June check-in

Hello Internet! Did you miss me? I missed you.

Scaling Mount Washmore

I've been very busy traveling and recovering from traveling. If you are a parent and know what it's like to return from a trip with not one suitcase full of dirty clothes, but four suitcases full of dirty clothes, one for every member of the family, you'll know what I'm talking about.

Adding to the fun, my daughter completed her post-graduate year at boarding school. And in packing up her room, she and my husband didn't sufficiently differentiate between clean and dirty clothes, but jumbled them up together. 

This makes for epic amounts of laundry.

Here be shoes. And purses. And Steven King books.

At the moment, my house looks like the Juniors' department of Bloomingdales exploded. Sorting through everything and squeezing it into the available space is an ongoing challenge. Her room appeared sufficiently full while she was away at school. It was furnished. She had bedding, clothes, and tchotkes. Now the prodigal daughter returns with a minivan of belongings to store. Where the hell are we going to put it all?

Some Kon Mari-ing is definitely in order.

Adventures in Michigan

Did I mention that she graduated? She did. And first there was a music festival where I got to hear her sing opera.

A screen shot of the crappy cell phone recording I made

After graduation, we traveled to Mackinac Island, Saulte St. Marie, Marquette, and Green Bay, Wisconsin before returning to Chicago.

Basically a circle tour of Lake Michigan, with a bit of Lake Huron and Lake Superior thrown in for good measure.

I did not grow up in the Great Lakes region, so I have all the enthusiasm of a recent convert. It was extremely scenic.

Some shopping occurred. Mostly for my daughter. I restrained myself mostly to picture postcards and the one sweatshirt I found that didn't have a moose on it.

I also bought a dress. It's still packed up in tissue, or I'd show you a picture. I had no business buying it. It is a size eight, and I am not. It's a vintage pink sheath with a coordinating striped coat with bracelet sleeves and rhinestone buttons. It was $53.00 at a vintage store in Marquette, Michigan. I had to buy it.

I must know someone who's a size 8 and wants to dress like it's 1965.

I Survived a Style Desert

Another reason I didn't post--I mean other than the fact that I was with my family 24/7 and it felt odd to spend too much time using my laptop--was that this was a uniquely unglamorous time, even for me. Mostly I wore jeans and a button-up shirt. My skincare was reduced from my Korean-skincare-expert-wannabe multi-steps to at most, four or five steps. My makeup consisted of BB cream and lipstick. It was ... I don't know ... kind of embarrassing to spend a lot of time primping when all these people were around.

And anyway, this was more of a sunscreen vacation. Nay, a bug spray vacation.

After I got home, I eased back into full-on skincare. I started using my new retinol cream, the very expensive Chantecaille stuff I bought a few weeks ago. I'm using it every other night for now, because my experience with the prescription stuff was not joyous. So far it's OK.

More Travel Awaits

Tomorrow I'm leaving for another road trip, this time to Oklahoma. My daughter has some kind of registration/pep rally/see your dorm/find the library event at her new college. The good news is that we'll be on the Mother Road, getting our kicks on Route 66! The bad news is it will be hot on a level I'm unused to, which makes me doubly glad I didn't splurge on a lot of moose-covered sweatshirts while I was in Michigan.