We’re only a few days into the month and September has been full of family fun, kitchen adventures, and some not-so-fun sniffles making their way through our kids. We’ve had a mix of coziness and activity, decorated for fall, and have been doing lots of reading. I made a visit to the hematologist and Sadie took an interesting picture on my phone! Here’s a look at our September… so far!

Family Fun This September ⛳️

As I mentioned in this post, we took the kids mini golfing! Totally wild and would totally do it again 🙂

Mini golfing was something on our summer fun list and we made it happen on Labor Day! It was a really great night. The course was bustling and the weather was lovely.

Jimmy and I managed to jog a mile together this week! We brought the kids down to our local park that has a track so we could keep an eye on them while we ran.

Jimmy said he might want to do a fall 5k, so we’ll see if we can squeeze in a few more runs together. He hates hot weather and the evenings have cooled off a bit lately. When we were running together in June, our pace was like 11:00 minutes per miles but this time it was closer to 9:30 per mile!

One not so fun thing has been the sniffles for the kids–especially Dakota. Sadie started complaining that her throat was sore, then all three kids were sneezing for a day. Then Dakota started in with a runny nose and has been out of it. I feel like you can see it in this picture 🥺

She’s pretty pleasant, just kinda pitiful! Sleep has been pretty nonexistent over here since Dak has a hard time breathing with her runny nose 😴

Want to hear something cute? Sadie saw the picture at the beginning of this post (of my Bible, a candle, and a mug of coffee) and then asked if she could use my phone to take a picture. She then set up her breakfast in the same spot and took a picture 🥹

It was a good reminder to me that my kids pick up on so many things that I do. With that in mind, I want to always be a good example to them in all that I do 🙏🏻

In terms of other fun things, as always, the kids have been enjoying their daily bike rides 🚲

Fall Decorating and Reading 📖

On an exciting note, we decorated for fall and pulled out all of our fall-themed books for the kids!

The kids love our tradition where I wrap seasonal books and they get to open one each day at nap time. Since I store these books away in the off-season, they feel brand new to the kids each year 🧡

I have my eye on a few more to add to our collection: The Littlest Pilgrim and I Love you a Latte.

September Recipes and Kitchen Experiments 👩🏼‍🍳

It’s beginning to look a lot like… soup season! I made butternut squash soup and finally took fresh pictures and updated the recipe. You can find it here if you’re looking for the perfect 5 ingredient fall soup that also happens to be gluten and dairy free 🥣

I experimented in the kitchen with making homemade deli meat! I brined a turkey breast overnight and roasted it low and slow the next day. I put it in the refrigerator overnight and then sliced it really thin the next day. It came out better than I expected!

Next on my kitchen experiment agenda? Homemade beef jerky! I’ll report back on how it goes 😉

Other Notes and Thoughts 📝

• Kinda funny, kinda scary but I just got this pack of (soft!!) shirts and put on the white one and what happened an hour later? Mordecai fell down our basement steps, bit his lip, and bled all over my shirt when I picked him up 😂 I will let you know if my favorite stain remover spray gets the blood out of my shirt. Also: he is totally fine and took the fall like a champ. WHEW!
• Dakota is officially in her snack era! She is old enough to have rice rusks and these dissolvable teething snacks.
• I visited the hematologist this week and will be having blood drawn next week to test my ferritin, hemoglobin, etc. and will go from there to see if I need any iron infusions.
• Alert: I cleaned out our junk drawer! We had random batteries in there that I put in our Battery Daddy storage container and I was reminded of how amazing that thing is. If you ever need to get someone a super practical gift, the Battery Daddy is it. I just looked on my Amazon account and I’ve bought this *six* times as gifts for loved ones and I always hear back that it’s useful!

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And that concludes today’s randomness! It’s currently evening as I type up this post and I just laid Dakota down for bed. She had a slight temperature and was definitely worn out from her cold. Hopefully she has a good night’s rest 🙏🏻

Have you tried any new recipes?

What’s the best practical gift you’ve ever received?