 pages) I’m zooming through it.

A Reel I enjoyed was this very enjoyable Christmas prank. I always joke that I’m the favorite kid so I should absolutely play this same prank on my brother. (Also, my mom sent me this Reel on Instagram so…)

A podcast episode I enjoyed was the most recent Patreon episode for Sarah’s Book Shelves Live. The whole group (Sarah, Catherine, and Susie) came together to discuss their DNFs for the year, which was a fascinating discussion. I’ve become a lot better about DNF-ing books and that’s mostly due to Sarah who is ruthless in her DNF-ing. I loved this discussion on what books they DNF-ed, what books they wished they had DNF-ed, what books they are glad they didn’t DNF, and why it’s good to DNF. (If you took a shot every time I said DNF, congrats, you’re drunk.)

The best money I spent this week was $10 on a smart plug. I have to thank Elisabeth for this. My mind was blown when she wrote about smart plugs in her gift guide earlier this week. I have been looking for something like this! Here’s the story: I use a four-drawer dresser as a makeshift nightstand and had to rearrange a few things so that my CPAP machine was at arm’s length. This way, when my alarm goes off, I can take off the mask, throw it on the floor, and turn off my machine without getting out of bed. Great! The problem is that I had to move my lamp out of arm’s reach. This means if I want to snuggle up in bed, reading, I have to physically get out of bed to turn off my lamp when it’s time to go to sleep. What a first-world problem, I know, but it means I usually just wait until I’m ready to go to sleep to get into bed. But with a smart plug, I can use an app on my phone to turn the lamp on and off! What the what! I thought I needed something fancier to have smart technology in my bedroom. The plug should arrive today and you can bet I am getting that bad boy set up and ready to go ASAP.

My plans this weekend include all the things! Today is my last day of work for the rest of the year, tonight is book club’s Christmas party, tomorrow will be spent making sugar cookie batter and doing a quick run at PetSmart for last-minute gifts for the pups in my life, and Sunday, we’re making Christmas cookies with the whole fam. YAY!

What was the high of your week? What are your weekend plans?

The high of my week was having dinner with my former boss! We had such a great time catching up and talking about her new role. She talked about the imposter syndrome she faced for a little while, which was startling for me to hear. She seems so confident! And she is, but I suppose we all struggle with these feelings of inadequacy from time to time. It’s a good reminder that none of us really had it altogether, even when it seems like we do.

The low of my week was another anxiety spiral about my mom. Sigh. Why do I do this to myself? It feels terrible and makes me imagine a worst-case scenario THAT IS NOT HAPPENING. And she has been fine 100% of the time! But when I can’t get ahold of her, my mind always goes to a dark, dark place.

I’m currently reading Summer Romance by Annabel Monaghan and I am loving it. All I want to do is sit down and read it! I also just started Vera Wong’s Unsolicited Advice for Murderers by Jesse Q. Sutanto on audio.

A Reel I enjoyed was this sweet dachshund “making coffee.” If you are not following this doggo, please do yourself a favor and give him a follow. His videos are delightful. He does very emotional “music videos” to Taylor Swift songs, which make me laugh hysterically. I am always so damn impressed with these animal content creators. How are they so creative?!

A podcast episode I enjoyed was Smutty Romance and the Christian Reader on Faith Adjacent. I have been waiting for this episode. When I was a Christian, reading non-Christian romance always felt like this huge, terrible sin—people having sex before marriage? Blasphemy! I don’t consider it a sin anymore, but it took a long time for me to come to terms with that (and purity culture as a whole). I really enjoyed this episode!

The best money I spent this week was $13 on a moisturizer specifically designed for CPAP users. I mentioned the skin irritation I’ve been dealing with in my post on Monday and I am willing to try everything under the sun to help my poor dry skin. I’ve been slathering Vaseline on the troublesome areas before I put on my mask at night, which does help a little but I still have this terrible cracked spot on my septum that’s driving me crazy. And I’m starting to see some irritation on my face around where the headgear straps sit. Fun times! I’m hoping this moisturizer provides some relief, but I probably fell for some silly marketing ploy. Oh, well!

My plans this weekend include not much! Tonight, I am going out to dinner with my mom and stepdad. Saturday, my only plan is my writing date with Mikaela. And Sunday, it’s a gym date with Mom and football time with the fam! Sunday is also my brother’s birthday so we’ll be celebrating that as well. Yay!

What was the highlight of your week?

The high of my week was receiving my APAP machine! It arrived yesterday in a great traveling case so I never have to leave home without it. I am writing this post on Thursday evening and tonight will be my first time using it. I will be sure to have a post up in a few weeks about how things are going! For now, I am just glad it is here and this long, four-and-a-half-month-long process to get it is over.

The low of my week was spending a few nights away from my girls. I dog-sat for Chip and Lucy from Friday night – Tuesday morning, which means I had to leave the cats for four straight nights. (When I dog-sit, I stay at my mom’s house because it’s easier. I come home every day to check on the girls.) They were very unhappy with me, even greeting me with, “Look who it is! Mommy Never-Home,” one morning, which was very hurtful.

I’m currently reading The Rachel Incident by Caroline O’Donoghue, which I am loving so far. I’m only about 50 pages in, but it’s not a long book (under 300 pages) and my goal is to finish it before August is over.

A blog post I enjoyed was You Can Do It! by Kyria. I thought this was such a motivating message for all of us. No, many of us do not have any desire to quit our jobs and road-bike around the world. But I think there are other dreams we have that we just have to be willing to put in the work to do.

To do new things, it takes work. You have to get out of your comfort zone and cede some control to other people, the unknown and life in general. I literally do not know what’s around the next corner most of the time, and this is hard. I am a type A planner, but in this case, I am often going day by day, because (a) you will just disappoint yourself if you have too high of expectations or you try to control every moment and (b) it’s actually part of the fun. 

A podcast episode I enjoyed was The Journey of Currently Reading on, you guessed it, Currently Reading. They just celebrated 300 “big show” episodes and as someone who has been listening to them from the beginning, it was fun to learn more about how they feel about their podcasting journey. It was a great episode!

The best money I spent this week was on Dayquil when I wasn’t feeling great. I don’t know if my virus was just mild overall or if the Dayquil really did the trick, but I was barely sick with this virus! This was my first time taking Dayquil for a long time because I once broke out in hives when I took Nyquil and I’ve been scared to use either medicine ever since. But no weird reactions this time around!

My plans this weekend include a podcast recording date with Bri tonight, a writing date on Saturday morning, game night on Saturday evening, and then the rest of the weekend is entirely plan-less! I’m off work today and don’t go back until Wednesday, so I’m going to have myself a nice little staycation.

What was the highlight of your week? What are your weekend plans?

There was a shark at the beach on Saturday!

The high of my week was going to a new HIIT class on Tuesday evening. My mom and I usually go to a different workout class on Tuesday evenings, but our regular trainer wasn’t going to be there so we decided to try this HIIT class instead. It was with a trainer I worked with in one other class, and he was very intense, so I haven’t been too keen on going to his HIIT class. And man, it was hard. The HIIT class we normally go to has 8 stations and we do 3 rounds of one exercise at each station. This one had 6 stations but with 4 rounds of two different exercises at each station (so essentially, 8 rounds in total for each station). There was a point in the workout where I thought I was going to throw up because my heart was beating so fast! I wanted to die during the workout and at the end of my class, my mom and I were like, “So, same time next week?” HA. (Also, the trainer was incredibly nice and accommodating! He wasn’t as intense as I had thought.)

The low of my week was lower back pain. While my sciatica isn’t as bad as it was earlier this year, I am starting to have the pain again. I need to start icing my back again and doing some stretches. I had a lot of pain during my Tuesday evening HIIT class and it really impacted how much of the movements I was able to do. I’ve been thinking about buying a back brace for my HIIT classes to provide a little more support for my back—it would also probably help my form during certain movements. One of the women in my Wednesday evening HIIT class wears one, and I really want to ask her about it (but I’m shyyyy).

I’m currently reading two books. I’m listening to What Lies in the Woods by Kate Alice Marshall on audio (the narrator is terrible, but I’m powering through). And I just started The Housemaid by Freida McFadden in print!

A Reel I enjoyed was this very funny dog video that my mom sent me. Please enjoy!

A podcast episode I enjoyed was Real Life Homes on The Girl Next Door podcast. I love when Kelsey and Erica talk about the most mundane details of their life, and this one fit the bill as they talked about how they really live in their homes—like, where do they eat their meals and what spaces do they spend the most time in? At the end of the episode, they played a game of “Where do you keep that?” which I loved so much that I took notes so I can do my own version on the blog.

The best money I spent this week was $9 on a new can opener. How exciting! My can opener bit the dust this week and I immediately purchased a new one because that’s a “can’t live without” kitchen tool for me.

My plans this weekend include not much! I have a writing date with Mikaela on Saturday morning and a workout with Mom on Sunday morning, and that’s about it. But it’s also OLYMPICS WEEKEND! I will be spending a lot of time parked on my couch, watching athletes do seemingly impossible feats over and over again.

The high of my week was getting my sleep apnea sleep study rescheduled for tomorrow! Originally, my sleep study was scheduled for August 3rd so I couldn’t pass up getting it done two weeks earlier. Am I looking forward to it? Absolutely not. Do I want to sleep with a CPAP every night? Nope. But do I want to sleep more deeply and feel better? Yes and yes. So I’m glad I’ll finally get this step done so I can start my new CPAP journey.

The low of my week was Lila’s matted fur. Oh, how I wish Eloise was my long-haired cat. She loves getting brushed and doesn’t need to be brushed nearly as much as Lila does. But, of course, it’s the cat that hates getting brushed who needs it the most. This week, I started noticing little areas of matted fur at the base of Lila’s spine and around her tail. I’m guessing those are just areas that are hard for her to groom because she is, ahem, very floofy. Lila often acts like I am attempting bodily harm when I bring out the brush, so I decided on a new tactic. Since she loves snuggling with me right before bed, I brought the brush into bed with me and then, when she was snoozing away, I started brushing her. It worked! I was able to get out a few of the matted spots before she ran away, so I’m just going to keep trying this method until she’s mat-free. (The other option is to give her a dose of gabapentin, which I have on hand and I’m willing to try, but I just really, really want her to get used to being brushed!) The goal is to get her fur all cleaned up and then continue brushing her at night until she realizes I’m not trying to hurt her. Baby steps with this one!

I’m currently reading three books. On audio, I’m about halfway done with Supercommunicators: How to Unlock the Secret Language of Connection by Charles Duhigg, which I’m finding super informative! In print, I’m working my way through Family, Family by Laurie Frankel and liking it a lot. And my e-book right now is Highly Suspicious and Unfairly Cute by Talia Hibbert, a YA romance.

A Reel I enjoyed was this absolutely adorable cat video. Eloise is now asking to be included in our biweekly family game nights after seeing this Reel.

A podcast episode I enjoyed was the Big Brother 26 draft on Rob Has a Podcast. This is such a niche interest of mine. Wednesday was the season premiere of Big Brother, and I am so excited to get fully immersed in a new season of my favorite show. I also love listening to podcasts about the show, and the lovely folks at RHAP are some of the best. It was fun listening in on their draft, their trash talking, and their frank assessments of the new houseguests. My mom and I do our own mini-draft (we only pick 3 players each), which we’ll probably do sometime this weekend!

The best money I spent was $100 on a new cordless vacuum. YES, THIS IS NOT WITHIN THE PARAMETERS OF NO-SPEND JULY. But it was Prime Day and I really, really needed a new vacuum. I’ve had a Shark robot vacuum for a few years now and while originally I loved it, we have decided to consciously uncouple. It just doesn’t vacuum as efficiently or deeply as I want it to, and I’m ready to get back into the manual vacuuming game. I had a few cordless vacuums saved on my Amazon wishlist, and one of them was $50 off for Prime Day, and I decided to buy it. This is a need, not a want, and I’m okay with breaking the rules to buy it. The new vacuum should arrive today and you guys have no idea how excited I am to use it. (God, adulthood is so stupid.)

My plans this weekend include going to the dog beach with my mom, stepdad, Chip, and Lucy on Saturday. MY SLEEP STUDY!!! And a baby shower for my cousin on Sunday afternoon. It will be a busy, fulfilling weekend.

What was your last boring adult purchase that you were actually super excited about? What was the high of your week?