Favorite Things

  • 5 Subscriptions I Love

    If you’ve been around since the beginning Sol Book Box days, you’ll probably be unsurprised to hear that I love a good subscription service. That’s kiiiind of why I founded one! 

    And I have to say, I have tried several of them in my day– you know, for market research purposes :). But also because they make me so happy! Getting something fun in the mail every so often is just the best, ¿que no? 

    I was thinking about Book of the Month, which is one subscription I REALLY love and that I had been meaning to share about this month, since March is National Reading Month. And then I figured that if I was telling you about that one, I might as well tell you about some of the other ones I’ve been enjoying in case you’re in the mood to treat yourself (or your kids). 

    So! Here are 5 subscriptions I love: two for me, and three for the kids!

    FOR ME

    Book of the Month – I signed up for Book of the Month wayyyy back in the spring of 2020, thinking it would be a fun little mood-booster while we were pandemic-ing. To be honest, prior to that I didn’t buy too many books (for myself– books for kids, well, that’s a whole other story). I figured, that’s what the library is for! But I can’t tell you how happy it makes me to get to pick a BRAND NEW book every month and not have to wait in an outrageously long hold line for the library copy. Plus, now I always have great books to lend or give as gifts, which also makes me very happy. I can’t prove it because I didn’t keep track of my reading until last year, but I’m pretty sure that I do a lot more reading, too, because I always have a beautiful book I’m excited to read. AND (have I convinced you yet?), Book of the Month books are about half the price you’d pay normally. Wins all around.

    Woman with book of the month subscription.

    MommaStrong – I’ve talked about this one before, but it’s another long-time subscription for me. I think I’ve been subscribed to this exercise program for the entire life of my youngest child! The founder, Courtney Wyckoff, is not only experienced but also extremely relatable. She’s a mom who doesn’t have hours to exercise, just like the rest of us, and sometimes finishes a workout while holding a baby, haha. Her workouts focus on core and pelvic floor strength, and also on “functional fitness” (read: preparing moms to do all the squatting, lifting, and crawling you actually have to do when running after young kids). ALSO. The workouts are 15 minutes long, which I love because even in my busiest seasons I can convince myself to do them. Right now I’m doing her “Momma-to-be” program for pregnant women, but I’ve done her “New Momma” program for post-partum, and love the regular “Momma D15” one, too. 

    FOR THE KIDS

    Sol Book Box – I mean, obviously :). Sol Book Box was acquired in 2021 and I have slowly been transitioning to a smaller role under its new ownership, but I still 100% vouch for the power of libros en español in raising bilingual children. One cool thing is that Sol Book Box now has a few different options, depending on where your kids are in their language journey! The “Amor Box” for babies has board books, the “Sol Box” is perfect for Spanish learners, and the “Book Box” is the classic subscription that sends one hardcover book in Spanish for kids who are already fluent. If you haven’t checked out the new(ish) website, take a look around! 

    Sol Book Box subscription.

    Kiwi Co – This is another phenomenal subscription for kids. We got all of our kids a year-long subscription as a Christmas gift this year, and it makes their day every month when they show up. My 7-year-old gets the Kiwi Crate, which she loves and can do on her own. My 4-year-old and 2-year old both get the Koala Crate, but they each get a different one every month that’s more personalized to their specific age. I love that this subscription makes me feel like I’m the type of mom to look up/plan/prep/purchase all the stuff to make these cute crafts and projects (because… I am not.) KiwiCo honestly has a crate for everybody (STEM, cooking, art, and geography, with options for babies to adults) and they’re all SO well done. That link is a referral link (just a regular person one, not an “influencer” one), and you get $10 off your order if you use it.

    Little Poppy Co – For the girl moms of the group! I feel like bows really had a moment a few years ago, and all these bow-making small businesses really took off. I think bows are maybe not such a big thing now? But I have to say that nothing brings me more joy than seeing all my daughters bien peinaditas, and preferably with an adorable bow or two. (Tell me you’re a mamá mexicana without telling me…) I had this moment a few months ago where I was doing my daughters’ hair and realized that their bows were looking kind of sad. I decided that if ever there was a time to address the bow situation, it’s now while they’re all still little and will actually wear them! This subscription sends you 3 bows a month and they are BEAUTIFUL and really well made. Another referral link for you – if you use the code BFF5 at checkout, you get your first month of bows for $5, which is an amazing deal!

    ***

    I’d love to hear about any subscription services you love! I think they’re so fun to give as gifts (I gave my mom a subscription to FabFitFun last year for Mother’s Day and she got a big kick out of getting her box every quarter!).

    READ MORE

  • Three Favorite Things

    Every once in a while I like to share some things I’ve been loving lately. Here are three recent favorites! 

    Little girl looking at Hatch Rest light
    HATCH REST

    Once upon a time, I had a toddler of the sleep-despising variety. For months and months, she woke up between 5-5:45 am, no matter what time we put her to bed. I had noticed a friend recommend the Hatch Rest several times, but we already had a sound machine and my girls didn’t use a nightlight so I wasn’t on board to invest. 

    One day, in desperation, I bought it and OH EM GEE. After we’d had it a few days, I sent my friend a text full of exclamation points and that one emoji with the brain (you know, the one that means “mind blown”). One of the first nights we had it, both of my kids slept till 7 am which is basically unheard of in this house. I am pretty sure the “wave” noise has magical sleeping properties, for real. 

    These days, the girls take turns picking a color for the light each night (which is exciting timez for the toddler & preschooler set), and then they know that they aren’t supposed to come out of their room until the light turns white in the morning at 6:30. Now that said toddler is acting like she’s going to give up her afternoon nap (noooo!), it’s also super useful so she knows when nap time/quiet time is over.

    I highly recommend this product to set your kids up for sleep success! 

    MOMMA STRONG

    After the obligatory 6 weeks postpartum that I wasn’t exercising after the baby was born this summer, I really wanted some sort of program to follow to get back in the swing of moving my body. Normally I just cobble together workouts that I can do at home, but I felt like during this postpartum time I needed some guidance to get strong again without beating up a body that’s been pregnant three times in the last 5 years.  

    Also, I needed something with a short time commitment because that’s all I have in this season of many small kids with all the needs. 

    The Momma Strong membership has been so perfect for all of this! The workouts are only 15 minutes long (but you really do get a workout!) and she focuses heavily on the core and pelvic floor muscles which is crucial for most moms to get strong again. Also, the membership is only $5 a month which is ridiculously affordable. 

    Andy Warhol eating cereal with his mother.
    MORNING SUMMIT BREAKFAST CEREAL

    I feel like cereal is kind of a random thing to put on here, but I’ve had to force myself to eat different breakfasts because all I want is this on repeat, so here we are. I have it with almond milk and cut up some of those amazing fall Honeycrisp apples to put in it and it’s delightful every single time. I’ve only ever seen it at Costco (although while looking for a link I found the cereal on Amazon in case you’d like to spend way too much money on a box of cereal, yikes). 

    Any recent favorites on your end? I want to hear what you’re loving right now!

    Photo of Andy Warhol eating cereal by Ken Heyman/Time Life Pictures / Getty Images

    READ MORE

  • Three Things Making My Life Better

    Sometimes, it’s the simple things that make the biggest difference!

    VEN CON UN CUENTO ON SPOTIFY

    I’m not the one that actually uses this, since it’s a playlist of short stories in Spanish for kids on Spotify. But my hija loves it, and I love it for entertaining her during quiet time so I can get some work done. 🙂

    As a side note, last week I wrote about the book The Read Aloud Family, and one of the things the author mentions is that it doesn’t necessarily have to be YOU reading aloud to your kids always. Apparently audiobooks totally count! So this little playlist is a win all around.

    Each story is short, so my daughter blew through the whole list in just a few days (I tried to ration them out a little). I thought she would color or something while she listened, but she straight up just stared at the phone, haha. Not sure if that says more about how riveting they are or how riveting the phone is…

    I’m always on the hunt for kid podcasts or audiobooks in Spanish, so if you know of any more I’d love if you shared!

    FLIC APP

    This is one of those things that I use and then kind of forget about for a while, but oh man it’s been a game changer for me.

    If you’ve never heard of it, it’s an app for sorting and deleting the pictures on your phone, which is a task I’d procrastinated for literally YEARS before I got it. Basically it works like Tinder (I think; I’ve never used Tinder): you swipe right to keep, left to delete. I have no idea why this is so much faster and easier than the regular way but… it is. And more fun.

    You can get a free version, which limits you to 100 pictures a day. That sounds like tons, but the first day I blew through that in just a couple of minutes. I ended up upgrading to the paid version for the extravagant price of $1.99 and I’ve never looked back! But the free version is nice if you just want to give it a try first.

    SETTING UP SCREEN TIME/APP LIMITS ON MY IPHONE

    I’m planning on writing (much) more about this is an upcoming post, but I’ve been reading the book 168 Hours: You Have More Time Than You Think by Laura Vanderkam. I mention this only because it motivated me to do something I knew I SHOULD do, but kept not doing.

    I turned on limits for for screen time and social media on my iPhone.

    This is technically something I could have done months ago when Apple released the update that made it possible, but honestly I just didn’t think it would make that big of a difference so I didn’t do it.

    But after reading Vanderkam’s book and realizing that I wanted to be a lot more intentional about how I spent my days and my time, I gave myself a 35 minute daily limit for all social media and OH MAN.

    It’s weird, but seeing that “Time Limit Reached” screen really works for me (even though, technically, I could also just tap “Ignore Limit” for either 15 minutes or for the whole day). But I think the best part is that since I go through my daily limit fairly quickly, for the rest of the day I pretty much have no temptation or inclination to pick up my phone and do the mindless scrolling thing.

    The only thing I don’t love is that it counts the WhatsApp and Telegram apps as part of social media. Since that’s where my big family group chats live (with groups for my parents & siblings, a big tías + cousins group, a primas only group, etc.), I don’t really think of those as “social media;” for me it’s more like the best way to stay in touch with my international family.

    So I do some ignoring of time limits for those apps 🙂 but it’s still helped tremendously for me to cut down on my (mostly unnecessary, let’s face it) phone time. CAN’T RECOMMEND HIGHLY ENOUGH.

    And now I’d love to hear: if you have any things making your life better right now, please share!

    (Photo of Kate Winslet reading by Wes Anderson/American Express.)

    READ MORE