FROM: STELLA

TO: LAURA

1. I’m 10 years late to the party, but finally started watching Homeland. I think maybe season 1 was spoiled for me back when it first came out and I didn’t end up watching it. I am now very excited to have 96 episodes to watch and no recollection of the spoiler.

2. I was excited to discover a new park this week that’s super close to our Airbnb. It was a good reminder to “look beyond yelp” and explore our neighborhood ourselves without relying on the internet. That being said, I also enjoyed getting to be the “first to review” so that others will discover it.

3. Colby has a new found love for stuffed animals and my husband and I are enjoying every minute of it. He likes to line them up together on the couch to read books. It’s been a weeklong read-a-thon at our house as he pulls out all of his favorites to share. We’ve especially been enjoying Good Night Beach, the Melissa & Doug Poke-a-Dot books, and this picture book First 100 Animals.

4. I was super excited to discover that Levain Bakery (home of the most amazing cookies in NYC) has a bake at home option that you can purchase at Whole Foods. I’ve been meaning to try a copycat recipe for ages, but this has made it so much easier!

5. Our book club pick this month was House in the Cerulean Sea and I really loved it. I have not read a fantasy book in a while and it was really fun to escape from the real world and enjoy the magical world TJ Klune created. I primarily listen to rented audiobooks but since this one was so popular and I had a limited time to read it, I ended up not being able to download it from the library. So I actually bought the book and read the physical copy. I think that made the magic feel even more real and I’m excited to pick up another “real” book for my next read as well.

FROM: LAURA

TO: STELLA

1. My favorite thing about this week was The Stack’s episode drop on Wednesday with author Mira Jacobs. It was host Traci’s first time delving into the world of graphic novels and it did not disappoint. I also had never read a graphic novel and was entranced and delighted by how much I liked it. I blew through the July book club pick of The Best We Could Do by Thi Bui and quickly read through Jacobs’ own book, Good Talk, as well. All around fantastic picks and I’m thankful for the introduction to a new genre for me!

2. Somehow my husband hasn’t ever really been on the FIRE, financial literacy, intense interest in our finances bandwagon the way I have. I send him all the links I really like (as well as all our finance blog posts) but it’s just never really piqued his interest… until this week. I don’t totally know what’s changed but all of a sudden he’s much more engaged in having those conversations and I’m not longer the only one constantly logging into and refreshing our joint Personal Capital account. I know he’s been listening to more finance-related podcasts lately, so maybe that’s it! All that to say, we’ve been doing a lot of deep diving on the Engaging Data early retirement calculators as well as the Safe Withdrawal Rate Series from Early Retirement Now and it’s been fun to envision what our future might hold.

3. I really loved this post by Emily Henderson talking about what kids actually remember from trips and vacations (and the difference between the two!). As a kid, my family went to the same beach and rented the same house every year since I was born. I have huge nostalgia for that specific place and building as it was our big escape for the year. Conversely, my husband’s family did a lot more trip-type getaways while he was growing up — road trips around the US, multi-city excursions to Europe, etc. It’s been interesting to talk together about what we want to prioritize for our family and what we want to share with Ernie in terms of vacations and trips, and this article helped me put words to a lot of the more nostalgia-based feelings I have about returning somewhere again and again.

4. Somehow I only learned about the Amazon Shopper Panel rewards program a few months ago. I’ve reached my $10 rewards every month since and I’m super enjoying the freebie cash! (Insert disclaimer here about how I’m simultaneously trying to buy less with Amazon because I don’t agree with a lot of their business practices, but it’s also so hard to argue with the convenience factor…)