Currently: July and August 2025

You’d think after so many years in this world that I would know… You should never tell the world what you want, lest it make a joke out of your desires. I ended June with the idea that the school break would allow me to slow down and enjoy part of our vacation.

July came in like a lion. Tom ended June with an ear infection. A lot of things happened with work. I spent SO MUCH TIME on zoom. And suddenly… it was our last week in France. I would go to pastry school for an entire day, work for a couple hours, go to dinner… and come home to work more.

August was intense with back to school, advisor training, a trip to Cleveland as Board Chair (!!), another round of hiring, and a quick trip to San Francisco to see family and friends. In some ways it was the summer of friends – meeting up with friends in France, spending time with friends in San Francisco, and planning our anniversary around the friends we’ve made in Florence.

I can’t remember a summer where I felt more tired than this summer. Of course, the silver lining is that for a good part of it, I was in France. We spent some incredibly memorable moments with many friends this summer. And, of course, I love that we even have the opportunity to do all these things. But, this summer was hard and I have a lot of mixed feelings about how it all came together in the end. It is what it is, as they say. C’est la vie.

Disclosure:  This post contains affiliate links for tours and products I love at no additional cost to you.  You can read my full disclosure policy here.

Health & Wellness:

I ruined my 100 day streak for the Peloton Challenge in July. That did not make me happy. We weren’t as active on our France trip as I hoped we would be. I’ve maintained my weight, but I haven’t made as much progress on stretching and strength training as I would have hoped. I’m trying to manifest that in my daily planner now that school has started and I’m on a more “regular” schedule. Mentally, I’m in a really weird place for the end of summer. My week in pastry school wasn’t quite as therapeutic as I would have hoped. The world weighs heavy.

Some of the things that I’ve thought about for the upcoming year… Finding balance. Date nights. Cooking classes. Making things for wine dinner. Workouts and walks. Wine down Wednesdays (or an equivalent idea) with my team. Writing more. Refining my knowledge of food and wine pairings. Finding ways to engage my brain in a way that doesn’t always involve work. More time with people I love. Of course, it all sounds like a good idea at the time.

One of the things I thought about during a massage recently is how I need to work on being a more gentle version of myself. Having lost my dad at a young age, I am often acutely aware of the milestones I pass that he wasn’t able to. This year, Tom and I will celebrate our 12th anniversary, and I will be the same age my dad was when he passed away. I don’t want to look back and think that I wish I had more kind and more patient with him. I know that probably sounds incredibly morbid and sad (as well as a no-brainer), but I know that I’m toughest on the people I’m closest to. I just need to be a bit better at all of that.

Wearing:

I love an end-of-summer sale, especially on things that I’ve deemed to be timeless and have been able to wear for multiple occasions over the last few years!

Ever grateful for the cooler temperatures, I exclusively packed lightweight summer dresses for our anniversary trip. I actually wore my Hill House Daphne dress paired with my Marta Scarampi cape on the plane. (The Daphne dress is on sale with an additional 20% using the Hill House promo code BYESUMMER!) I wore my Sarah Flint 30 block sandals all over the cobblestones in Florence. (Save 25% on all Sarah Flint shoes and sandals using Sarah Flint promo code LASTCALL!) I did pick up this Kallmeyer draped top on sale, and I’m excited to pair it with my favorite Oscar de la Renta shorts for the rest of summer and my J Brand Maria jeans and boots this fall.

We went to Fearing’s for Wine Around the World again in August. I wore this amazing Emilia Wickstead gown that I bought for our anniversary a few years ago. It’s very similar to a shorter version of a dress that Kate Middleton wore a few years ago. I was super excited to have an excuse to wear it again. And, it was fun to dress up a bit.

Not wearing, but saving for winter! I found a pair of my favorite Wolford Augusta leggings on eBay. They shipped all the way from Austria, and I had to pick them up at the post office. (No tariff required!) I can’t explain how thrilled I was to find another pair of them, as I live in constant fear that mine will not live forever. I need to start looking for a true replacement option.

Travel Planning:

I cut back my work travel pretty significantly this fall. I’m not doing conferences the same way in September. I do have an immediate work trip to Houston, followed by one in DC. I’ll have 2 work trips to NYC this fall, as well. Beyond that, we decided to spend our anniversary in Florence and Montalcino this year. Florence, for obvious reasons, and Montalcino because Tom loves it.

We will attend the members event at Castiglion del Bosco again this year. The difference is that we’re going to participate in all the events, which I am excited about. Last year, we did the master class and a concert. It was so lovely and the weather was perfect in October.

We’re doing a family Thanksgiving trip this year with my mom and my cousin. I’m working on planning that itinerary. It’s a change from what Tom and I originally planned, but it will be good. It’s going to be places we’ve been and loved. My mom and my cousin both expressed a desire to visit places that would be new-to-them, which is influencing our itinerary. Stay tuned on that plan.

And, we’ll round out the year in Europe again. Presently we have flights in and out of Rome with the expectation of exploring southern Italy. However, we’ve toyed with the idea of changing that plan a bit. I’m itching to go back to the Loire Valley and spend a bit more time there. We’ll see. I haven’t had the bandwidth to start sketching out a plan yet. I’m hoping to use some of the downtime during our anniversary trip to do that.

Reading:

I ended my summer with some non-fiction. I actually came home from Case Western to find a letter from someone who changed my life in college. He has written a memoir of his life, and he was writing to let me know that I was both acknowledged for my kindness but also for the work I did to speak out on his behalf. It was a humbling moment that brought me to tears.

Trials and Triumphs of a Plague Doctor by Dr. Thomas Butler

“There is not a case on record that could better illustrate a service to society.” These words were shared during the sentencing of Dr. Thomas Butler in a post-9/11 world. His memoir, Trials and Triumphs of a Plague Doctor, dives into his story, not merely as an alleged bio-terrorist, but as a doctor on a mission working in some of the most impoverished communities of the world throughout his career. The book is dense, full of stories of medical research – something many of us take for granted and don’t always understand. We see the end product – the treatment, the cure, the relief, but we have no idea how those strides were made and to what end. And, if I look at the world today, the intersection of medicine and politics converging again, I think this book is more important than ever.

Butler’s story is not self-aggrandizing, nor is it a story of his (appalling) persecution in a zealous post 9/11 world. It’s a small story about what happens when science and politics converge and we lose sight of the greater good. It’s a cautionary tale of how isolationism hurts humans and humanity. And, it’s a fantastic reminder that there are good people who have dedicated their life and career to advancing the care for others over their own personal gain and comfort. Butler’s humility shines in this book. He’s quick to acknowledge the work being done by local communities, quick to share credit, and slow to quantify the immense impact of his work.

Dr. Thomas Butler has lived a life of consequence that most people could only dream of. I appreciate that he was willing to share his story with a broad audience, as it is something that each of us should aspire to emulate in our own sphere of influence.

The Women’s Orchestra of Auschwitz by Anne Sebba

Note: I received an advanced reader copy of The Women’s Orchestra of Auschwitz through Net Galley. All opinions are my own.

This book took me over a month to finish. Sebba writes a haunting tale of heroic women in deeply disturbing circumstances. It’s hard to read it without hearing the backdrop of the music that these women were forced to perform in exchange for their lives. That knowledge makes it difficult to read for long periods of time.

Sebba does a great job explaining the reasons for inconsistency in testimony and stories of survivors. It’s hard to imagine how one could distinguish the days from one another when you hear the details of the daily lives of these women. In the same way, the book doesn’t necessarily have a natural flow to it. The disjointed recollections of the women is a good reminder that nothing about their experience was linear, even upon liberation.

This is a human book with very real human emotions. It’s well-researched and thought-provoking. It grapples with a difficult subject with a bit of clinical reserve. It reminds me of my visit to the Jewish Museum in Berlin – facts presented without shock-value sensationalism. It’s an important piece of history that most people don’t know anything about, so it’s certainly worth a read for content and the subject matter.

It’s an essential read for the question of humanity and further understanding of the human spirit.

Photo Editing:

I haven’t touched my external hard drive in weeks. I did bring them on my anniversary trip with hopes that I’ll feel a bit inspired to do some writing. I really want to write about our stay at Les Hauts de Loire, a hotel I’m already itching to go back to and truly enjoy. It’s going to be awhile before we can do that though. (I really want to go in the fall!) I did update my post about visiting Reims since stayed somewhere new and have a great restaurant recommendation! And, there are draft posts on visiting Brittany and spending 3 nights in Trieste that I just need to finish off. I just haven’t had the brain space or capacity to work on them at all.

However, in the spirit of ending on a positive note, I did add a new recommendation to my post on where to eat in Paris, as well as some photos from our most recent visit to Robert et Louise, a place we visited on our honeymoon and enjoyed again this summer.