A Daily Routine From the First Week Without School

The good and the bad and the gross

The end of the school year is both amazing and daunting. I have to say that I adore not doing the early wake-ups and battles over getting out of bed and putting on matching shoes. We have been sleeping in until about 9 on some mornings and it makes a huge difference in how my brain works.

But we also have three children who need to be occupied all day. This week we still have full time help with the three of them from about 9-5 but next week Nick and I are solo with them. We are up in the Catskills which makes a huge difference because they can be released outside, but the two year old has to be constantly watched and there is still a lot of “what to do next????”

Summer days are all different and chaotic. A lot of you have been asking how I balance kids and work.

Here’s my day right now.

8:30-9 am: Wake up to a demanding baby yelling “Hey mom. Get me out now. Yes now. You come here.” There is also often another child spread eagled in the middle of our bed. I do not know when they appeared, but somehow by morning they are there. We make bagels or frozen waffles and I try to extract myself to do work. This is not easy. Because our cabin is tiny I have to physically leave and I go down to the closed bar at the Spruceton Inn to try to do morning work.

9:30-11:30 am: I am revising my new novel The Parisian Heist, while I amp up the mad hustle for Everyone is Lying to You. And speaking of…now is the time to order it.

Basically, if you want this book to succeed, preordering it is one of the best things you can do. I APPRECIATE YOU. This is the book where I finally got to dive deep into influencer culture, mommy wars, and what it means to be ‘a good woman’ online. If that sounds like your kind of story, please preorder it. And maybe buy it for your cousin whose husband is a douche.

You get this substack for free for a year when you order!!! A truly excellent deal for about $15 plus a book.

Here is the Amazon link. I know it is often the easiest one. This is a list of more purchasing options, but it is also available at a lot of indie bookstores and you can get signed copies mailed to you here and here. Tour stops are here!

I have been trying to edit between 25-50 pages of the new heist book and then do about an hour of Everyone is Lying to You marketing. Then I do another hour or so of podcast and substack work.

I am also currently in the phase of parenthood where I think every freckle is a tick. I am constantly scratching at everyone’s skin and looking at it under a magnified lens on my phone to see if they have legs. So I spend too much computer time trying to figure out the best bug sprays and tick extraction methods.

not a tick

Noon: I head home for lunch and to do an interview. I am trying to keep interview time (both me doing promo for the book and making episodes of Under the Influence to an hour a day and I force everyone outside no matter the weather. Sometimes this is a massive fight and sometimes it is easy. Every day is fucking different.

Afternoon-ish: I bang through emails and busy work. I have also been making myself fun little to do lists for the summer. I want them to include things that aren’t work related.

This week I wanted to learn to make a campfire and I did! Check, check and check bitch. I wanted to keep updating our smutty summer reading list and I have added ten more suggestions from you. I also dove into this sexy romance from 831 while hiding from my kids.