Summer Grace

“So when are you guys getting married?”

“What?! Us? Oh no, we’re breaking up next weekend”

Literally the exact conversation I had with my friend Emily about my now husband. It was our third date in early May when Finn asked me “so, do you want to just do, like, a summer fling?” to which I replied “Totally!” It sounds pretty un-romantic, and it kind of was. I wasn’t sure I liked this guy enough to officially call him my boyfriend, and he felt the same about me, but we were having a ton of fun together and didn’t want to stop hanging out, and as the summer ended, we had a campfire with Emily and her husband, when we decided “well this was fun, but summer’s over, sooo…” We didn’t get too serious, we had so much fun, and we didn’t feel the need to hide the ugly parts of ourselves because ya know, it’s not going anywhere, so why not just be who we wanted to be?

Turns out, I just wasn’t ready for our summer fling to be over, so it morphed into a fall fling, and a winter fling, and it was the end of January before we finally made it fb official, and I started referring to him as my boyfriend instead of “just a friend” to which my friends and family members would roll their eyes and say “yea, sure…”

It was the next summer when I finally met my Finn’s best friends, who lived in California where he grew up, where they called me Summer Fling, which quickly got shortened to Summer, which is what he calls me now, and the start of the name of my new blog.

I feel like everyone needs a little bit more Summer in their life. Life is crazy, and getting caught up in all the mama drama is exhausting! All that energy you currently spend on stressing about whether your kids’ snack is healthy enough and should you or should you not post about it on instagram (too healthy and you seem like you’re a boring, health nut mom, not healthy enough and you’re an irresponsible, crazy mom), when you could be laughing and playing with your kids! Have some fun with them! All they want is you, and the real you. Don’t be too serious, have some fun, and just be who you want to be!

Grace. I know we ALL need more of this. Maybe from our friends and family. Definitely from ourselves. Your kitchen is a mess, you have laundry spilling out of every hamper in the house, and your kid just had a major meltdown in the middle of Target on a Sunday afternoon. You are done.

What you want is for your house to be spotless and your kids to be perfectly behaved.

What you need is grace.

You need to be kind to yourself, and realize that no one is perfect, in spite of what they post on instagram, and no one who really loves you expects you to be. Set realistic expectations for yourself and your family, and just relax! Your kids and your husband just want you. Not the perfect hair, I-shower-everyday-and-always-have-the-house-clean mom/wife. They want the crazy, sing in the car, dishes-in-the-sink-but-we-dance-anyway mom/wife.

Don’t be so serious, have some fun, and be kind to yourself! In other words, enjoy a little summer, and give yourself some grace.