(bi)Weekly recap + what we ate: What I wore one week in fall

I am feeling a little underwater right now. We’ve been rehearsing 11am – 6:30ppm, which in theory gives us the evening off, but I don’t get home until 8pm and the evening’s kind of over by then because my brain is fried. Plus I had some titles to do for an upcoming recital. And Hallowe’en. And the mornings…. I haven’t figured out my mornings. Conceivably the only thing new in the morning now that I’m back in rehearsal is that I have to pack my own lunch in addition to the kids’, which shouldn’t take that long, but somehow, any empty space in my morning pre -going back to rehearsals seems to be gone. I’ve been thinking about what of my own buckets I want to be filled in the morning, and how. This is what I came up with:

Body – yoga
home – make my bed
brain – read 15 minutes
soul – journal
family – check in with Husband before he leaves for work.

But then also, the MUST DOs in the morning:
-make lunch (two kids and myself)
-Get the kids’ breakfast. Often the Husband does this before he leaves for work. Really, the kids should be at the stage where they get their own breakfast.
-Supervise practicing piano for the 8 year old and worksheets for the 6 year old. (that makes me sound very Tiger Mom, but the 6 year old does worksheets so that she stays out of the 8 year old’s hair while he practices piano.)
-Supervise morning chores (unloading dishwasher, sweeping)
-Get myself dressed. (Sometimes shower, but very rarely. Meaning I try to shower at night. But even then I don’t shower every day.)
-Prep dinner (if needed) and pick up kitchen and make sure counters is clear.
-get the kids out of the house on time.

I feel like if some of any of the above doesn’t get done, we get by, but the effects of neglecting those things are cumulative and really pile up, making stress for future us and future me.

Which is all to say, getting my feet under myself the past few weeks has felt like a lot. In my journals, the second half of October has been blank. I can always tell when I’m in a busy season when I look back through my journals and there are a string of blank pages. And actually, funny enough, when looking at my five year journal, October/November seems to be the months every year with the most blank pages. Which I guess is itself telling.

Anyhow, before I got really swamped, I decided I would do a “What I wore” post because it take a little bit of daily effort to put together and I thought I’d be able to dash it off. Plus, it’s fall and fall is my favorite season for dressing – all cozy layers and deep colours. So here is a week in October:

Monday:

This was the first day of rehearsal. I have a jacket I used to wear to every first day of rehearsal, but when I put it on this time, it was a little tight around the shoulders, which makes me sad. So I wore this instead. Red Wool& dress. Striped sweater from a Teat & Cosset, a maternity brand that no longer is around. Yes, that’s a nursing sweater. But I still wear it because it is a comfy cotton/wool blend that keeps me from overheating and it’s neutral but not plain. The denim jacket is from Uniqlo – one of my clothing purchases this year. I always swore I’d never wear a denim jacket, but this one has a bit of stretch and a boxy, but not too boxy, silhouette, and is so practical and versatile that I’m growing to love it. Black jockey leggings (cotton with pockets!). Blue boots from Reiker. I actually liked this outfit so much that I work it for family photos later that week.

Tuesday:

I’m sure I wear this dress at least once every time I do a week of outfits. It’s a linen shirt dress that I wear throughout the year, regardless of season. It’s easy to dress it more warmly or less. Orange pocket leggings from Toad and Co. Grey wool sneakers from Geisswein. I used to have All Birds, but then they stopped having fun colours, so I found this other brand online. I actually find them more comfortable than All Birds.

Wednesday:

There’s the denim jacket again. I did probably wear that jacket every day this week. Butterfly sweater bought from Nordstrom Rack several years ago, before I stopped buying white clothes because of kids and messes. (I’m slowly introducing white back into my wardrobe.) Sweater is worn over blue Wool& dress. Purple scarf was a gift from a friend – it has the first page of Jane Eyre printed on it. Red Geisswein wool sneakers. I had ordered several pairs of Geisswein sneakers because I couldn’t tell from online which pair I would like best. I liked both.

Thursday:

My Day Off, hence the hastily snapped picture while I was at H&M. Snoopy sweatshirt and green joggers are all from Uniqlo. I bought the joggers for our trip to South Africa and these have proven very cozy and thick. I’ve worn this outfit on almost every day off this fall. Same shoes as yesterday.

Friday:

I had a different outfit planned this day, but then I didn’t do my yoga in the morning, so I decided to wear my very stretchy Duluth Trading Company NoGa pants in case I had time to do some light yoga at work. (I didn’t). I like the NoGa pants because they are basically yoga pants that I pretend are okay to wear at work. The purple sweater is from Uniqlo. The shoes are a repeat from yesterday. The hat was a gift from my bachelorette party sixteen years ago. The scarf is the same as Wednesday.
Later that day, I did change because we went to the opera. I have one nice dress, which I wore with a black blazer. I don’t really have pictures of that night, but I’ve probably worn it here before.

Saturday:

I’m pretty sure I wore this in last year’s “What I Wore” post. Sweatshirt dress, bought when I was pregnant – it has thumbholes! The sweater is a hand me down from my cousin. I was wearing my sneakers because I was coming from doing the13 year old’s voice lesson run and had gone on a walk while waiting for voice lessons. I had brought ankle boots to change into at work, but then I went directly from voice lesson to work and was slightly late to rehearsal so I didn’t change. The leggings are from Duluth Trading Company. They also have pockets. Everything I’m wearing has pockets. Except my underwear.

Sunday;

If I have to be at work on Sunday, I’m going to be comfy and casual. Fox overall and striped henley from Duluth, The same blue boots I wore on Monday.

Bonus Monday:

I took so long to write this post that I am back to Monday, so I thought I’d throw in this outfit too. Wide legged pants from Uniqlo. I feel like they are a little frumpy on me, but they are comfy and cool in the summer. (They’re actually summer weight pants). The shirt I’ve had for maybe 15 years, I think I got it at Nordstrom Rack or some such. I never want to wear it because it is a little short, but the new trend for high waisted pants has brought this shirt out of hiding. The orange sweater I love for the pop of colour. I think it’s another Nordstrom Rack purchase too. Or maybe Marshalls? I remember when I first saw it in the store, I put it back, thinking, “Oh, this is too orange.” But then I went back for it because I loved the colour so much.

So that’s my sartorial week one October week in 2025! I feel like I wear the same clothes over and over, but looking at this, I do see that I’ve made a few new purchases this year.

Grateful For:

-singers who close doors. So there are doors in our show. Three of them at one point. Something that is becoming really clear to me is that one thing seasoned singers do that younger/newer singers don’t, is they close doors behind them when they make an entrance. You cue them onstage, they open the door, walk through the door, and then close the door. A lot of younger singers don’t close doors behind them, just leave it gaping open because they are focused on the music they are about to sing. I think it’s just something that happens as singers mature and being onstage becomes more natural – they do things that are natural in every day life. When you or I walk through a door, typically we close it behind us. Another thing in this world is picking up things that fall onstage. In real life, if I drop a pencil, I will pick it up while going on with my life. Some singers don’t do that. Things will accidentally fall onstage and they just leave it there. And the audience is stuck wondering if someone is going trip over the thing. And afterwards, they will say, “I didn’t know if I should have picked i up.” Seasoned singers will just casually pick the thing up and move on with life. Anyhow, all that to say I really appreciate the singers who have been onstage enough years to close doors and pick up fallen objects without being told.

-Past me for freezing soup for an easy dinner for everyone when I’m not home and the kids and Husband have a million things to do. (I think I’ve been grateful for this a lot in the past, but Past Me is really clutch in this area.)

-five minute curtain holds. Here’s a secret at the opera: we always start the show 5 minutes after posted curtain time. So if the show says it starts at 7:30pm, we always start at 7:35pm. This was a very good thing because on the Friday before, we took the family to the opera. But the 8 year old had soccer practice until 6pm and the show was at 7:30pm. I had to work until 5:30 or so. The whole evening was precisely timed to get us where we needed to be -the 13 year old and I was supposed to meet the Husband at a Metro stop after I got off work – He would pick up dinner after soccer and pick us up at a nearby stop so that we could drive down in one car. But then as the 13 year old and I were walking to the metro, the Husband called and asked, “Can [the eight year old] wear his cleats to the opera?” OMG. The kid had forgotten to bring shoes. So the Husband picked up dinner, came home, picked us up, picked up shoes for the 8 year old and we got down to the theatre at 7:15pm, and ate our sandwiches in the lobby of the theatre in our fancy clothes. It was real classy. But that’s kind of how it goes when you squeeze in a trip to the opera after soccer practice. This is one of those times where we wonder, “Are we doing too much? or do we just suck at logistics?”
Which is all to say, thank goodness the show really started at 7:35pm and we had time to wolf down our sandwiches.

Looking forward to:

-Planners! My planners for 2026 arrived. I did order them off Amazon, which I feel a little guilty about. I usually order my planners from Jet Pens, but they were out of stock, so I waited a week to see if they would re-stock and then ordered from an Amazon retailer. But then… a week after I ordered them, Jet Pens had the planners back in stock. Bummer. Although I know if I had ordered them from Jet Pens I would have thrown another $100 worth of pens and stationary supplies in my cart too, so perhaps this is the more economical option. Anyhow – I love the delicious anticipation of empty planner just waiting to be filled.

-Getting our family photos back. We did end up going to the nearby downtown area and having our pictures taken against murals and plazas, and we even went into the Metro and had some pictures taken there too. I’m kind of excited to see how they turned out.

-light in the morning now that we’ve turned our clocks back.

-Tech week! It’s tech week! Yay moving into the theatre. I’m excited, but also already tired. It kind of sucks to have tech week the week after daylight savings ends. Last night we got done rehearsal at 10:30 and I couldn’t figure out why I was so tired, then I remembered that my body thought it was 11:30pm.

What We Ate – this is a really vague list because I wasn’t home most evenings for dinner. Shout out to the Husband. Also – this is kind of the typical weekly dinner rotation for those “How are we going to make dinner when we are down one parent at home” weeks. Which is all to say, sometimes we have complicated dinners loaded with lots of vegetables, and sometimes we feed the kids food that is tasty and low effort and it’s all fine.

Monday: Thai meatball soup, from the freezer.

Tuesday: Taco Tuesday. I think they had beef tacos.

Wednesday: Mac and cheese and hot dots. The 13 year old made dinner.

Thursday: Breakfast sandwiches.

Friday: We got takeout sandwiches from a diner before the opera.

Saturday: Pizza and movie night – I think the family watched Spiderman 2, the second Toby Maguire version of Spiderman.

Okay, that’s the report from the week. I’ll give the Hallowe’en report next time – it was a good time. Happy November! I’m not participating in NaBloPoMo this year – October is just not when I have the bandwidth (see above about empty journal pages.) But I’m excited to read what other people are up to when I can.