Does it feel like like Mercury has been in retrograde for the last two weeks and not just since Friday? I feel like everyone has been having a rough time, and I have been trying to keep my head above water while balancing a ton of different stressors on my plate. My boyfriend is moving in next week, so I’ve been trying to clear out space and maintain some order in the midst of boxes and piles, but it feels never ending! - D

After cleaning up the holidays, we’ve now jumped right into birthday season at our house, since Cece and Lila both have January birthdays. Fully into planning a disco/rock and roll birthday party at the moment and trying to come up with ideas for presents that they didn’t get for Christmas. If anyone has any suggestions, send them my way! The good thing about planning all of these parties is that it’s gotten me out of the January slump that I was in last week-being stuck at home with very cold weather and a lot of work to catch up had me ready to crawl back into bed at a moment’s notice, but party planning lifts my spirits every time .- E

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What We’re Reading and Watching

• I was in the mood for a silly action movie and watched Eternals, which is the newest chapter in Marvel movies. It has a great cast (Angelina Jolie, Gemma Chan, Salma Hayek, Richard Madden and more) and was an interesting pivot with only minimal references to the Avengers, and rest of the movies. I overall enjoyed it and would definitely watch the next one! - D

• Eloise had already read You’ll Be the Death of Me, but I read it over the weekend and loved it! A YA thriller that takes place over a single day and had just the right level of high stakes but not a crazy amount of violence. - D

• The season premier of Summer House is tonight! I’m so excited for my favorite Bravo show to be back. -E

• I’m in the middle of reading Lucky by Marissa Stapley, about a woman who has been raised as a con artist. When she wins the lottery for real, she’s on the run and can’t redeem the ticket until she deals with her past. It’s very good so far and I’m rooting for Lucky ! -E

What We’re Buying

• With the move, most of my purchases are boring organizational items, but I am very excited about restoring some order. One of the things driving me crazy right now is the number of cords and chargers everywhere, so I bought this charging station for the entryway table to keep us more organized. - D

• Another slightly mundane purchase, but with Boston requiring proof of vaccination to go to restaurants, I bought these plastic protectors! I gave away the extras, and am so happy knowing I can pop my card into my purse and it will be safe. - D

• I read a glowing review of these all natural teeth whitening strips and now I want to try them! -E

• I’m also in the mood for striped button down to wear with white jeans or shorts on an upcoming warm weather trip and debating between going for the higher priced classic or the Amazon dupe that also has good reviews. -E

• I’m spending so much time in my black Dudley Stephens fleece, that I’ve been debating adding another fun fleece to the rotation, like this one or this one. -E

What We’re Making

• We made Cast Iron Nachos for dinner this weekend, and while it was definitely not the healthiest dinner that I’ve ever served, the kids loved it! My next goal is to make it outside on the fire pit when it’s a little warmer. We used this recipe for inspiration, but ended up setting up the toppings as a bar so that everyone could personalize their own. -E

• I also made Greek Chicken Bowls for dinner, doing a mash-up of this recipe but using this recipe for the chicken, since our grocery stores were having meat and produce shortages, so I was working with what I could get, and what I could get was ground chicken, haha! It turned out to be a great switch up that everyone enjoyed. -E

• We wanted to do something different with the sweet potatoes in our pantry so I decided to do a “breakfast for dinner” theme and make this hash. Unfortunately, my oven gets extremely hot, so it ended up getting slightly burnt, but we were able to make it edible. It was yummy, but keep an eye on it in the oven and don’t cook your onions as much as they recommend before! - D

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