sunday edition | a holiday postcard

things i'm loving lately, including wellness non-negotiables and snaps from London & Paris.

Dec 22, 2024

∙ Paid

Bonjour from London and Paris! And by that I mean… yo! from my couch four days after returning home. Toddler jet lag, am I right?!

I’m back home in the strange lull period before (more) holiday travel, marking the third time in as many weeks that my little family will set off on yet another flight. This type of schedule, a bit optimistic, a bit punishing, always has the impact of warping time, jumping weeks in what feels like a matter of moments

In a previous life, I would have rolled from time zone to time zone no problem, moving piles of clothes from suitcase to laundry and back again with enthusiasm and not a bit of care. Perhaps it’s just being 33, and perhaps it’s the reality of international travel with a toddler, but this go around I’m moving *much* slower, and it’s taking a lot more intentionality and recovery to feel like we’re ready to load up and jet off again.1

I really enjoy

Kate Eskuri, DNP

‘s approach around wellness “nonnegotiables” - it’s something I’ve been working to incorporate into everyday life, but especially when recuperating from travel or illness. Rather than a full blown routine, there are a few low-effort things on I’ve got on repeat this week to keep it manageable:

Sleep: Toddler jet lag after international travel is no joke, so we’ve circled back to our tried and true “shift schedule” from when little bear was a newborn in order to ensure one parent is always on point to manage middle of the night wakeups, and we’re both set up to get the 8+ hours of sleep we need within our available schedules.
Hydration: Nothing crazy here, just doing my best to get in 16 oz+ of water before coffee, and a commitment to finishing two Stanley’s (so.. 80 oz?) each day. When I remember, I’ve also mixed in electrolytes every other day or so, and have been unnaturally committed to my night-time skincare routine as I attempt to save my dry winter skin from multiple transcontinental flights in a few weeks (this skin oil continues to be one of my best purchases of the last few years).
The 20-Minute Tidy: Clutter makes me want to crawl out of my skin, which is unfortunate because I am not a naturally tidy person and I have a two year old with a penchant for chaos. I’ve gotten in the habit of setting a 10 or 20 minute timer to tackle particularly problematic areas (say, the suitcase I still haven’t unpacked and repacked… ), putting in headphones and knocking out as much as I can in the time allowed. It’s one of the best ways I’ve found over the years to combat procrastination, and helps keep things manageable.

Otherwise, I’m savoring the holiday magic of a toddler who almost but doesn’t quite get it – he is obsessed with decorations, doesn’t seem to be afraid of Santa, but cannot quite register what it’s all for. It’s all stretching my own abilities to explain tradition and religion and magic and whimsy to a child, but it’s also been fun.

With each expression of delight, and each funny, fumbled conversation (attempting to explain who Santa is, or how Christmas decorations are different from Halloween, and so on) I think I understand, slightly better, the you’re gonna miss this, crowd.

Below, a few snapshots from my travels and things I’ve been enjoying lately, plus a few options to weigh in on what you’d like to see published next (because I love all my darlings equally, and need your input!).

Hope you and yours are safe, healthy and happy this holiday season.

All my love,

realized that I had a mid-transit configuration error on the coffee with maggie ep. 3 from last week that would have impacted free subscribers: this has since been updated, so if you missed it please check it out!