What's Up Wednesday: August 2025

Instead of a "What's Up Wednesday" it's a "What's Up Tuesday." As has often been the case these past few months, I want to catch up on some blogging, thus this post is coming later than I had intended, but I'm still posting it.

Answering these questions monthly helps me reflect on the past month and I really appreciate having a record of what we've been up to. The questions come from Shay at Mix and Match Mama and Sheaffer at Sheaffer Told Me Too.

image from here

 

What we're eating this week... Last weekend we went through our freezer and discovered over twenty cups of frozen pumpkin (which is a ridiculous amount of pumpkin!). So I opened Pinterest and discovered these Pumpkin Cream Cheese muffins. Um, they are seriously delicious and another batch is being baked today because they lasted about three days. The recipe is here if you're interested.

We also have way too many frozen bananas in our freezer so we'll be baking a lot of banana bread/banana muffins these next few weeks.

 

What I'm reminiscing about... As of Wednesday, we will have two kids in high school. What the what?!?!?! Thus, I am reminiscing about their first days of school way back in 2013 and 2015. I am feeling like the years are flying by right now.

What I'm loving... I am loving our cooler nights. After way too many heat warnings this summer, I am thrilled to be chilly at night and to snuggle under a warm blanket.

 

What we've been up to... August was a very full month. We started out the month in London, England with my parents. We toured the Chelsea football stadium, we saw a Shakespeare play, we strolled along the Thames, we saw a pre-season friendly football match, and we had so much fun!!!

 

When we got back from Europe, Rachel got her braces off, so we ate a lot of popcorn!

My mom and I did a walking tour of grocery stores in our downtown which was really interesting. You all know how much I love a local walking tour!

Then it was time to prepare for Rachel's Bat Mitzvah. Among other things, my mom made 14 centrepieces and three larger bouquets to help decorate for the lunch afterwards.

We hosted most of Dave's family for a Friday evening BBQ and then, the next day, Rachel became a Bat Mitzvah!!!

The week after her Bat Mitzvah, Rachel attended a dance camp and I went back to work.

And Sam spent almost two full weeks at camp, participating in a leadership program.

In the midst of all that busyness, I enjoyed time in our backyard, hanging out with my parents. Those were some of my favourite August moments!

 

What I'm dreading... As always, this time of year, I'm dreading the first week of school. It's such a busy time for me at work and for us as a family. While I *think* I'm ready for these next few weeks, life just starts to move a lot more quickly now that it's September.

 

As an aside, I was kind of dreading these last two weeks, as they were my first weeks back to work after summer break, but they went really smoothly. Thus I have hope that these next few weeks might not be as bad as I'm anticipating :)

What I'm working on... This is the time of year where there is constantly produce to deal with. Right now, kale and swiss chard need to be chopped, garlic needs to be processed, and I'm just constantly in the kitchen. Or I'm constantly asking someone else to do something in the kitchen!!!

What I'm excited about... September baseball!!!

 

Also, there are some big changes coming for our family this fall and I'm both nervous and excited about them... I'll fill you in more when I can...

What I'm watching/reading... Baseball, baseball, and more baseball. I'm writing this as I'm watching the Blue Jays play the Reds, and this morning when I woke up, I read all the interesting articles on mlb.com. This is the time of year when I'm constantly checking my MLB app :)

 

I love reading articles like this!

 

What I'm listening to... I looked for an "autumn mix" on Spotify last week and it was a lot of 70s songs. I don't really have a fall playlist and I would like to find one. What do you listen to in the fall???

What I'm wearing... Rachel was determined that she wanted a London sweatshirt on our trip and had been dreaming about this particular item for months. On the Sunday morning we were in London, my mom, Rachel, and I went up the Tower Bridge and then walked along the Thames. We found a store which sold the exact sweatshirt Rachel wanted, and my mom insisted on buying me one too. She thought I needed something from one of my favourite cities in the world. While it wasn't something I was anticipating, I have definitely been wearing this sweatshirt a lot this past month.

I'm not always drinking a Pimms when I wear it though. Darn!

What I'm doing this weekend... Instead of writing about what I'm doing this weekend, I'm going to write about what we did this past (three day!) weekend. On Friday night, Dave, Sam, and I went to the Jays game. It was hilarious because we knew four different groups of people who were there that night so visited with a few friends during the game.

   

I did a whole bunch of laundry, we cleaned a whole bunch of rooms, we ran a few "school is starting" errands, and we cooked a whole bunch of food. Why can't every weekend be a three day one?!?!?! We also worked on getting up a little earlier each day in preparation for school starting this week.

What I'm looking forward to next month... As always in September, I'm looking forward to LUMEN, our city's festival of light and technology. It's always one of our absolute favourite nights in our uptown.

And while I'm sad that summer is officially ending, I'm looking forward to getting back into our fall routines. I love having a break, but I also love getting back into everything -- soccer, dance, SoulFood, and all the fun that comes with.

 

So that's what's up with us this last Wednesday in August this first Tuesday in September. Thanks for reading today and don't forget to leave your fall playlist suggestions in the comments. I need something seasonal to listen to!!!