September Brain but End Of Summer Reads

Plus vanilla girls, bra hacks, online shopping and back to school vibes.

Hello, hello friends! I hope your last gasp of summer has been everything you wanted and needed it to be. We had lots of family visiting, and then went to Lake George for a few days, which is as beautiful as it is (now, depressingly) Trump-y. But when I wasn’t explaining to my kids why the gift shop next to our ice cream shop was selling thin blue line flags and Fuck Biden t-shirts, I was swimming, attempting yet again to paddle board (every year, I forget how to stand up!) and reading all the books.

And then we got back just in time for the back to school rush. Apologies for all the non-New York readers who have been back for ages, but mine start first and fifth grade today. And I am working on a massive BT Guide about diet culture in schools, but it’s not quite ready for you yet. So instead you’re getting all the links because I read so much good stuff while I was away, followed by a fun little end of summer book list.

Friday Links & Recs (but make it Tuesday)

Anne Helen Petersen

shared this piece on Insta a few weeks ago and it completely explained my relationship with my hair for the past 20 years? (I’d posit Elle Woods is the proto-hair though.)

Your school’s “healthy eating curriculum” is a problem.

If you hate, hate, hate online shopping, this will help.

I needed to read this the other day and maybe you do too?

Two icons (named Petersen) talking momfluencers: I want to take a bath in this conversation.

I’ll have a dollhouse project update soon but in the meantime, this Etsy shop can just have my bank account.

This by

Lynn Steger Strong

is just the best thing I’ve read on writing and motherhood and how they don’t go together but they do.

If you, like me, feel an overwhelming urge to organize pens (and other art supplies) right now, this remains the best such organizer ever.

I’m also obsessed with these for making sense of the PILES of drawing paper, construction paper, sketch pads, etc that otherwise form an impenetrable mat on my kids’ art table.

Such a beautiful tale of friendship, bra sharing, and inter-size solidarity from

Virgie Tovar

.

I have somehow completely missed the vanilla girl trend but was absolutely fascinated by Brittany Luse and Steffi Cao in conversation about it.

What I Read On Vacation

We might be entering September Mode, but the gardener in me would like us all to remember that summer isn’t technically over for another two weeks. It’s still porch reading season and soon it will be cozy blanket reading season, and I promise, these work for all weather.