I'm very picky when it comes to sales, but that wasn't always the case. I used to talk myself into every one, calling it "saving money." Now I’m much more intentional about it, I keep a running list of things I need from brands I already love, and I wait. Labor Day is fun because so many brands have sales. Here's what made my list, and the one question I ask before anything goes in the cart: would I pay full price for this? Most of the home pieces featured are from Lulu and Georgia, they have 25% off sitewide and it’s really good because that doesn’t happen often:

The living room

We haven’t painted the living room yet or hung art on the walls but I love that we moved and all the pieces still work in this house too:

The Merrit sideboard is a little long for where I have it right now, but I love it so much I’m keeping it here for the time being. It might need to go in the entryway but I haven’t styled that area yet. It’s the collab with Sarah Sherman Samuel and I love her interior design, I bought it when we were in San Marino.

The Baird swivel chairs come in so many prints, but I still think they’re so cozy in the brown, and these wool light filtering curtains.

The wool throw in the color rust lives on our chair and we use for movie nights. This one is perfect in brown too. The Olema handwoven wool throw I’ve had since 2023 and it’s still in good shape.

Our round coffee table is sold out, but this one is the one I'd buy now. I love a round table with little ones. When they start walking I’m not worried about sharp corners, we had a square marble coffee table in our first house with Poppy and I was always nervous about her falling into it, so I’d keep her out of the living room. That’s not practical, I want our living room to be cozy and a place for the whole family. And the kids loveee this sheepskin ottoman, especially when we light the fireplace.

Our Chiltern rug is thick and cozy and the quality is great. Mine is the colorway with more pink in it and I wish I’d gone a bit darker like the copper color.

The Kemble woven basket holds our firewood and looks pretty next to the fireplace. It’s from the Heidi Callier collab and her rooms are always so warm and elevated at the same time.

The Deep Silence print is in Anthony’s office waiting to be hung. We’re behind on a few house projects but it will be up hopefully soon! Here’s what it looked like at our previous home:

The dining room

The Raphael sideboard is in our dining room and I love how light it is next to the other furniture. I still need to hang prints and style that area more. I’m borrowing Jay’s lamp from her room, I just ordered this one.

Our bedroom

The lamps, the nightstands, the full length mirror are all from the collaboration with DISC Interiors, who do beautiful work out in LA. We need to paint our room still, not loving the grey walls it has currently, but here’s how they were styled in our previous home:

My bedframe comes in so many prints.

I love this Lee tall dresser I use the inside shelves for folded sweaters and joggers for the fall and it makes it easy to see everything alongside having drawers.

The Vekki bedspread is on our bed now. I originally bought it for Jay’s room last year, but with her new room here the mattress was smaller so it was too big. See Jay’s room before and after here.

Avocado mattresses. Every mattress in our house is an Avocado because the materials are truly clean, organic latex, organic wool, and organic cotton with no foam, no chemical flame retardants, and no fiberglass. Up to 20% off mattresses and 15% off bedding and bath.

The kids’ rooms

The kids both have Lorena Canals washable cotton rugs in their room (see them in this post), these are some of my favorites, dog pillow, checkered rug, line rug.

This dresser and Anastasia mirror are in Poppy’s room. I painted it Incarnadine Red from Farrow & Ball most recently:

It’s adorable in the white too, how it was in her previous room:

In Jay’s room (see them all featured in this post): the Birchly chandelier, the Monroe velvet pillow on her bed, and the Duna organic towels in her bathroom. The bath sheet is huge and so cozy, and the hand towels can be personalized, which gives it that hotel touch.

My kids’ both have avocado toddler pillows and Elliott has the crib mattress and Poppy has the kid mattress. See how I styled Poppy’s room in this post.

Boden is 15% off new kids’ styles. I had to get this jacket and dress for Poppy (thinking would be perfect for Christmas), sooo cute!

I love Hanna Andersson, especially the matching print above. Their site is 40% off and code FUN20 takes another 20% off your order. These toy story PJs in 100% cotton are adorable! I love this dress and this for Poppy, this and this for Elliott, and this and this for Clive.

Elevated closet staples:

Madewell is up to 50% off sale, plus 25% off fall selects with code LONGWEEKEND.

I love this look: my jeans, shirt, belt, shoes. I’m 5’10 and wearing a size 27 Tall in the jeans, if you’re over 5’9 the tall length is perfect. The jeans have a tiny bit of stretch:

Left: Low slung baggy | Right: Low Rise Loose (both in the tall length)

Other items I’m loving from Madewell: woven bag, tank I own in barn red, loafers.

MATE the Label organic cotton basics that hold their shape after washing. Their Long Weekend Event is 20% off sitewide I love their biker shorts and leggings.

Other honorable mentions:

Helmi pendant, the Kalani pendant (we put this in the stairway of our Pasadena house), the Garda sconce, a dried strawflower wreath for fall, the Dori linen placemats, the Pearl stoneware, and wavy dinnerware I use nightly. the Darcia vase, and the Olivia candlesticks. The Villers compote bowls

The KitchenAid Artisan stand mixer is $100 off and Crate and Barrel is giving 20% back in reward dollars on top. I use it every day and it’s worth the money. With the holidays coming it’s nice to catch it on sale.

xx Brittany

I’ve been in this space since 2013, which means I’ve been through different waves of people saying it’s over, or that it’s not a long-term plan, and lately it’s being talked about more than it has in years. There was a Vulture piece called “The Influencer Recession,” about aspirational content losing its grip and creators turning to what the writer calls brand-safe rage bait just to get seen.

Jennings’ argument is that this is a supply problem. Too many people want to work in the attention economy, and attention runs on supply and demand, so the formula that worked ten years ago, post something aspirational enough consistently enough and an audience finds you, has stopped working. She points out that individual creators are now competing against clipping farms, companies paying people thousands of dollars to flood platforms with clips, which means an average post has almost no chance of reaching anybody new. On top of that, the aspirational stuff reads as tone deaf now, and luxury has gotten too common to signal anything, with one creator telling her that everyone has an Hermès these days. So people are reaching for rage bait instead, because anger still moves. She's right that it's happening, but I don't think it's a great strategy (more on this later).

NPR followed in August with an episode titled “The influencer era is dead. What’s next?” And talks about streaming as what comes next, and brands buying their way into the background of somebody’s live stream, then paying clippers pennies to spread those moments around. That’s the billboard model again, just cheaper. I’m no streamer, but when it comes to fashion, beauty and lifestyle brands, that’s not what I’m seeing. Brand budgets were at their wildest around 2020 and they’ve tightened since, but the deals didn’t disappear, they got selective. Brands are being much more careful about who they work with, and what they’re asking for isn’t eyeballs anymore.

I started my blog right after we got married in 2013, called Thrifts & Threads (my then IG handle too), thrift store finds mixed with whatever was already hanging in my closet. I loved fashion but we were also doing Dave Ramsey’s envelope system to pay off our credit card and student loan debt, so I didn’t have much extra to spend on my clothing budget, and finding cashmere or leather at a thrift shop and styling it was how I grew my blog. I was so excited when a brand reached out wanting to send me an item to feature in my email blast, because I could get the clothes I loved without increasing my clothing budget, and when another blogger told me I should be making a rate card and charging for those features and getting paid for my time, my mind was blown. This is was my first rate card:

My husband and I got really strategic and were so consistent, working on the blog on the weekends to make sure we had posts ready for the week while we were at our corporate jobs. Once I started making a little money at it, I also had a weekly section about how to start a blog and grow on Instagram, and my email list ended up being those who wanted outfit ideas plus other potential bloggers trying to build their own site.

I packed up my desk of my corporate marketing job at an insurance firm, in June of 2015, right as Jadyn got out of school for the summer. The blog had been outearning my salary for six months in a row and I wasn’t planning to leave if it hadn’t. I remember standing there thinking I really hope this keeps going, because it felt so freeing, no more late nights and weekends working on the blog, now I could be productive during the day with it! I also didn’t want it to be a failure and I didn’t want to waste the momentum my blog had going as my readership kept going up and that helped book even more blog post jobs. My CEO and CFO at the time were so supportive but I’m sure were a bit confused about what I was doing, because at the time I put in my notice I had 50k followers on IG and they were shocked it was making me money but also happy for me. I drove home that day thankful and completely determined to stay consistent and help people even more than I had been. Anthony left the following year after the business matched his salary six months as well.

Quitting meant I could pick Jadyn up from school and she no longer had to do the after school care, and it was the first time I ever felt like I had a flexible job to be there for her. She was eight and loved my blog because in her mind that’s why I was there every day at pickup.

We kept posting and focusing energy on hitting the Instagram algorithm to increase my followers, and every week I’d watch the numbers go up when I posted specific photos at certain times of day. I’d post ripped skinny jeans holding a coffee on a Thursday evening and it would do so well. I knew exactly what to post and when, and I’d hit some kind of flow.

I won Breakthrough Blogger of the Year at the 2015 Bloglovin’ awards and got my first agent for sponsored deals, and every deal we booked made us more excited that we’d made the right call going full-time.

My first designer fashion show was Chloé, fall 2016. And I only got invited because I’d bought one of their bags and worn it on repeat and kept using their #chloegirls hashtag, and someone in their PR office noticed and invited me. I’d never even been to Europe before; I had only recently traveled out of the country for the first time ever for our honeymoon. Anthony said well, we’re going, we have no clue what we’re doing but we’ll figure it out! They sent me an outfit and bag to wear to the show, and I sat in there certain I wasn’t supposed to be there, because my blog was called Thrifts and Threads and this was designer fashion. But I was so inspired, already thinking about getting home and writing up the trends I’d seen and the outfits I’d worn. That trip was where we figured out we loved traveling and loved not being tied to an office, and it made us want to work even harder to keep the whole thing going.

Nobody paid me for that bag. I bought it, I wore it constantly, I tagged it, and a person at Chloé happened to see it. That was the entire mechanism back then, and nobody was measuring anything. It was all happening organically, and I was very excited that I had saved up for that bag, believe me I was going to be posting it everyday!

The early deals were blog traffic and email inclusions, then Instagram got added on, so it was a blog post plus a grid post. When Snapchat and Stories showed up brands wanted the daily check-in, you walking through your day on video, and I was terrible at it. I’d been shooting outfit photos in sunglasses for years and suddenly I was supposed to talk to a camera without them, and I felt so awkward. I forced myself to get over it and learn it anyway, because you either evolve or die in this business. A deal by then was a feature plus a post plus stories, sometimes all three.

I only got on TikTok because of Jadyn. It was her favorite app and I didn’t understand it at all, so she’d sit and show me videos, and what I noticed was that I was barely seeing any fashion on there. That looked like an opportunity. I started in 2019 and was posting from the shows in Milan and Paris that March, right before COVID hit, and it opened doors to brands I wouldn’t have reached otherwise. Then the pandemic came, with everyone stuck at home the whole thing took off, and I gained millions of followers in a few months. At one point I was posting two TikToks a day, heavy on outfit transitions, and the editing ate hours because of all the clips, and that was on top of Instagram photos and the blog (which by then had become brittanyxavier.com). Everyone was trying to crack the code on going viral and brands were paying whoever managed it. Something had to give, so we stopped posting on the blog and put everything into video. We also grew my YouTube channel to over a million by focusing on strategy for that. Audiences followed whoever was most viral then, and brands paid for my reach.

But something began to happen…

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I walked into the ADU (where we set up her room so she has her own space for the summer) out of habit, said "Jay," and then it hit me, she's not here anymore, and I got emotional in there. All summer that was my little routine, poking my head in to see if she wanted matcha, or to come along for whatever I was doing that day, and the kids were always running in there to find her (usually waking her up much earlier than she was planning). Now it's quiet, and I got so sad standing in it, her bed was neat and she left her room all organized.

We just got back from dropping Jay off in Boca Raton for her sophomore year at Lynn University. This letter is the whole weekend, an hour into a 13-hour drive and she's on the wrong freeway, the dorm room rearrange, and the goodbye in a hotel lobby that got all of us teary eyed...

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We’d never been to 30A, (I hadn’t even heard of it until we moved to Franklin). People here kept asking if we’d been, and it’s the way many people here visit the beach without getting on a flight. It’s about a seven hour drive, and if you leave early enough in the morning you’re there by the afternoon, so it’s doable with kids. We left later than we wanted to and and stopped more times than originally planned, we ended up getting in by 10pm, but we eventually made it!

The area is named after Scenic Highway 30A and the communities are strung along it one after another, Seaside, WaterColor, Grayton Beach, Rosemary Beach, Alys Beach, and Seagrove, which is where we stayed. Each one has its own feel, some planned out and some older and more lived in. There’s a paved bike path running the whole length of it so people get around on bikes and golf carts, and the water is so clear and turquoise it almost looks like the Caribbean.

We were looking in Seagrove specifically. It's right in the middle of everything, Seaside a few minutes one way and Rosemary Beach a few minutes the other. It's one of the older parts of 30A too, it grew on its own instead of being planned out all at once, so it's live oaks and magnolias and beach cottages mixed in with the bigger houses. I loved the trees and nature along the houses, I kept forgetting the beach was so close.

Top | Pants | Headscarf | Earrings

The house we stayed at is called 10 Palms 30A and it has ten bedrooms! That sounded like way too much house when we were first looking at it and then we counted our six, plus everyone who wanted to come, and it ended up being perfect. There was enough space to have the kids nap in a quiet area while everyone was being loud in another part of the house. And traveling as a family of 6 now means we'd most likely need two hotel rooms, especially as the kids get bigger. So finding a house that felt like a hotel resort but we had our own private pool and space felt so nice! People usually book it for bigger groups too, company retreats, bachelorette parties, a few families going in together, etc.

My friend Jenna met us there with her husband Kevin and their two little girls who are five and one. Jenna and I met at cheer tryouts in high school in 2001 at Glendora High School in CA and we've been close friends ever since. She's in Colorado now and we would typically see each other when she'd visit CA, her family has a beach house in Newport Beach. But we hadn't seen each other since we moved to TN and had been trying to figure out if we would go out to her or she would fly to us, and they had been wanting to check out 30A too and had never been. So we thought this would be the perfect spot to go and for both of us to have a beach vacation. Our friend Jeff came from Miami, which would be a nine hour drive for him, so he flew. We originally met him in 2016 when he was shooting street style photos in New York, and he and Anthony connected at our first Coachella and have been friends ever since (10 years!) And Anthony's family drove down from Tennessee for the last half of the trip. None of us had been before so we weren't sure what to expect. It was also the last trip we did before Jadyn went back to college, so having all of us together was what I was really looking forward to.

We booked through 360 Blue and Natural Retreats. It felt like staying at a hotel but with the ability to make food and do laundry, that was key, I packed so much lighter knowing I could wash clothes there. There was concierge service the whole week, so if we needed anything I could just text them and they’d handle it, they were so great!

The beach access with the house was private. It was a three minute walk, you go down the path off 30A to a gate, and there's an attendant who walks you over to your set up, chairs and umbrellas already out for all of us, every morning. It's right next to the public beach and so much less crowded. The water was so clear, and my kids would not stop talking about how soft the sand was, it was really powdery and white!

(I’ve had this swimsuit for two years and it’s one of my favorites! It’s sold out in red but linked the black one)

It was Clive’s first time at the beach. The water was so warm I could let him splash in it for a bit, and he sat there chewing on his hand, happy, the water coming up over his feet.

Our days were spent with beach for the first part of the day, back to the house to swim in the pool once everyone was hot and hungry, then the walk back down for golden hour, which was SO pretty. At night we’d put a movie on out by the pool and the kids would swim while it played (we did ISR swim lessons earlier in the summer and this trip was even better knowing my kids could swim!). It reminded me of our Disney Cruise in a way, because we would go to the beach off the boat and come back later and swim while they played a movie on the deck, Anthony said the same thing too.

There was a coffee shop called Prema Organic around the corner and we walked over each morning and got their Balance Latte.

The house had a golf cart so we took it around and explored, and we ended up at Coastal Rancher for eggs and snacks, they had grass-fed beef, pastured eggs and raw milk too, which is not what I expected to find on a beach trip. And we got donuts delivered from Heirloom, which fries theirs in beef tallow.

We cooked together every night in the kitchen. With a large fridge we shopped for groceries when we got there and I brought supplies to bake and that made it convenient to eat as a large group, going out to eat would have been a bit tricky with more than 10 people. Anthony made his burgers, which are my favorite because I love how they’re seasoned:

Anthony’s Burgers

2 lb ground beef
1.5 tbsp salt
1.5 tbsp pepper
1.5 tbsp onion powder
1.5 tbsp garlic powder

Mix, roll into balls, smash down into patties.

Poppy turned five while we were there. The kids swam most of that day while I worked on her cake and made sourdough for dinner, and then we walked over to see golden hour at the beach and came back and she opened her presents.

On her actual birthday we did a 5 year old pancake which is a yearly tradition, and she wanted the chai tea from Prema around the corner, so we walked with me to get it that morning and she felt special, she told me she “felt like she was 5 now!” So cute!! Also how has it been 5 years since she was born??

Towards the end of the trip we took a pontoon boat out to Crab Island, set up by 360 Blue with Destin Party Pontoon (you can set up excursions through them too). It was one of our favorite moments of the trip! Clive, Poppy and Elliott had their life vests on for the ride over (I was dying with how squishy Clive looked in his!), and once we docked the kids took theirs off to swim out to the raft with us.

My linen button-up (size Large)

The water there is so shallow that people are standing around in it playing and swimming, and it’s so clear it felt like swimming in a pool, everyone hanging out on their boats and so many kids out there. Clive was on the raft with us for a while and then slept on the boat for his nap, and Anthony’s mom was there so she kept wanting to snuggle him while the rest of us swam. Poppy and Elliott were jumping off the rafts the whole time. There was a fresh fruit boat going around taking orders that we were able to have coconuts delivered too.

As for the house, there was so many different areas to explore… ping pong, shuffleboard, the views from the fourth floor deck, the kids never ran out of things to do. It felt relaxing because we didn’t have an itinerary.

My dress | Bag | Heels

We’d end up around the couch or the table talking too late and the kids would be off playing together in the house. We originally thought we’d go out and explore the downtown areas more but we were all content hanging at the house and being together.

White one piece | Earrings

On the way home we stopped at Salty Bottle, which is a popular spot Jadyn saw on Tiktok and wanted to try it, and it was so good, there’s something fun about trying out cute new coffee shops.

There’s so much of 30A we didn’t see, and we already know we’re going back, everyone was saying it in the car. Next time we’ll explore more of it!

xx Brittany

I usually would buy birthday cakes for the kids, but last year at Poppy's 4th birthday I made her this berry one and it turned out so great! The layers were easier to do than I thought. Now it's been fun to think of what kind of cake they want and how I can make it. I’m also able to use better ingredients this way too along with homemade frosting. I made this no-bake watermelon “cake” last year to display the fruit too, and it was a hit!

For Poppy’s mermaid cake I let her pick everything out ahead of time so we could pack it for our trip. She loved the mermaid figurine with the bubbles as well as this number 5 mermaid candle.

I asked her what kind she liked and she said vanilla with white frosting, so that was the plan. This one came out so spongy and moist, and she said it's her favorite cake! I only put a thin layer of frosting between the layers, but depending on how much frosting you want, you could make the layers thicker. We put the leftovers in the fridge, and eating it cold the next day was also so delicious. I didn’t get a good picture of the inside of the cake until the next day when the kids were already digging into the frosting on the top (they LOVED the frosting), the sprinkles also made it look so festive and these ones are dye-free:

Elliott and Poppy were talking together about what cake he should choose for his birthday in November, it was really sweet! Last year I made him this checkered flag cake for a race car theme, which came out so adorable and I highly recommend it.

The recipe below includes how to make the frosting as well as what to do if you want to make cupcakes instead of the cake. Here’s the supplies I used for Poppy’s mermaid theme: balloons, mermaid streamers, iridescent steamers, mermaid cupcake liners.

Tools & Supplies

• Three 8-inch round cake pans

• Round parchment paper (or cut it out)

• Stand mixer or electric hand mixer

• Large mixing bowl

• Medium mixing bowl

• Fine-mesh sieve or flour sifter

• Rubber spatula

• Measuring cups and spoons

• Cooling racks

• Serrated knife, for leveling the cake layers or cake leveler.

• Offset spatula, for frosting

• Cake stand or serving plate

For Cupcakes

• Cupcake pans

• Cupcake liners

• Cookie scoop or measuring cup, for portioning the batter

Vanilla Birthday Cake

Prep Time: 25 min Bake Time: 30–40 min Total Time: ~1 hr 30 min (plus cooling) Serves: 12–16

Before You Start

1. Bring the butter, eggs, Greek yogurt, and buttermilk to room temperature before you begin. This helps the batter mix evenly and gives the cake a softer, lighter texture.

2. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Grease three 8-inch round cake pans with butter and line the bottoms with parchment paper, or I used an olive oil spray and sprayed down the parchment paper rounds after placing them inside.

3. Make sure the cake layers are completely cool before frosting. Even slightly warm cake can melt the buttercream.

Ingredients

For the Vanilla Cake

• 3¼ cups all-purpose flour

• ½ cup cornstarch

• 1 teaspoon baking soda

• 1 teaspoon baking powder

• ¾ teaspoon kosher salt

• 3 sticks (1½ cups) salted butter, softened

• 2 cups granulated sugar

• 3 whole eggs + 3 egg yolks, room temperature

• ¼ cup Greek yogurt, room temperature

• 1½ cups buttermilk, room temperature

• 1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract

For the Vanilla Buttercream

• 3 sticks (1½ cups) salted butter, softened

• 4½ cups powdered sugar

• 1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract

• Milk, 1 teaspoon at a time as needed

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Grease three 8-inch round cake pans and line the bottoms with parchment paper.

2. In a medium bowl, sift together the flour, cornstarch, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.

3. In a large mixing bowl or stand mixer, beat the softened butter and sugar on medium-high speed for 3–4 minutes, until very pale, light, and fluffy.

4. Add the whole eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the egg yolks one at a time, then mix in the Greek yogurt and vanilla until combined.

5. Turn the mixer to low. Add the dry ingredients and buttermilk in alternating additions: flour, buttermilk, flour, buttermilk, flour. Mix only until the final streaks of flour disappear. Do not overmix.

6. Divide the batter evenly between the three prepared pans. Place the pans in the oven with at least 1 inch of space between them.

7. Bake for 30–40 minutes, until the tops spring back when lightly pressed, the edges begin to pull away from the pans, and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out with a few dry crumbs.

8. Let the cakes cool in their pans for 10 minutes. Turn them out onto cooling racks, remove the parchment, and allow them to cool completely before frosting.

Vanilla Buttercream

1. Add the softened butter to a stand mixer and whip on medium-high speed for a full 5 minutes, until very pale and fluffy. Don’t rush this step. Whipping the butter thoroughly is what helps keep the frosting light instead of greasy.

2. Turn the mixer to low and add the powdered sugar 1½ cups at a time, scraping down the bowl between each addition.

3. Add the vanilla, then beat on medium-high speed for another 3 minutes until light and fluffy.

4. If needed, add milk 1 teaspoon at a time until the buttercream is soft and easy to spread.

Assembly

1. Once the cake layers are completely cool, use a serrated knife to level the tops if they have domed.

2. Put a little buttercream frosting in the middle of the cake stand to help the cake avoid slipping. Place the first cake layer on your serving plate or cake stand and spread a thin, even layer of buttercream over the top. Repeat with the second layer, then add the final cake layer.

3. Spread a thin crumb coat of buttercream over the entire cake. Refrigerate for 15 minutes to set the crumb coat.

4. Cover the cake with the remaining buttercream and smooth the top and sides with an offset spatula.

5. If your kitchen is warm, refrigerate the finished cake and remove it about 1 hour before serving.

For Cupcakes

Use the same batter without making any changes. Line cupcake pans with liners and fill each about ⅔ full.

Bake at 350°F for 18–22 minutes, until the tops spring back and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out with a few dry crumbs.

The full recipe makes approximately 30 cupcakes.

For a half batch, halve all of the ingredients and use 2 whole eggs + 2 egg yolks. This will make approximately 15 cupcakes.

While I was pregnant with Clive, I'd be out somewhere and people would ask me if this was my first, and when I'd tell them he was my fourth and that I'm 39, I'd get "oh you don't look that old!" Then they'd ask the ages of my kids and I'd get "you don't look old enough to have a college-aged kid!" So it had me thinking… when is it too old to have a baby?

Is it external pressure about the age? Is it because I had Jadyn so young that I was always considered the young mom, and now I'll be considered an old mom?

I get asked this a lot too. People message me saying they’re worried they waited too long, or that they’re 37 and their doctor said something that scared them about being a geriatric pregnancy, or that they’re not old enough, 24 and everyone around them telling them to wait even though they’re married and feel ready.

If you’re new here, Jadyn is my oldest and I had her when I was 20. She turns 20 herself this January. I was a single mom until she was 3 when Anthony and I met, and by the time we got married and settled into life together she was 6. Then Anthony and I waited 8 more years to have a baby together. Poppy was born when I was 34, Elliott when I was 36, and Clive this past May at 39. There’s 19 years between my oldest and my youngest, and I’ve been on both ends of it, 20 with my first and 39 with my fourth.

So I'm writing it all out here, everything I'd tell you if you sat down across from me and asked, what having a baby at 20 was like versus 39, where that geriatric label came from, and when I think it's too old…

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Our packing piles have officially started in the living room. We leave for 30A soon (our first time going!), and it's about a six-hour drive with all four kids (well, Jadyn is an adult kid, but you know what I mean). With a road trip it's easy to overpack, there are no TSA restrictions to hold me back, so I had two choices: get systematic or bring too many things we won't use and waste space in the car. I got systematic, and now I have a good system down for staying organized. I like to pack early in the week so I know if I need to get any supplies, and have enough time to grab them if I do.

Clothing:

This time I'm packing the kids sudoku style, and it's such a great space-saving idea! Poppy and Elliott each get a 3 by 3 grid laid out on the bed: three tops across, three bottoms, and three layers. The rule is every top has to work with every bottom. If a shirt only matches one pair of shorts, it goes back in the drawer. The pieces are overall pretty neutral, so everything can be mixed and matched. That's 27 outfit combinations from just nine pieces!

Because it's a Florida beach trip I'm not doing heavy layers, but this method could easily work for any trip, even one where colder weather layers are needed. And instead of one of Poppy's layers, I opted for a sundress she can wear over her suit to go to the beach.

Each kid's grid goes into their own packing cube, and all three cubes fit inside one suitcase. (Jadyn packs her own bag, 19 years old and well past letting me plan her outfits.)

And because our rental house has a washer, I'm only packing enough PJs and swimsuits for half the trip and doing one load mid-week, three PJs and three swimsuits each. That means we're traveling with half the clothes we'd typically pack, because I'd normally do a full outfit per day per kid and always end up with items they never wore. Now that I'm packing for Clive too, I need to be really efficient with space, because I have his diapers and extra supplies to pack.

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Food:

Being prepared with food on the way is a huge help, I do this for planes and especially for road trips. On the way there it's nice to pack a lunch because it eliminates a stop and any wondering what's for lunch. Egg salad sandwiches, beef sticks, goji berries, chia pudding, cheese, and fresh fruit, all packed the night before, and we eat at a rest stop or a park where they can run around for fifteen minutes.

And for the meals we do eat out on the road, we use the Seed Oil Scout app to find restaurants near us that cook the way we eat at home. It's a map with little color-coded pins that show what each kitchen cooks with, butter and tallow versus seed oils, and you can filter for things like grass-fed beef. It's how we find the organic spots in towns we've never been to before, and I love using it to find good coffee shops too!

The drive:

Poppy and Elliott get one small backpack each of toys and books for their seat, and whatever fits is what comes. We typically don't do screen time at home unless it's Friday, when they get to watch a movie. But on the road they each get to watch two movies, and they'll nap and do activities in between. The week before the trip, we don't do any screen time at all, because I told them we're saving it for the drive, and now they're looking forward to it.

The backpacks and movies keep everyone happy on the drive. Keeping everyone healthy is the prep I care about most. Especially when traveling, vitamin C is a must for us. Summer asks more of our bodies than it looks like, long days in the sun, travel, new environments, and nobody is getting sick before Poppy's birthday beach trip if I can help it, so we've been on top of our doses. The front seat gets the console kit that I always have on hand in the car: snacks that don't melt, wipes, and a little zip pouch where our vitamin C lives. That's Pique's Daily Immune, the vitamin C plus elderberry we take daily, and it's become one of the few supplements I never leave home without. It comes as a little packet you drink, no water needed (but it tastes so good added to water too).

I used to take the pill version of vitamin C and thought that covered it. It's not just whether you take vitamin C, it's whether your body is able to use what you take. Regular vitamin C is water soluble, so a lot of what's in those pills passes through you before your body puts it to work. Pique's Daily Immune is liposomal vitamin C, meaning the vitamin C gets wrapped in a tiny layer of healthy fat, almost like it arrives in its own little delivery package. It's designed for superior absorption, so more of it gets delivered where your body needs it instead of washing out, supporting daily immune health and collagen production for brighter, more radiant-looking skin. And healthy skin isn't just about what you put on your face, it's about what your body has to work with every day. It's also made with real organic elderberry juice, no artificial sweeteners, no fillers, and the kids loveee the taste, so they each get their tiny bit and feel very included.

If you want to try it, my link is piquelife.com/brittanyvc, for 15% off, and every order has their 90-day money-back guarantee.

Arriving

Before packing our beach supplies, we checked what our rental provides, and they really thought of everything! Chairs, umbrellas, even a golf cart to drive around. So we’re not packing beach chairs or towels, those will all be there. We’re bringing an ice chest with our fish and meat from the farmers market, because we can count on the quality, so that just leaves the sides to buy from the store (I’m also bringing all the dry ingredients to bake Poppy’s cake and cupcakes there). Depending on what time we arrive, we’ll hit the local Whole Foods that night or first thing the next morning. I like to get the food set up for the week early, so we can grill while everyone swims and pack lunches to take down to the beach.

And when we pull in, there's an order to it: the ice chest comes in before anything else does, fish and meat straight to the fridge, then we deal with the rest of the car. After that we always unpack, it's the method I've followed on past Disney cruises to stay organized, and I'm doing the same here. Living out of the suitcase seems easier, but by the end of the week it's a mess and nobody can find anything, so each kid's cube gets organized into a drawer. It especially helps to unpack the toiletries and get settled that first day. I pick the laundry corner the same night, I bring a portable laundry bag that all the dirty clothes go in, so the mid-week load is grab and go instead of a scavenger hunt around the house. And the beach bag gets packed before bed for the next day and lives by the door, sunscreen, hats, water bottles filled, so mornings start on the sand instead of hunting for things, and the vacation begins! :)

I’ll share how it all goes! Thank you for being here.

xx Brittany

We started a pile in the corner of the living room for everything going with Jadyn, and it’s slowly growing as move-in day gets closer. Her doormat is already in there, the one from our Target run last week. When we get back from 30A we’ll repack the car and gather the rest of her things to drive her back to college. The kids have been having so much fun with Jay living in our ADU, and they always want to go out and visit her, so it will be sad when she leaves, because I know she’ll miss them showing up each morning, sometimes waking her up earlier than she planned. And she already mentions how big Clive will look the next time she sees him, of course we’ll be FaceTiming, but it’s never the same as cuddling a baby in person. It feels like summer has flown by (and it’s not over yet!), but it’s getting close.

Most of what’s in that pile isn’t decor. It’s the same swaps we’ve made here at home; her sheets, her detergent, her water, the light in her room. Here’s the thing about a dorm room. It’s a vinyl mattress a hundred other students have slept on, fluorescent tubes overhead until midnight, and everyone else’s dryer sheets and plug-ins drifting down the hallway. We can’t change any of that, and we’re not trying to. What we can change is what’s inside her four walls, the light she reads by, the water she drinks, what her sheets are made of, what her clothes get washed in. I always think that if you can make home the place where her body gets a break, it’s easier to handle everything she can’t control out there. Jadyn recently did an HTMA test and her top stressor was pesticides, which is tough because the college cafeteria isn’t organic, but water is one of the ways pesticides show up, so filtering her water was the first thing I wanted to get right this year. The sophomore dorms are a bit bigger, but she still won’t have a kitchen where she can cook her own meals, so she’ll do what she can and I’ll help where I can.

The first one is the same one we did last year. Dorm lighting is bright and cold and it stays on late, and all that blue-heavy light at 11pm works against the body’s natural wind down, so I got her an amber bulb for her freshman dorm, one that screws into any lamp and is 99.94% free of blue light. I got her roommates one for their lamps too so they could all sleep better. This year she has her own bedroom, so she can keep the overhead lights off completely and just use the lamp at night.

The rest of this one is for my Substack family. I’m sharing the full list zone by zone and why each thing matters, and what she’s bringing. There’s also the swap list and what we’re not sending, plus a plain-language cheat sheet for every certification on these labels and a printable checklist you can take to the store.

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I love this focaccia because it's about as simple as bread gets. No kneading, no shaping, no scoring. You mix it at night and it does the work while you sleep.

If you don’t have a sourdough starter you’ll need one for this recipe, so check out my instructions on how to start one from scratch. Feed it about 12 hours before you make the dough. I fed mine in the morning and it was bubbly and active by evening, and that’s when I mixed everything up.

The cast iron is what makes this work as a pizza. The oil in the bottom of the pan fries the underside of the dough while it bakes, so the bottom crust is crispy when you cut it and the edges go dark and crackly. The inside is sooo delicious. Jadyn is obsessed with this version of pizza, and she said I should add even more cheese next time. Note taken.

Par-bake the crust before you put anything on top. This means baking the dough by itself first until it's cooked through, then adding your toppings and finishing it. I learned that one the hard way. I figured I could bake it the way I bake focaccia on a sheet pan, where it crisps up evenly all over, but cast iron is heavy and slow to heat, so the dough sits in a cool pan while the oven is already hot. Add sauce and cheese sealing the top and the middle stays gummy no matter how long you leave it in. Cast iron is worth it, though. Nothing else gives you that fried, crackly bottom crust, and the par-bake is all it takes to get there.

Save the basil for the end if you want it green. Baked basil browns and shrivels, and fresh basil torn over the top tastes better too. I baked mine because my kids think raw basil is a tad spicy, and if it’s cooked a bit they eat it all, so do whatever works for your preference.

You can also top it however you want. Ground beef if you want more protein on it, or hazelnut spread and strawberries once it comes out for a sweet one. Here's how I make it:

No-Knead Sourdough Focaccia Pizza

Prep Time: 20 min (plus rising time) Bake Time: 28–30 min Total Time: About 15–20 hours Serves: 4–6

Before You Start

Make sure your sourdough starter is bubbly, active, and has doubled before mixing the dough.

I used a 12-inch cast iron skillet.

Plan to mix the dough the evening before and bake the pizza the following day.

Use cool water, not warm. It slows the rise down overnight so you wake up to dough that’s puffy instead of overproofed and flat.

Ingredients

50 g active sourdough starter (about ¼ cup)
375 g cool water (1½ cups + 1 tablespoon)
20 g honey (1 tablespoon)
500 g all-purpose flour (about 4 cups, spooned and leveled)
9 g fine sea salt (1½ teaspoons)
3 tablespoons olive oil
Flaky sea salt, for sprinkling
¾ cup pizza sauce
2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese (about 8 oz)
1 cup cherry tomatoes, halved
¼ cup fresh basil leaves, torn or thinly sliced

Instructions

In the evening after your starter is active and bubbly: In a large bowl, whisk together the sourdough starter, cool water, and honey until well combined.

Add the flour and sea salt. Mix with a fork or dough whisk until a shaggy dough forms, then finish mixing by hand until all of the flour is incorporated. The dough will be very sticky.

Cover the bowl with a damp towel and let the dough rise at room temperature overnight (about 70°F) for 12–18 hours, or until doubled in size and full of bubbles.

The next day: Pour the olive oil into a 12-inch cast iron skillet, coating the bottom and sides well.

Turn the dough into the skillet and gently flip it so both sides are coated with oil. Don’t stretch it yet. It will relax as it rests.

Cover and let the dough rise again for 1½–2 hours, until very puffy.

Preheat your oven to 425°F.

Using lightly oiled fingertips, gently dimple the dough all the way to the bottom of the pan, pressing it evenly to the edges. Sprinkle with flaky sea salt.

Bake the crust without toppings for 18 minutes, until the surface is set and lightly golden with no wet spots remaining.

Remove the skillet from the oven. Spread the pizza sauce evenly over the crust and top with the shredded mozzarella.

Return the pizza to the oven and bake for 10–12 minutes, until the cheese is melted and bubbling and the edges are deep golden brown.

Let the pizza rest in the skillet for 5 minutes. Scatter the fresh basil over the top, then transfer the pizza to a cutting board. Slice with a pizza wheel and serve warm.

xx Brittany

Last week Jadyn and I went to an event together for Altar’d State. It’s so sweet because they’re faith based and started as a Christian book store. Then they started selling clothes, noticed the clothing was doing well, and expanded from there.

They don’t only carry faith based clothing, it’s other styles as well, but I loved this tee:

The event was first at their new store in the Green Hills mall then at Cheekwood, which is a gorgeous botanical garden that we go to often to walk around.

My jeans are from Abercrombie and I love the fit of these. They’re slightly baggy and high rise, I’m wearing the tall length. They’re one of my most comfortable pairs of jeans and I’ve been wearing them non stop postpartum (more on that in these posts here and here). My top is nice for hot weather as well as breastfeeding friendly, I’m not wearing many high neck tops at the moment to make it easy to nurse him on-the-go.

Antiquing

Last week Jadyn, Poppy, Clive and I went antique shopping while Elliott spent time with Anthony. We checked out the Franklin Antique Mall for the first time and it was so fun to walk around and look at all the items with so much history.

I found two of these chairs for $25 each and thought they would be great in the garden!

We usually love going to estate sales each weekend, and here are some of my best tips and how to find them in this post here. Antiquing feels like the more curated version of an estate sale. It’s already been sifted through and the better items are there, so you pay a bit more but you have better options in front of you.

In my garden

We’ve been harvesting mini sweet peppers, onions and tomatoes. The kids have especially been loving the sweet peppers and eating them as snacks. These Hunter boots have been my go-to for all things gardening and I just ordered this color for fall, especially because they’re on sale right now! These Mate 100% cotton leggings are so comfy and I wear them all the time. I also have them in black.

Fresh tomatoes are growing so nicely, I’ve been loving them with salt and pepper eating them fresh but they’ve been also so delicious for hamburger night.

Onions are also from our garden.

New arrivals

I haven’t been in a Target store in quite a while. I usually order delivery (more about our drive times and how we live here in this post). Clive was taking a nap and Jadyn said, should we get a matcha and go to Target? Anthony was going to stay back with him, so we hurried to get Poppy and Elliott ready and the four of us headed out. It was my first time leaving Clive at home while going out and it felt so weird!

We wanted a strolling Target run rather than one for necessities, which is when I’m most likely to get myself in trouble. I’ll pick something up, tell myself I need it, then put it back two aisles later. I’m pretty good about making sure what I buy will be useful and beautiful. I narrowed it down to these:

This doormat is for Jadyn’s door. I don’t have a butter dish and liked the look of this one. The berry bowls, I already have the white one and loved the cranberry. They’re so great for setting the table with berries or any fruit that needs airflow. I’ve been looking for a good roasting pan and this one is stainless steel. I was standing in the store looking up the reviews to see if it would last, and they were great, so I got it. That night I made chicken and potatoes in it. Such an easy weeknight dinner with plenty of leftovers for lunch.

The kids picked out these figurine toys and they’ve been playing with them all week. Poppy picked The Little Mermaid and Elliott picked Toy Story.

I’ve been investing in kitchen items that make weeknights more efficient to cook. This pan is so nice with all the functions it can do. I love the steaming option, I didn’t have anything that makes steaming easy. It can do all these things which is pretty cool: braise, sear, steam, strain, sauté, fry, boil, bake, roast and serve, and it’s oven-safe up to 450°F! The sage color is so pretty too.

Clive is getting so big. He’s 2.5 months, wearing 6-12 months and 17 pounds!

Love this little striped set for summer.

Sometimes when I get him from his nap he’s on his back, having rolled over from his tummy. None of my other kids ever rolled this early. I don’t think he knows his own strength yet!

This organic cotton mat is perfect for picnics or the beach. This photo is from Cheekwood recently at their summer night event.

We’re planning our beach trip to 30A, which is somewhere we’ve never been before and where a lot of people here vacation. It’s on the Florida panhandle, about a 6 hour drive from us. We’re really excited to check it out for the first time. My long time friend Jenna and her family will be going with us too and we’re celebrating Poppy’s 5th birthday there. More about what I’m packing in this post here.

xx Brittany

I get messages about this almost every week now. People tell me they would love to get out of the city, and then they ask how we decided, whether we regret it, what the hard parts really were. So I'm writing it all out here, everything I'd tell you if you sat down across from me and said we're thinking about doing this too.

If you're new here, a little of how we got to Tennessee. Anthony and I both grew up in Southern California, he's from Fullerton and I'm from Glendora, and we first met in Claremont after we both graduated college. We got married in 2013, moved in together, and spent our first years in apartments, most of them in Pasadena. We could walk to coffee, we ate out more nights than we cooked, and we never once thought about a yard because we didn't have one and figured we could always take Jadyn to the park when she wanted to play outside. We had started the blog but were both working full-time corporate jobs, so on our off time we would shoot outfits in downtown Pasadena and LA. Over the years building the blog then social media, it turned into a very fast-paced lifestyle, which meant events and shoots and enough travel that once Poppy came along we had a nanny to make any of it possible. It was a full life and a good one.

We bought our first house in 2020 in Pasadena and renovated it while we were living in it (more about that in this post here). A couple of years later we found another one in a quieter part of Pasadena that we thought was going to be our forever home, so we sold the first and moved into another apartment while construction started. Construction was taking longer than expected, so we moved into a rental house in San Marino that also had a tiny yard. Our "forever" home was still being renovated when we welcomed Elliott at that rental, and having two little ones now changed our priorities. I wanted to slow down and be with them more, and I was also learning to cook because I wanted them eating nourishing meals and not takeout all the time like we were used to.

Around that same time Jadyn started looking at colleges out of state, when we had always assumed she'd want to go to school in California, and something about seeing her want to explore another part of the country made Anthony and I start asking each other some real questions. If we could make an intentional decision about it, was Pasadena where we wanted the little ones to grow up? Or would we want to be somewhere we could have land? We had never had the chance to move before, we'd thought about New York when Jadyn was in middle school and couldn't do that to her mid-school-year, and now the main reason we hadn't moved was letting go on its own. Long story short, after contemplating it for quite a while, with our list of whys and praying about it continuously, we decided to move out of California before that house was finished. It was completed after we were already living in Tennessee and we sold it last fall. (I wrote the whole story of that here).

We've been here for almost a year and a half, and this is what I'd want you to know before you make a move like this:

Get specific about what kind of country you want. We wanted “country-ish”, because country means very different things to different people. We’re not in a truly small rural town, and we’re not trying to be fully self-sufficient the way I’ve seen other families do so beautifully. That’s not us right now and it might never be. What we wanted was land with a garden and (some) animals, while still being close enough to a city that we could get on a plane easily or go out to dinner or see a concert if we wanted to. Franklin Tennessee ended up being exactly that mix. Nashville is right there when we want it, the airport is easy, Green Hills with luxury stores is twenty minutes away, and then we come home and there’s nothing but our own yard and quiet.

We looked at other places first. I fell in love with Carmel CA and we thought about it for a while, but land there was expensive and there were enough restrictions on what you could do with it that we didn’t think it would work for us long term, and water was a real question mark. We looked at Dripping Springs in Texas and liked quite a bit about it, but the drought concerns were an issue, and if the whole point was growing food and maybe animals eventually, we didn’t want to be fighting for water to do it. That’s what pulled us toward Tennessee. Rain, real seasons, land you can plant in, and a city close enough that we never feel cut off from anything.

We found Franklin because of friends. I had been to Franklin once when I was younger, around thirteen I think, our family friend had moved there to work with Christian bands and we went to visit. I remember thinking how green it was, but it wasn't built up then the way it is now. Anthony had never been to Tennessee at all. Then our friends Stevie and Sazan Hendrix were planning to move from Texas to Tennessee, and we were visiting them in Texas when they said wait, you should come see Tennessee, we just bought a house there! So we flew out that fall, and I don't know how much of the decision got made in those first few hours downtown, all the red trees, everything so quaint and homey, but I remember walking around and thinking I could see us here. We came back a second time once we'd decided, this time to look at houses, and we spent part of that trip an hour outside Franklin looking at places with a lot more land. We drove away from those knowing it would be too remote for us. We also realized we needed to rent first to figure out which part of Franklin we wanted to be in, we still weren't sure how many acres we'd want.

Rent for a year before you buy. If I could only give you one piece of practical advice, this is the one. We rented a historic house built in the 1860s on thirty acres, and I fell in LOVE with that property. But it was in an HOA, which meant there were rules about how often you mow, what your fence posts had to look like in the front of the house, and you couldn't have any animals outside besides horses. That year taught us we didn't want to be in an HOA, especially once we knew chickens weren't allowed. It also taught us we didn't need thirty acres, a garden takes so much less than that, but we still wanted enough room for privacy and for the kids to have space to run. We would have gotten both of those wrong if we’d bought right away.

The quiet will be harder than you think. When we moved into our rental on land here, I would lie in bed those first nights straining to hear something, anything, and there was nothing, and it was so dark. In California I had stopped registering sirens and traffic years before, and I guess I didn’t know how loud my life had been until it was silent. The stars were amazing though, that part I loved right away.

You’ll miss your old routine. For weeks it didn’t feel like we had moved at all, it felt like a long trip somewhere new, the kind where you’re still figuring out which grocery store you like, and then the last box got unpacked and I stood in the kitchen thinking, now what? Back home we had our coffee shops and our routes and ten years of memories around every street, and here everything felt like starting over. I missed my old routine until I got into my new one.

Your kids will need to un-learn the city. This one caught me completely off guard. At our rental house in California I had always told Poppy she could never go outside by herself, cars came around that corner too fast, and she learned that rule so well that when we got here, all that grass and her toys sitting right outside the door, she wouldn't go out alone. She wanted one of us standing next to her. It took months of saying you're okay, we can see you from the window, before she believed anything had changed. Nobody tells you that you don't just move your kids out of the city, you have to un-teach them the city too, and watching Poppy and Elliott slowly figure out that they could run out there without us was really sweet to see.

Making friends takes longer than you'd like. We knew a few people when we moved but it all still felt unfamiliar. I remember thinking we have friends, we just moved away from them, and now we would need to be open to meeting new ones too. We kept showing up at the same places until we stopped being “the new family”. For us that was church and one little coffee shop we kept going back to. Our neighbors invited us to their Fourth of July party that first summer and I walked home from it feeling like we finally had people here, not just a house. We have our people now, and the funny thing is that once I stopped worrying about it, I realized how much I love a quiet night at home too. We have friends over and it's so fun, and we're just as happy when it's only us.

You will lose a version of yourself. I wasn’t prepared for that at all… (the full post continues below for my Substack family)

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Back when I drank Starbucks I always got the brown sugar shaken espresso in the summertime, and even though I rarely drink Starbucks anymore, I found myself missing that one drink and wondering if I could make my own version at home that was better quality. We have such good coffee shops here, our favorites are Hank's, High Brow and Perenn. I love going for a seasonal drink, but this was the flavor I kept thinking about.

I first learned about unrefined sweeteners from Dr. Bill Schindler, who wrote Eat Like a Human and co-founded Modern Stone Age Kitchen, and his thinking is why I use muscovado now instead of regular brown sugar. Most brown sugar is refined white sugar with molasses stirred back in after the fact, but muscovado is unrefined, so it never had its molasses stripped out in the first place, which is why it swaps in so easily and gives that deeper caramel note and that natural molasses is where its minerals come from. When I was having a hard time finding an organic muscovado and asked Dr. Bill which brand to buy, he told me the integrity of the sugar matters more than the label, that he'd take muscovado over a refined organic sugar every time. These are the ones I use for either dark muscovado sugar or light muscovado sugar.

The Starbucks version you get out is built on a brown sugar syrup and a bottled sweet cream on top, and I wanted to keep that same warm, cinnamon flavor while making it from things I already keep in the kitchen. So I stir muscovado straight into the hot espresso instead of a syrup, along with real cinnamon and a little vanilla so everything dissolves all the way through. For the foam I whip heavy cream with raw honey, a touch of vanilla, and a pinch of sea salt. It’s so good! Here's the to-go lids I use for my mason jars.

Brown Sugar Cinnamon Shaken Espresso with Salted Vanilla Cold Foam

Prep Time: 5 min Total Time: 5 min Serves: 1 (20–24 oz)

Before You Start

Fill your serving glass with fresh ice before assembling the drink.

Brew your espresso fresh so it’s hot enough to fully dissolve the muscovado sugar.

Ingredients

2 shots espresso
1 tablespoon muscovado sugar
¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 cup ice (for shaking)
¾ cup whole milk (or milk of choice)
Fresh ice

For the Salted Vanilla Cold Foam

¼ cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons whole milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon raw honey or maple syrup (or more to taste)
Pinch of fine sea salt
Ground cinnamon, for garnish (optional)

Instructions

Brew the espresso. While it’s still hot, stir in the muscovado sugar, cinnamon, and vanilla extract until the sugar has completely dissolved.

Fill a mason jar with the ice. Pour the espresso mixture over the ice and shake vigorously for 20–30 seconds, until chilled and frothy. Then add the milk.

In a separate measuring cup or frothing pitcher, combine the heavy cream, whole milk, vanilla extract, honey or maple syrup, and sea salt. Froth with a handheld frother for 20–30 seconds, until thick, silky, and pourable.

Slowly pour the salted vanilla cold foam over the top of the drink.

Finish with a light dusting of cinnamon, and enjoy!

Check out my other summer drink recipes HERE and HERE.

I used to work at Nordstrom. Once in high school, then again for three years starting when I was pregnant with Jadyn, so I worked four or five Anniversary Sales from the other side of the register. Here’s what really cool about these items and why I would get excited for it: it isn’t leftover summer items. It’s brand-new fall product, marked down before the season, that goes up to full price on August 10th. The buyers would come in and talk about the fall items that were going to be on the sale and it was always a good time to buy that fall piece you were thinking about.

I was terrible with money back then, and being at the mall every shift didn’t help. I’d shop the sale before it even opened to the public and I almost always walked out with items I didn’t need, like new flats for Jadyn (I was obsessed with buying her flats for some reason).

It's easy to get caught up in all the good deals, and I tend to spend more money when I think that way. Instead, I'm focusing on items with better quality materials. I went through the sale and pulled out only what's made of natural materials: cotton, linen, wool, silk, leather, suede. I don't mind wearing polyester here and there, like for a special-occasion dress where the style is what I'm after. But for classic pieces I'll reach for again and again, I want natural. I've got 25 core pieces here, plus a few fun accessories at the end that I think are great deals!

Bedding:

If you buy one thing from this sale, buy sheets. Here’s the difference of percale vs. sateen: Both are 100% cotton. The only difference is the weave.

Percale is the classic over-under weave, the crisp, cool, matte one. Think of the sheets on a really good hotel bed, or a freshly pressed white shirt. It breathes beautifully, so it stays cool all night and never feels clingy. The tradeoff is that it wrinkles a little and feels crisp rather than buttery. If you sleep hot, percale is made for you.

Sateen is woven so more of the thread sits on the surface, which is what gives it that soft sheen and silky drape. It feels a touch warmer and cozier against your skin, the kind of sheet you sink into on a cold night. The tradeoff is that it holds a little more heat. If you run cold, go sateen.

Boll & Branch Framed Organic Cotton Percale Sheet Set

The contrast trim is so chic!

Coyuchi Classic Organic Cotton Sateen Sheet Set (in color undyed white)

Coyuchi is amazing deal when it’s on sale. GOTS certified, woven in a Fair Trade certified factory.

Nordstrom 400 Thread Count Organic Cotton Fitted Sheet

We have two sets of sheets for our bed, so when I’m washing one I can put the other one on the bed, this is great for that second set.

Parachute Organic Cotton Twill Quilt

A quilt is the layer that makes a bed look finished. I’ve had our Parachute quilt since our first house in 2020. I love the cinnamon color for making the bedroom cozy for fall, but I have the cream one.

Coyuchi Classic Organic Cotton Blanket

This is great for pulling out for a movie night or when guests come over.

Kitchen

If you've been thinking about making the switch from nonstick, this is the time to invest in cookware that will last.

Our Place 4-Piece Cookware Set

The Always Pan and Perfect Pot, plus the minis. Ceramic instead of the usual nonstick coating: Our Place says it’s made without PFAS, PTFE, PFOA, lead, or cadmium. If you’re currently using non-stick pans they most likely contain forever chemicals, so it’s best to switch to something like this or stainless steel.

Madein Stainless Stainless Clad Frying Pan Set

Madein pans are fully clad 5-ply stainless, five layers of steel and aluminum bonded together and running all the way up the sides, so the whole pan heats evenly instead of just the bottom. The aluminum in the core spreads the heat, the stainless makes it last, and the magnetic stainless exterior means it works on induction and every other cooktop. I love using stainless steel to cook with because there’s no coating to scratch or wear off, nothing leaches into your food, it doesn’t react with a tomato sauce or a splash of wine, and it takes the high heat that gives you a real sear. They also rarely go on sale.

LE CONNOISSEUR 6.6 Qt. Round French Oven

This is perfect if you wanted to get started on making sourdough bread, I also use this to make our stews, I use it many times weekly it’s worth the investment.

For Baby:

These are staple items that aren’t on sale very often so I think are worth it:

Stokke Flexi Bath:

I love ours, it’s what I used for Elliott and now with Clive. It folds up so you can take it on a trip too.

Nuna Rava Next Flame Retardant-Free Convertible Car Seat

$150 off, such a deal! We love Nuna in our house, no added flame retardants, which is pretty tough to find in a car seat.

Nuna PIPA Aire RX + PIPA Relx Base

Nuna TRVL LX Compact Stroller

Both of these are in my non-toxic baby registry guide!

WILDBIRD Aerial Linen Baby Carrier

100% linen for a baby carrier is a really good deal.

Stokke Tripp Trapp high chair with cushion and tray

We love ours, it supports correct sitting position as they grow and it’s rare to see it on sale.

For Kids:

This is also a good time to think about back-to-school items. I'm keeping fall in mind in general as I look at the kids' clothes:

Polo Ralph Lauren Kids’ Cable Stitch Cotton Cardigan

This one is so classy! Cardigans are on repeat for us in the fall.

Mini Boden Kids’ Scallop Trim Cardigan

I love the print of these ones.

Two-Piece Organic Cotton Rib Pajamas

Long sleeve PJs are something they’ll wear again and again.

Pan Polo long sleeve

I love layering a white long-sleeve like this under a cardigan. It's also great if they go to a school with uniforms.

Pan Polo short sleeve

Poppy likes short sleeve under cardigans because she tends to run hot, so this is something she’ll wear more.

What I’m loving for myself:

I tend to look for simple items I can use as classic basics:

Free People Torres Turtleneck Sweater

100% cotton and runs slightly large. I love it in the cream color.

Relaxed Fit Pima Cotton Crewneck T-Shirt

Pima is extra-long-staple cotton, which is a fancy way of saying the fibers are longer, so it's softer, stronger, and doesn't pill or go rough the way cheap cotton does. That's why it costs more, so it’s a good deal when it’s on sale.

Nordstrom Gingham Cotton Pajamas

These are so cute! I love they don’t look like typical PJs. I like the navy color combo.

Ella Rib Lettuce Trim Cotton Pointelle Tank

Such a cute trim detail on a classic tank.

Denim Popover Shirt

Love the style of this, also breastfeeding friendly with the opening.

Free People We The Free Palmer Cuffed Baggy Jeans

Free people always has good fits, their jeans are some of my favorites!

Merino Wool Sweater Jacket

Merino wool is something I’ll invest in because it’s warm and breathable. I love it in the cream color.

Natori Bliss Cotton French Cut Briefs

My favorite underwear, what I switched to when I was looking for cotton underwear. Pima cotton with a cotton-lined gusset, they’re so comfortable!

Handbags:

Lately I've been using two styles: either a smaller shoulder bag or a larger tote with all the kids' items in it:

The Date Night Suede Shoulder Bag

Real suede and perfect 90s style.

Suede Satchel

This is a great size for shoulder bag and I love the dark color of the suede.

The Shopper Tote

This is such a classic, I love the Madewell bags, the leather always feels so nice.

Accessories:

These are fun styles I love!

Pearl Cross Necklace (I got one for me and one for Jay)

Baguette Cross Necklace

Chunky Huggie Hoop Earrings

Kacie Ring Set

Gold Band Ring

Gisele Cat-Eye Polarized Sunglasses

The Suede Statement Belt

Pure Silk 6-Pack Skinny Scrunchies- These are perfect for ponytails, they protect my hair with real silk and don’t hurt when you pull it out.

What I’m skipping

• Barefoot Dreams and the CozyChic blankets. They’re 100% polyester microfiber and something I avoid when looking for blankets.

• Vegan leather.“Vegan leather” is plastic, usually polyurethane. It cracks, it peels, and it’s in a landfill in three years. A real leather bag on sale is the better buy in every way that matters. Some people do it for animal rights, I think that’s different if thats why you want to buy it, but don’t buy it thinking it’s better quality.

• Anything labeled “performance,” “moisture-wicking,” or “wrinkle-free.” Those are finishes. I have this type of material for our couch, but for clothes I try to avoid.

• Faux fur throws. Also plastic.

xx Brittany

Most mornings right now I’m outside with Clive before it gets hot, giving him a few minutes of gentle sun, his “sun snack”, what my midwife Shannon calls it, before it’s strong out. The other two are usually out there too in their pajamas, giving snacks to the chickens, Poppy in her rainboots even though it’s July, and I’ve got my coffee and no shoes on, and it’s become my favorite part of the day.

Clive is my fourth baby and the first one I’ve done this with from the beginning, and it makes me think about how scared of the sun I was when Poppy was born, how covered up I kept her, it feels so different now. I’m particular about summer more than any season, because the kids are outside all day and everything is touching their skin, the sun, the pool, the grass, the bug spray, so over a lot of reading and trial and error these are the items I trust and use, all in one place.

I have my Complete Non-Toxic Baby Registry Guide if you want the baby-specific things, but this one is for the whole family and just for summer.

For Sunscreen

If you change one thing this summer I’d make it this, because standard sunscreen has quite a bit of chemicals in it that I believe are more risky than sun exposure. We rarely use sunblock here, unless we’re going to be in the sun for awhile without shade, which rarely happens. My kids swim and play outside, they’re getting a little sun every day and I can’t remember the last time they got burned because they’ve built up what’s known as their “solar callus”. It’s the same idea as a callus on your hand, a little exposure over and over and your skin adapts, building up melanin and getting more tolerant so it can handle the sun instead of being shocked by it.

I’ve learned so much from Dr. Alexis Cowan, who has her PhD from Princeton and studies light and metabolism, and she’s the reason I started questioning what I previously believed about the sun… I used to be so scared of it! The research that convinced me is about outdoor workers, people who are out in the sun all day for a living turn out to be less prone to melanoma than people who work indoors, which is the opposite of what I’d always assumed. She explains that the real risk isn’t how much sun you get, it’s whether you burn. Skin that’s been covered up all year has nothing built up, so a full day of sun on vacation turns into a burn, and the burns are what do the damage. Those workers are getting more sun than those working indoors and burning less, because they’re adapted to it. A little sun daily is what builds that callus.

She also explains that being sun deficient carries real risk of its own, that when UVB hits your skin it isn't only vitamin D your body makes, it's a whole family of related compounds from that same starting material, plus a hormone cascade that includes the signal telling your skin to make melanin, which is what protects you. The same light that makes the vitamin D is the light that tells your skin how to handle it. And UVB is only around when the sun is high enough, here that's usually 10am to 4pm, so I make sure they're outside for a little in the afternoon too, not just first thing.

The part surprised me is that it starts with your eyes. When UVB reaches your eyes it sets off that hormonal cascade, and part of what that produces is the signal that tells your skin to make melanin. So if you’re outside in sunglasses, you’re blocking the message, your body never gets told to tan, and you burn instead. It doesn’t mean staring at the sun, it’s just letting light reach your eyes, even on cloudy days. She says the same about morning light, getting outside at sunrise, when it’s red and infrared and there’s no UV in it yet, is what preps your skin for the middle of the day. So I don’t wear sunglasses at the beginning of the day when I’m trying to tell my body to get ready for the sun. I still like the way sunglasses look for certain outfits, but by the pool or out in the garden I’ve gotten into the habit of going without. It’s a big part of why the kids are out there right after breakfast, they’ve eased into the day before the sun is ever strong.

So that's what we do. I don't hide my kids from the sun like I used to when Poppy was born, but I'm also not letting them get burned either, so if they've already been out for a a little and they want to stay out longer, that's when the sunscreen goes on, and after that I'll utilize shade. It's so nice not being as stressed about the sun! My vitamin D is in the optimal range now, and I'm not taking a supplement for it anymore.

When I do use sunscreen, I keep it simple, I look for zinc, and the fewer ingredients the better. Zinc works completely differently than the rest of what’s out there, it sits on top of your skin and reflects the light back, and non-nano means the particles are too big to pass through skin at all. The chemical ones do the opposite by design, they absorb the light, and they absorb into your bloodstream right along with it.

These are the ones I always avoid when I’m looking at sunscreen ingredients: homosalate, octisalate, octocrylene, avobenzone, oxybenzone and octinoxate. When they tested all six, every one was in people’s bloodstream after one day of wearing it, and two of them were still showing up three weeks after people stopped, so it isn’t passing through. Several of these are endocrine disruptors, which means your body reads them as hormones and responds to them. All this to say, I thought I was doing the right thing with the spray sunscreen I used to use, and it turns out I was doing my body and my hormones a disservice instead.

My favorite now is:

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A couple weeks ago I shared the two iced drinks I’ve been living on this summer, and so many of you made them and sent me pictures (the cold foam was a hit with the matcha!), so I wanted to come back and show you the other half of my day.

The summer is really setting in with the heat! The kids aren’t phased by it though, they’re still outside all day either playing with the chickens, picking the cherry tomatoes off the vine, on the trampoline, or in the pool with us, and they come in soaked, which I love for them, sweating is one of the ways their little bodies clear out what they don’t need. I'm also doing sauna sessions throughout the week, so between that and breastfeeding, I really need to stay on top of my hydration.

My daytime drink is still the B•T Fountain (I told the whole story of how I first found it at Erewhon in this post if you missed it). The short version is that it’s the electrolytes that makes my water count, because I learned a while back that staying hydrated isn’t only about how much water you drink, your body needs the minerals and electrolytes to hold onto it, and in a Tennessee summer you’re sweating those minerals right back out. Pique B•T Fountain is also so good for my skin! It has clinically studied ceramides and hyaluronic acid in it that hydrate my skin from the inside while I drink it, so it’s doing double duty on the days I’m sweating half of it back out in the garden.

The kids lose their minerals in all that sweat too, so I've been making sure they stay topped up. They love the sachet just stirred into plain water, the flavor is so good on its own, but the watermelon version is a fun way to make it feel extra special. Elliott loves muddling, which means half of it ends up on the counter, but he's so proud of it that I don't worry about the mess.

Watermelon Lime B•T Cooler

Prep Time: 5 min Total Time: 5 min Serves: 1 (16–18 oz)

Before You Start

Choose a ripe, sweet watermelon for the best flavor.

Chill your water or sparkling water before making the drink.

Ingredients

1 B•T Fountain sachet
½ cup fresh watermelon, cubed
Juice of ½ lime
8 oz cold filtered water or sparkling water
Ice
Fresh mint, for garnish (optional)

Instructions

Add the watermelon to the bottom of a large glass and gently muddle until it releases its juices. Slowly pour in the cold filtered water or sparkling water and gently stir to combine.

Add the B•T Fountain sachet and lime juice, stirring until the powder is completely dissolved.

Fill the glass with ice.

Garnish with fresh mint, if desired, and enjoy immediately.

Then there’s the other end of the day, which has become my favorite part of it. We’ve started eating dinner early, around 5pm, because it’s been better for everyone’s digestion and we’ve all been sleeping deeper for it, and by the time the Poppy and Elliott are down it’s usually around 8:30pm. Clive is almost always with us then, either nursing or just awake for a little while before bed, and Anthony and I have gotten into the habit of making our night drink and sitting on the couch together to enjoy it. It's usually the two of us with the baby, talking about the day and thinking about plans for the next. It's almost like a regroup, and such a calming way to end the night.

That's where Pique R•E Fountain comes in, it's built around magnesium, the mineral your body leans on to relax, your muscles and your nervous system both need it to settle down, which is why being low can leave you feeling wired and restless right when you're trying to come down, and so many of us are running low without even knowing it, between stress, sweating, and not getting much of it from food anymore. What I love about this particular one is that is uses three different forms of magnesium (triple maxed) instead of just one, so your body can absorb and use it, and it has the other electrolytes right alongside it; potassium, sodium, and calcium. So it's replacing what a long hot day pulls out of me while it helps me wind down. The nice thing is it works both directions, the magnesium helps calm everything down in the evening so you rest better, and then you wake up feeling clearer and more focused the next morning. It has a soft lemongrass-lemon taste that comes from real lemongrass and lemon juice, nothing artificial, no flavoring or fillers, (which is rare for an electrolyte!) and it turns the prettiest pale blue from spirulina.

There’s no sugar in it, it’s lightly sweetened with organic monk fruit instead, which doesn’t spike my blood sugar the way regular sugar does, so it doesn’t work against me at night. I feel physically more relaxed after drinking it. I give the kids a little too, their recent HTMA results came back a bit low on magnesium, so I asked our practitioner about the ingredients in this one for them, and she had me go off the standard 150-pound adult serving size and divide it down based on their weight, so Poppy and Elliott each get about a quarter of a sachet. They love it, they call it the “blue drink” and think it’s a treat (because it’s so delicious)! Once they’ve done their other supplements at night, the “blue drink” is the last thing they get before bed. I’ll retest them in a couple months to see how it’s helped their mineral levels too.

You can add this single serving size to plain water or here’s the recipe we love for our favorite wind-down mocktail:

Sparkling Cucumber Mint R•E Spritzer

Prep Time: 5 min Total Time: 5 min Serves: 1 (16 oz)

Before You Start

Use chilled sparkling water.

Gently muddle the cucumber and mint to release their flavor without breaking them down too much.

Pour the sparkling water in last to keep the bubbles fresh.

Ingredients

For the Spritzer

1 R•E Fountain sachet
3–4 thin cucumber ribbons
4–5 fresh mint leaves
Squeeze of fresh lemon
8 oz sparkling water
Ice

Instructions

Add the cucumber ribbons and mint leaves to the bottom of a large glass.

Gently muddle just enough to release their natural oils and flavor.

Slowly pour in the sparkling water and gently stir.

Add the R•E Fountain sachet and squeeze in the fresh lemon juice. Stir until completely dissolved.

Fill the glass with ice.

Garnish with an extra cucumber ribbon and a sprig of fresh mint, if desired.

Serve immediately.

I keep thinking about how before Elliott was born I wasn't paying attention to any of this, and now it's woven into our days without me even trying, the cold one when the sun's high and the kids are wild in the yard, and the blue one on the couch with Anthony once they're all down. I can't remember the last time I had the kids or myself drink plain water without electrolytes in it. You can absolutely just stir either one of these sachets into plain water, that's how I have them half the time, especially if I'm running low on time, but making them into a little something fun with seasonal ingredients is an extra treat I look forward to.

I love the quality of Pique! They also offer a 90-day money-back guarantee, so there’s really no risk in trying it, and the discount through my link is 20% off for life, not just your first order, which is so cool! If you only want to start with one, I’d grab the B•T if your days are hot and long, or the R•E if it’s your sleep that could use the help. And if you’ve been meaning to get better about your hydration all summer and keep forgetting, consider this your easy start! Use my link, piquelife.com/brittanydhp, for 20% off for life + free gifts.

Let me know if you make any of them, I want to hear which is your favorite!

xx Brittany

If you’ve been wanting to start a garden but have no idea where to begin, this is the guide I wish I’d had our first year. I tend to over-research before I try something, and I like to learn from people who have done it, so I get why so many have been asking me the same thing: “Where do I even start with growing food?” That’s exactly what I’m walking you through here, start to finish, in the order I’d do it. And if you’re reading this in the middle of summer thinking you’ve missed your window, you haven’t!

I'll show you exactly what you can still get in the ground right now for July and August, with specific examples of what to direct sow and what to grab as transplants based on the space you're working with. I'm still learning myself, but this is the method we used to plant our spring garden, and we had a pretty good harvest for how low-maintenance it was (I share what we're currently growing and the mistakes we've learned from in this post)

The biggest thing I want you to hear before anything else: you don’t have to do it all at once. You don’t need a big yard or a dozen beds to grow your own food, you can do it with a relatively small space. If all you do is put a few pots of herbs on your patio, it’s a perfect place to start! So take what’s useful here, leave the rest, and don’t let the idea of doing it perfectly stop you from starting.

Why grow your own in the first place?

If you're wondering whether it's even worth the effort, believe me... it is! Once you've eaten a juicy tomato you picked from the vine, the store-bought ones are ruined for you, they have less flavor and they're so pale compared to the rich red of one you picked yourself. And it's not just taste, they're better for you too, because produce starts losing nutrients the second it's picked, ..so by the time the ones at the store have traveled and sat on a shelf for a week or more, a lot of that is already gone. That's why, if you're not growing your own, a farmers market is the next best thing, the produce isn't traveling as far since it's coming from local vendors.

But nothing beats walking out to your own backyard, and the part I love most is the control it gives you over your food, you know exactly what went into the soil and that there's no pesticides on it. It's changed how we eat too, we end up eating way more vegetables just because they're right there. I'll walk out and pick the chard and bring it in and make it, and it's gotten us eating more seasonally, just using whatever's growing at the time, lately it’s been beet greens, kale, chard, spinach. That ownership over what we're feeding our family feels amazing. We're not at the point where we grow everything we eat, we still shop to fill in the gaps and are figuring out how to store what we grow, but starting small and seeing that we could do it is what's gotten us to where we are now.

Before you start, here’s what to expect

The setup is the biggest part, and it’s a one-time thing. When we built our four beds last summer, Anthony put them together in one morning, we filled them with soil that same day, and we planted the following evening. So give yourself a weekend or a few evenings here and there, to go from nothing to fully planted. If you’re starting with a couple of pots on a patio, it’s even quicker, an afternoon.

After that it’s pretty easy. Most days it’s just watering and a quick check to see how everything’s doing, with a little more on the weekend. The hard part is the beginning, once it’s in the ground it pretty much takes care of itself. When we did our first small garden last summer, we didn’t even know to prune things for a bigger harvest, and we still barely did anything to it and got tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, and all our herbs for very little effort. It kind of shocked us, like wow, if we could get more strategic with this, we could probably grow enough to feed our family once we had a system down.

That's exactly what I've put together below, the full step-by-step, including the part I needed help with the most when we first started: what to plant right now and exactly how to lay it out, whether you're starting with a few pots on a patio, one bed, two beds, or a full four-bed setup. I'll walk you through my whole plan, the specific varieties I'd buy, how many of each, and explain what goes where in every bed, so you're not guessing at any of it. I'm only in my second year of this, so I’m still learning too, but it's what worked for us, laid out the way I wish someone had done for me when we started.

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Eight weeks already, and I keep thinking about how different this feels from those first newborn bubble weeks when I couldn't do much more than stay on the bed and nurse. The thing I've loved most lately is being able to pick up Poppy and Elliott again, scooping them up for snuggles, helping them with something, carrying them when they need me. For weeks I felt so limited, standing at the bottom of the stairs waiting for Anthony to bring them down to me, and now I can just reach down and lift them up like I used to. Elliott keeps asking me, "better now?" because I always told him that when I'm healed and better I could pick him up again, and even though I've picked him up quite a bit by now, he still asks me every time. I just laugh and tell him, yeah little man, I've been better for a few weeks now.

Our days have more of a solid routine now. Clive usually nurses then goes down around 9 or 10pm, then wakes around 2 or 3am, then again around 5 or 6am, and after that he sleeps until 8:30am. He was in my bed with me for a while, but we recently set up his crib in my room right next to my bed, so Poppy and Elliott can sleep in our bed when they want to and Clive is still close enough that I can grab him easily in the night. We go to bed around 9:30pm, so even though I’m getting up in the night I still feel rested, I haven’t felt too tired this way. Usually I’ll nurse one side, then change his diaper and nurse him on the other. The times I’ve skipped the second side and laid him back down, he’s woken up so much sooner, so I try to do a full feeding every time he wakes, which gets me more sleep in a row after.

In the mornings Anthony works out first while I do the early feeding, and then we switch. He takes Clive so I can go get my own workout in with red light therapy, and he starts breakfast with the kids. We come back in and all do devotion together over breakfast, and then for the past five weeks we’ve been heading to ISR (Infant Swim Rescue) lessons. When we get back it’s lunch, and the afternoon is when I’ll get on the computer, film, or work in the garden, depending on the day. I’m wearing Clive for most of his naps. I’ll either wear him until he falls asleep and then lay him in his crib, or if we’re staying inside I’ll just keep him on me because he sometimes sleeps better that way. But if I’m going to be out in the heat, I like to put him down in his crib so he can get a solid nap. I really just go off what he’s doing. I don’t stress about what time he sleeps or where he sleeps, as long as he sleeps, that’s the most important part.

Back to ISR, because it's been a whole thing these past weeks. When we first started, both kids were screaming and crying and they didn't want to do it, they were scared of the water, especially without their swim vests on, (our instructor had us get rid of the swim vests after the first day since she said they teach kids a false sense of security and put them in the wrong position for learning to swim). Those first three days were rough enough that I wasn't sure it would be like this the whole time, but then something switched. The lessons are only ten minutes each so they're quick, but they're going every day and seeing the same instructor, and they started understanding what to do, and the quicker they did the amount of swims required the quicker the lesson would be over, and then they started having fun with it.

Now Elliott cries when the lesson ends because he wants to keep swimming! Which after that first week of tears is not something I saw coming, but so proud of them both. We've been having good talks with them about how good things are often hard, as much as we can explain it to them anyway. Poppy understands it more than Elliott does and it's been a sweet little lesson for all of us.

I'd been resting and taking it slow for weeks now, wondering the whole time if it was doing anything, and yesterday at my postpartum check with Shannon I finally found out…

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I love a festive 4th of July cake and wanted to make a version out of real food that still gives you that classic stars-and-stripes look everyone loves at a cookout.

Boxed cake mixes lean on artificial flavors, preservatives, and a long list of additives so they can sit on a shelf for a year or two. And cool whip (which I used to loveee) isn’t really cream, it’s mostly water, hydrogenated oils, high fructose corn syrup, and corn syrup, held together with things like polysorbate 60 and sodium caseinate. Cream, on the other hand, is one ingredient, and it whips up into something so much better for you.

This version is a honey-vanilla sheet cake with a light vanilla milk brush that keeps it tender, real maple whipped cream in place of cool whip, and fresh raspberries and blueberries for the stripes and stars. There’s no refined sugar in it, just honey, maple, eggs, cream, and berries.

The whipped cream is the same one we make most weeks for our sourdough protein waffles. All you do is beat cold heavy cream with a little maple and vanilla until it’s soft and fluffy. A stand mixer or a hand mixer both work, and it takes just a few minutes. The one thing to watch is not to overbeat it, because cream will go from fluffy to butter consistency quick if you walk away, so stop once it holds a soft peak.

You can bake the cake the day before, whip the cream in the morning, and add the berries an hour or two before everyone shows up. Raspberries hold their shape and don’t weep the way sliced strawberries do, so the flag still looks clean by the time you’re serving it.

One tip: dry your berries really well after washing them, and wait until the cake is fully cooled before you spread the cream, or it will slide right off.

I made the usual swaps to keep the ingredients clean: honey and maple instead of refined sugar, grass-fed butter, pasture-raised eggs, unbleached flour, aluminum-free baking powder, and real heavy whipping cream (I like the Kalona Organics or Alexandre Family Farm brand at either Sprouts or Whole foods, both have no added gums).

Full recipe below:

Naturally Sweetened Berry Flag Sheet Cake

Prep Time: 30 min Bake Time: 22–28 min Cool Time: 1 hour Total Time: ~2 hours Serves: 16-20

Before You Start:

Preheat oven to 350°F.
Grease a 13 x 18 inch rimmed half-sheet pan, line the bottom with parchment paper, then lightly grease the parchment.
Set the eggs out so they are not fridge-cold.
Melt the butter and let it cool slightly.
Wash the raspberries and blueberries, then dry them very well.
Keep the heavy cream cold until you are ready to make the whipped cream.
Make sure the cake is fully cooled before adding the whipped cream or it can melt.
Add the berries within 1–2 hours of serving for the cleanest flag design.

Ingredients

For the Honey-Vanilla Sheet Cake
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 tbsp baking powder
¾ tsp fine sea salt
5 large eggs
¾ cup raw honey
⅓ cup pure maple syrup
1 cup whole milk
¾ cup unsalted butter, melted and slightly cooled
1 tbsp vanilla extract
1 tsp finely grated lemon zest

For the Light Vanilla Milk Brush
¾ cup whole milk
¼ cup heavy cream
1 tbsp raw honey
1 tsp vanilla extract
Pinch fine sea salt

For the Maple-Vanilla Whipped Cream
3 cups cold heavy whipping cream
3 tbsp pure maple syrup, or up to ¼ cup to taste
2 tsp vanilla extract
½ tsp finely grated lemon zest, optional
Pinch fine sea salt

For the Flag Topping
4 containers fresh raspberries, 6 oz each
2 pints fresh blueberries

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350°F and prepare your half-sheet pan with parchment and butter.

In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt.

In a large bowl, whisk the eggs until smooth.

Add honey, maple syrup, milk, melted butter, vanilla extract, and lemon zest.

Whisk until fully combined.

Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients.

Whisk gently just until the batter is smooth and no dry flour remains. Do not overmix.

Pour batter into the prepared sheet pan and spread evenly into the corners.

Bake for 22–28 minutes, until the cake is lightly golden and the center springs back when touched.

Start checking around 22 minutes. If the top is getting too dark before the center is done, loosely tent with foil and keep baking.

Remove from oven and let the cake cool in the pan for 15 minutes.

Make the Light Vanilla Milk Brush

In a small saucepan or microwave-safe bowl, warm the milk, heavy cream, honey, vanilla, and salt just until the honey dissolves.

Do not boil it.

Keep the cake in the pan.

Use a toothpick, skewer, or fork to poke small holes all over the cake.

Slowly brush or spoon the milk mixture over the cake.

This is a light brush, not a heavy soak. The cake should be moist, but not wet or soggy.

Let the cake cool completely.

Make the Maple-Vanilla Whipped Cream

Add cold heavy whipping cream to a large mixing bowl.

Beat on medium speed until it starts to thicken.

Add maple syrup, vanilla extract, lemon zest if using, and salt.

Keep whipping on medium to medium-high until fluffy and spreadable.

Stop when it holds soft-to-medium peaks.

Do not overwhip or it starts to turn to butter consistency.

Assemble the Flag Cake

Make sure the cake is fully cooled.

Spread the maple-vanilla whipped cream evenly over the cake.

Place blueberries in the upper-left corner for the blue star section.

Arrange raspberries in rows across the cake for the red stripes.

Leave whipped cream showing between the raspberry rows for the white stripes.

Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes before serving.

Serving Instructions

Serve chilled, straight from the pan.

Slice into squares.

Keep refrigerated until close to serving, especially on a warm day.

Make It Ahead

Day before: Bake the cake, add the light milk brush, cool completely, cover well, and refrigerate.

Morning of: Make the whipped cream and spread it over the cake.

Within 1–2 hours of serving: Add the blueberries and raspberries.

Tips

Don’t overmix once the flour is added, or the cake can become dense.

Use a light hand with the milk brush. Too much liquid can make the cake feel heavy.

Make sure the berries are dry before decorating so the flag stays clean.

If your oven runs hot, bake at 340°F and start checking around 20 minutes.

There's a moment in recent mornings, before the house is really awake, where I take Clive outside with me and the sun is just coming up and it's still cool out and the birds are going, and it's so peaceful that I sit there for a little while with the light in my eyes. I'm standing in the middle of eighteen garden beds with my coffee, trying to remember which things need harvesting and which will need to be rotated out soon, thinking about the seeds I want to start, admiring the wildflowers….it's my favorite way to start the day. Back in California our mornings looked nothing like this. We'd make eggs or run out for breakfast burritos from Erewhon, and we spent almost no time in our own backyard. It's funny, when I think of California living it seems like I should have been outside all the time, but we were always on the go, in the car, off to places, in the air conditioning on hot days.

I think about our house we sold in Pasadena sometimes, and the flowers growing in the backyard were so beautiful, but the lot was mainly on a hill and shaded by these gorgeous old oak trees, not much sun all day in the flat areas I would have needed for garden beds, and looking at it now I know my garden never could have thrived there the way it does here. And we certainly couldn't have had chickens for our own eggs. It's strange to realize how much of our life has changed in a year and a half…

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This meal is something I originally prepped for postpartum healing and froze in these soup prep containers as single servings. Once those ran out, Anthony made it fresh for me at least three more times since Clive was born. It seems really simple, and when I first made it I wasn't sure it would be that filling because it doesn't have many ingredients. But it's SO good.

The Chinese red dates really make it. They’re a bit sweeter than regular dates, and I love the texture. They’re firmer when dry, so in the soup they turn into this amazing bite.

In Chinese tradition, red dates have been used to help mothers recover after birth for generations. They’re thought to nourish the blood and bring warmth back into the body, and they’re high in iron, that’s why they turn up in so many recovery soups and teas. With the chicken broth for protein and the ginger to settle your stomach, a bowl of this feels nourishing in the best way. It was one of the meals I was so glad to have stocked in the freezer those first few weeks with Clive.

I found the recipe in the First Forty Days book, which is all about postpartum healing and warming foods. Red dates aren't something I'd ever think to buy, and this was my first time having them, but I'll always keep them stocked now. You can find them at an Asian market or order them online. I ordered mine from here: TeaCuppa

If you know someone who's pregnant or just had a baby, this is an amazing meal to bring a newly postpartum mom. It's also great to prep ahead if you've got your own postpartum coming up.

Chicken, Red Dates & Ginger Soup

Prep Time: 15 min Cook Time: 2 hr 40 min Total Time: ~3 hr Serves: 6–8

Before You Start

Rinse the chicken thoroughly under cold water.

Wash and slice the carrots.

Peel the onion.

Leave the ginger unpeeled and simply cut it in half.

Have a large stockpot ready.

Keep a spoon nearby for skimming any foam from the broth while it simmers.

Ingredients

For the Soup

2–2½ pounds whole chicken or chicken parts
½ white or yellow onion, peeled
1 (2-inch) knob fresh ginger, unpeeled and halved
3 medium carrots, peeled and thinly sliced
5 Chinese red dates (jujubes)
3 tbsp dried goji berries
Sea salt, to taste
Cold water, enough to cover the chicken

Instructions

Rinse the chicken under cold water, place in a medium stockpot and add enough cold water to just cover the chicken.

Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, uncovered.

Once boiling, add the onion and ginger.

Reduce the heat to medium, cover, and simmer for 40 minutes.

Occasionally skim off any foam that rises to the surface.

Carefully remove the chicken from the pot and set aside until cool enough to handle.

Remove the meat from the bones and shred it.

Return the carcass and bones to the pot.

Reserve any extra chicken for another meal and return about 1–2 cups shredded chicken to the soup.

Add the carrots and red dates.

Simmer uncovered over low heat for 1 hour.

During the final 15 minutes of cooking, stir in the goji berries.

Season with sea salt to taste.

Remove and discard the bones before serving.

Serve warm.

Storage: Keep in the fridge for up to 5 days, or freeze for up to 3 months.