A summer round-up and setting September goals
Summer holiday highs and lows & getting myself organised in September.
Summer highlights
I know that it feels like a long time ago now, but how was your summer?
I really enjoyed the summer holidays with my kids and here are some of our highlights:
Me and the kids spent the first week of the summer holidays in West Wales with my mum - I think my husband enjoyed having a quiet house while we were away too!
I came up with lots of creative ideas for the kids to do, some ended up being more successful than others! One of my ideas was for the kids to keep a daily summer journal. My middle child (who is a rule follower) stuck to this religiously and now we’ve got this lovely record of what we did, in his words, over the summer. My eldest (most definitely not a rule follower) didn’t even attempt it!
We stayed in Cornwall for a week and it was just lovely to explore somewhere new and have family time .We had lots of lovely days out, like at The Eden Project, a steam railway family park (which my youngest LOVED) , a theme park (my eldest kept making my husband go on the log flume again and again) and of course, the beach.
The kids enjoying playing in the paddling pool in the evenings after tea at the start of the summer holidays (when it was actually hot!)
I started some new heath goals on holiday that I feel good about - read more about those in this note
I completed my summer ripple crochet blanket - it took me nearly a year and a half to make, but it’s absolutely huge!
I read some great books - 'Before I Let Go’ by Kennedy Ryan and ‘Matrescence’ by Lucy Jones really stand out (I talk more about my thoughts on Matrescence in this post)
We went to the beach lots - beaches in Tenby, Polzeath and locally in Barry Island too. I was even able to read on the beach for a little bit, while my husband took the kids down to the sea, that was just bliss!
When we went to Barry Island, a brass band was playing just behind us the whole time we were at the beach, and they played one of the songs we played at my Dad’s funeral - it’s no surprise that my Dad loved going to that particular beach with us. I choose to take these kind of signs as my Dad being with us, these tiny moments can bring me so much comfort.
I deleted Instagram for the summer and only posted on it when I published a new Substack post - this helped me to not to scroll endlessly like I usually do on there!
The tough parts too
Saying all of that, I did find the summer holidays hard at times, one of the main things was that I struggled to have time out for me.
When we were on holiday, it seemed even harder to have that time out because we were so busy out and about every day. We don’t eat out either because of my eldest’s allergies so food shopping/cooking took up a fair amount of time.
My youngest also really struggled with his sleep over the summer, so my energy was lacking and coupled with that I think he went through a major growth spurt and/or developmental leap, so he was very temperamental for the whole summer, so that was all exhausting!
I deliberately didn’t put the pressure on myself to post on Substack over the summer, and only posted when I felt inspired. So, on the one hand it was good taking that expectation off of myself, but I did miss having time to be creative.
Getting organised with goals
Now my two eldest kids are back in school, I’m definitely ready to get myself organised and start making progress towards my goals for this month.
I’m going to experiment with writing a ‘monthly goals’ post on here to:
keep me accountable
share my goals with you
show you how I take imperfect action on my goals
I’ll aim to post these at the start of every month (she says, writing this on 7th September!).
September 2024 goals
Here are my goals for September:
Health goals
Daily 10 minute yoga stretches in the morning or evening
Do a short Youtube video workout 3 times a week
Work goals
Write and record 4 mini podcast episodes ready for release in October - do all of the shownotes and canva graphics too
Write and post 3 ‘pinned’ Instagram posts on:
how mums can work with me
an introduction post on who I am and what I do
a post directing people to my Substack
Create and plan a workshop ready for release in October
Learning and fun goals
Create flower pom poms with my daughter from this book 👇
Listen to these 2 workshops in Leonie Dawson's Brilliant Biz and Life Academy (affiliate link):
‘How to Grow your Biz with Launches’ &
‘How to use Substack to Make Money and Grow Your List’ with
(Btw, if you fancy joining the Brilliant Biz and Life Academy, it’s just $199 until the price doubles on 12th Sept. You can find out all of the info and how many courses, workshops and resources there are here. I’ve been in the Academy for nearly 2 years now and would highly recommend it.) Here's just a fraction of the courses you'll get access to inside the Academy:
Something to help me achieve these goals
I’m going to be taking my own advice as a Coach for Mums and I’ll be following my tried and tested 5 step ‘Compassionate Goals’ framework. This means that I need to consider:
what my values are in my current season of motherhood (I talk about these in this post)
if my goals are realistic and if I can fit them in around busy mum life
taking small (totally do-able steps) towards these goals
staying accountable to these goals and actions
give myself a huge dose of compassion along the way
Challenges I’m likely to face in relation to my goals
To give myself the best chance of success in achieving my goals, I’m also thinking ahead to the challenges I might face, so that if and when they come up, they won't completely derail me:
Some of these challenges might be:
realising my expectations of what I can achieve in one month are too much and having to readjust my goals
feeling overwhelmed with the busy back to school routine
forgetting my goals
being busy with organising my eldest’s 10th birthday at the end of Sept
The main thing I need to remember is to be flexible and give myself self-compassion as and when these challenges come up.
I’m looking forward to getting myself organised and working towards my goals.
I’m also interested to see how far I get with my goals, because I think there’s a lot to learn from when we don’t achieve something too.
Being able to know why something wasn’t achieved is going to help me refine my goal-setting going forward too.
Ways to work with me in September:
If you are feeling like you want to get organised too and get more time for you this September, then I’ve got two things that will help you with that:
Swap overwhelm, mum-guilt and anger for calm and compassion by building up tiny moments of daily self-care over 12 weeks with the Bespoke Self-Care Plan for Mums.
Are you ready to make positive changes in your life in a gentle and kind way, that fits in with your life as a busy mum right now?
Then I’m here to encourage you, really listen to you and keep you accountable with Rediscover YOU, a 12 week 1 to 1 coaching experience.
Book a virtual cuppa with me to find out more!
Thank you so much for reading and I’d love for you to join me in the comments and let me know:
How was your summer? What were your highlights and what were the tough parts?
What would you like to achieve in September?
If you’d like to share your goals for September in the comments, I’ll check in at the end of September to see how you’ve got on for a little bit of accountability.
You might also like some of my most recent posts:
Motherhood and Creativity Interview #12 with Zoe Gardiner
Thanks for the mention Jenna - it was a JOY to host the class in the academy.