0:12
What I Eat for Breakfast as a Crunchy Mom 🥤🫐
She’s sharing a very personal morning routine: a smoothie that combines half a banana, frozen wild blueberries, avocado, hemp seeds, walnut butter, vanilla protein powder, a drizzle of Manuka honey, cinnamon, almond milk and a few ice cubes. The only “extra” she adds is a single dose of Vimergy’s organic liquid B12, which she says gives her a natural energy lift without caffeine.
The article leans on her own experience rather than scientific studies. For most people without a B12 deficiency, the evidence that a small supplemental dose improves energy or performance is modest at best. A single‑dose liquid B12 is low risk, but the benefit is usually noticeable only if you’re low on the vitamin to begin with.
She emphasizes that she avoids fillers and additives, and that the product is “organic.” Those claims are typical marketing language; the key point is that the supplement is a pure B12 source, not a blend of other nutrients.
If you’re curious, the recipe itself is a balanced mix of protein, healthy fats and fruit, which can keep you steady through the morning. Adding B12 is optional—if you suspect a deficiency, a quick blood test can confirm whether a supplement would help.
1:42
What I have been konsuming so far this summer...
I promise that I have been going outside, so please don’t be alarmed by how much content I have been consuming since May lol. Lots of travel and being in Maine gives me a lot of more downtime to consume that content!!!
The Price of Pretty by Alex Light. If you like my content and seek more women on the internet talking about why women are programmed to hate their bodies and what it does for society, you should be following Alex Light and reading her new book. She is someone I look up to in the space and she inspires me to keep shouting the truth.
Only Catch by Jess Turner. It’s set in Maine. It’s light and easy and exactly the book I am grabbing for on my nightstand!
Sunny Side Up is out in paperback!!! I know it’s shameless to talk about my own book here but if you didn’t read it last summer or it’s on your TBR list, this is a great time to pick up the paperback. If you or anyone in your life has gone through a break up or feels like their body is the problem or the reason they can’t find love, go read SUNNY immediately!!
Hoppers: The new movie from Pixar was great. I loved. Two thumbs up from the original Kid Kritic.
Widows Bay: Maybe not the right time for me to be watching a show about a New England town haunting as I am sitting in a new england coastal town, but its strikes that balance of humor and scary…but still…I can only watch it in the day light!
Love Island Season 8: No one is more surprised than me to see what a big Love Island fan I am. I don’t love reality TV but this is such a fun social experiment. The amount of episodes can feel overwhelming but the Fast Forward button is your friend. If you have never watched Love Island and feel too far behind on this season, you should just watch season 5 of the Love Island UK which is universally regarded as the best example of the franchise.
Traitors Canada has hit Peacock and I needed it. Finished Season 1 mostly to get to Season 2 to see my girl Lauren Chan compete. Great season and now I am on season 3 and was so happy to see The Birds Papaya! Just started that season but bless the Peacock gods for this mid summer release.
Survival of the Thickest season 3 just dropped and I will be tuning in! If you have never watched the show, watch it! I have a cameo in season one for 2 seconds! The show is funny and the only one on tv in recent history that celebrates plus size women. In Michelle Buteau we trust.
Four Seasons season 2: Off to a rough start with the first two episodes but glad I stuck with it! If you skipped season 1, just go ahead and watch. I would watch Tina Fey unload her dishwasher.
Off Campus: Wow. There was a lot of hype going in and that is never helpful for me, but this was worse than I expected. I am thrilled for the cast and crew and writers etc that they have a star on their hands but for me it felt like a film school project.
Villa Coco by Andrew Sean Greer who wrote the Less books, charmed me with this book set in Italy about a young and uptight American boy who has to learn to live outside the lines. If you read Less, it feels like a young Less goes and stays with a 91 year old eccentric Italian baroness. If you haven’t read Less, try that first!
No One Belongs Here More Than You by Miranda July. I will read anything this woman writes. This was a series of short stories that have July’s particular brand of humor and sadness and unique story telling that bring have me thirsting for her next book! John loves her too and we read this one with our ears because July narrates as well.
My Friends by Fredrick Backman. Sorry folks, I had to quit it. I couldn’t get into it!
Yesteryear: TLDR: Interesting but missed the mark. Yesteryear SPOILERS: Liiiiikkkkkeeeeeee…..I would have liked the book so much more if she had time traveled. There were so many plot holes and there didn’t need to be! This could have just been a sci fi pop culture mash up! I don’t know much about the author and I have not read anything about the online reactions but I thought it was an interesting concept not executed in an entertaining way.
Are You Mad at Me? by Meg Josephson. This book was in my last content round up but I just finished it and I am going to start it over because honestly I have never felt more illuminated about my tendency to FAWN. If you don’t know what that is, it’s a relatively new term that offers additional survival tactics like Flight, Fight, Freeze…OR FAWN. I am a fawner and it’s so interesting to see how it affects how I move through the world in ways I had not noticed. Really helpful.
The Helsinki Affair by Anna Pitoniak: You know I am such a sucker for a spy novel and this one was recommended by Amanda Dobbins and as I slowly discover that her and I are the same person, I will be paying closer attention to her recs because I am loving this book! You can check Amanda out here and here.
I bought a felt mushroom sewing kit at the Maine Botanical Garden Gift Shop and figured I would become someone who crafts.
7:37
Let's talk about tweens & teens: your questions answered
Huge thanks to everyone who tuned in to this morning’s live session and thanks also for your thoughtful questions. I love talking about teens, and every time I host one of these Q&As, I’m always reminded of how common our experiences and challenges are. There wasn’t one question asked that I didn’t relate to!
Here are some of the questions I answered in today’s live session:
What are your favourite books on teens?
How should I respond to my child when they have low self-esteem and say things like ‘I’m stupid’?
How do you deal with teenage negativity?
How do you encourage a quiet child to open up? How do you approach having conversations with a child who doesn’t want to talk?
What tips do you have for managing my response to my kids when they are moody or have emotional outbursts?
How do you respond to friendships you feel might not be healthy or happy for your kids?
How do you encourage your sulky teen out of their bedroom?
How do you encourage your teens to do their chores without it always being a battle?
How do you respond when one of your older teens is rude to one of the younger kids?
Do you let your kids have a glass of wine or beer at home? And what is your rule on attending parties?
9:10
13 Unexpected Things I Love About Being in My 50s!
Welcome to Happy on Purpose, a bestselling newsletter about happiness, habits, and midlife. Tap the ❤️ button to spread the joy!
Taylor Swift got married last weekend, and there’s one thing I can’t stop wondering: does she ever imagine what her fifties will look like?
Probably not—why would she?!
She’s young, beautiful, and supremely accomplished, living a turbocharged version of the fairy tale we’re raised on: a thriving career, a romantic wedding, followed by smiling babies, and a comfortable, bustling family home.
Taylor’s life is too electric, too full of newness and possibility, to spend time picturing a decade that feels impossibly far away—and that isn’t exactly heralded as something to look forward to…
I grew up in the 80s and 90s, watching middle-aged women characters in movies and TV shows who were deeply unappealing: the ice-cold boss who made the young heroine’s life a misery, the nagging moms wearing unflattering jeans, or the divorced and widowed women who, ignored by men, moved in with their friends.
At Taylor’s age, I dreaded midlife: I imagined myself careworn, wrinkled, chewed up by life. Except for the sororal delights of a houseful of women, it seemed clear that a life worth living ended sometime around 40…
But life, as I keep learning, is full of surprises, and one of the best is how much I love being in my 50s. This period feels magical: we’ve accrued wisdom, are strong enough to remain physically active, and our children are becoming independent and self-sufficient.
Of course, no phase of life is perfect: midlife means facing the sobering realities of aging: declining parents, the end of certain dreams, and the limitations of our bodies, which, if viewed optimistically, are also timely reminders that life is precious and to be savored.
Here are the surprising things I love about being in my fifties, and fittingly, for a post that started with Taylor Swift, there are 13—because, as every Swiftie knows, that’s her lucky number!
1. FOMO has lost its power. At 51, I’m not interested in counting the number of friends I have or invitations I receive. Hearing about a glamorous party I wasn’t invited to no longer fills me with jealous yearning — instead, I’m relieved I didn’t have to stay out late! I’m focused on nurturing relationships with the people I care about and who care about me: making time to be together without distractions, celebrating milestones, and taking trips we’ve fantasized about.
2. I’ve stopped trying to look like a twenty-something. It’s an enormous relief to know that wrinkles and cellulite are expected on a 50-something face and body, and to stop measuring how I look and feel by the yardstick of a beauty standard set by the young. I judge my appearance against the women I actually spend time with, not women I only know from a screen.
3. Reading glasses! While it was an adjustment to learn to buy them in multiples and stash them all over the house (and car, and purse!), I like the subtle sense of authority and intelligence that wearing reading glasses lends me. Plus, they frame my eyes in a way that my thinning eyebrows no longer can!
4. I’ve given myself permission to stop doing things I never actually liked. In my late thirties, I finally admitted that I disliked skiing and stopped trying to do it. Acknowledging that fact was surprisingly freeing—and opened the door to some more personal truths I was previously too embarrassed to acknowledge: I don’t like staying up late; I don’t value variety in my diet; any night can be for going out, and any night can be for staying home! It’s nice to accept that the time has come to firmly discontinue relationships, habits, and obligations that drain and depress me. Without apology.
5. There’s a compelling reason to do scary things. With age comes the acute awareness that “waiting for the right time” is no longer a valid excuse for not prioritizing our desires. The reminders are impossible to ignore: our parents aging, children leaving home, our bodies developing aches and pains. I like knowing that I don’t have forever to do things, and that if I want to achieve certain goals, there’s no longer a good reason to put them off. I secretly dreamed of being a writer my entire life but didn’t attempt it until I was 45. I started Happy on Purpose at 48 and Tennisette at 51!
6. Late-blooming is a genuine advantage. While our culture glorifies the precocious prodigy and the college dropout entrepreneur, research shows that older founders and creatives are equally—if not more—successful. A fascinating MIT study analyzed 2.7 million entrepreneurs and found that a 50-year-old is twice as likely to build a highly successful company as a 30-year-old.
7. Saying no is easier. It’s taken me half a century to learn that when I’m asked to do something, it’s perfectly acceptable to reply “I’m sorry, I can’t make it” without a long-winded explanation of why.
15:01
The Multi-Billion Dollar Planner Industry Ignores Jewish Women. I Fixed That.
I’ve been thinking about how most paper planners just skim over the Jewish calendar—usually only Passover, Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur and Hanukkah, and even then just the first day. That means holidays like Sukkot, Shavuot, the Omer count, or Simchat Torah get left out, forcing us to juggle a second calendar on the wall.
The author, a mom of three who’s used planners for years, decided to build something that puts the Hebrew dates front and center. She dusted off an old mock‑up during a design challenge, re‑worked it, and aimed to create a tool that lets work deadlines, kids’ pickups, and Shabbat all sit on the same page.
The result is the Copper Mirror Weekly Planner—a hardcover that runs July 2026 through June 2027, blending the Hebrew and Gregorian months. It lists every major and minor Jewish observance on the day it actually begins, leaves space for personal notes, and is meant to work for anyone from the secular to the traditional, interfaith or just curious.
It’s now for sale at coppermirrorpress.com, with a 10 % discount and free shipping for Kveller readers using the code KVELLER. The piece is a paid post, and the editorial team didn’t influence its content.
16:33
All the Jewish TV You Can Stream on Netflix
It’s never a bad time to sit indoors and have a little TV binging marathon — especially when there’s just so much great Jewish TV on the biggest streamers of them all, Netflix.
These shows will take you to Turkey, Mexico and even Egypt; they tell the true stories of spies and kidnappings and the fantastical fictions of every day life; they’re comedies, reality shows and dramas; the stories are full of romance and intrigue and relatable human moments.
Here, in no particular order, are the most Jewish shows to stream on Netflix.
Few Jews don’t have an opinion about “Nobody Wants This,” Netflix’s Hot Rabbi romance starring Adam Brody as said rabbi, Kristen Bell as his non-Jewish love interest, and a cast of incredibly hilarious actors, including Jackie Tohn and Tovah Feldshuh. Whether you love it or hate it, we have to accept that Erin Foster show is Netflix’s biggest Jewish hit in recent years — and it’s coming back for season three in the fall of 2026.
This TV show about a unit of Israeli “mistaaravim,” an army unit that goes undercover in Arab populations, helped catapult both Israeli TV and Lior Raz to fame. It’s fifth season, which centers on October 7, recently aired in Israel, and is hopefully coming to the streamer later this fall.
This reality TV show has a fairly strong cringe factor in this writer’s opinion, but for those who ever wondered what Israel’s two biggest TV stars — Lior Raz and Rotem Sela — are like in real life, this one is for you. Catch a glimpse of what the two are like as they travel the rugged terrain of Kyrgyzstan in jeeps.
This dramatic limited TV series stars Sacha Baron Cohen as Israeli spy Eli Cohen, who was caught and executed in Egypt.
One of the most underrated Israeli shows currently on Netflix tells the story of a support group for recent lottery winners; the winners are mandated to attend its sessions before they can get their millions.
This show about two best friends — Guy Amir’s Nisso and Hanan Savyon’s Pini — whose lives are in upheavals and who go together to Krakow, Poland, to see their favorite soccer team play. It is Netflix’s first original Israeli show.
The first season of this matchmaking show may not have led to any Jewish weddings (at least not between two participants) but it cemented Jewish matchmaker Aliza Ben Shimon as a reality TV star.
This profound and heart-wrenching Israeli show about infertility and relationships stars Rotem Sela and Lior Raz.
This funny Israeli comedy about a local cop takes on toxic masculinity in really fun ways. An American adaptation of the show starring Josh Groban is also available to stream.
This incredibly Jewish and profound animated show from the creator of “BoJack Horseman” is all about Jewish family and is one of the best things streaming on Netflix right now.
Netflix’s biblical show about the hero of the Passover story features opinions from rabbis and Israeli actor and model Avi Azulay as Moses.
Jewish hottie Bryan Greenberg stars in this show as Ben Epstein, a Jewish New Yorker trying to make is as an entrepreneur in the Big Apple.
Lena Dunham’s show based on her romance with British Jewish husband Luis Felber, is, in part, an ode to incredible Jewish women and moms.
Michael Douglas plays retired Jewish actor and acting coach Sandy Kominsky while Alan Arkin, in his final, wonderful TV role plays his former agent Norman. It also stars Lisa Edelstein and Paul Reiser.
This highly bingeable friendship sitcom stars Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin, with Fonda playing WASP-y Grace and Tomlin playing hippie Jewish Frankie, whose husbands leave them for each other.
Natasha Lyonne’s excellent Netflix time loop comedy beautifully tackles Jewish intergenerational trauma.
This show, based on the book by Deborah Feldman, earned star Shira Haas an Emmy and Golden Globe nomination, for playing a fictionalized version of Feldman — a formerly Orthodox woman who goes on a journey of discovery in Germany.
The even more controversial take on the transition from Orthodox to, well, secular life, is a reality show that centers formerly Orthodox businesswoman Julia Haart and her children as they navigate life is secular society.
Jordi Frades, executive producer of “Heirs to the Land,” said the show wants do for the Spanish Inquisition what “Schindler’s List” has done for the Holocaust. It’s an admirable feat, and this 14th-century period show definitely has dense Jewish representation.
This excellent Turkish show is about a Jewish mother who finds work at a nightclub in 1950s Istanbul. It’s full of gorgeous Sephardi representation.
This fascinating Mexican show is based on the true kidnapping story of two children in Mexico’s insular Jewish community back in the 1960s.
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The post All the Jewish TV You Can Stream on Netflix appeared first on Kveller.
22:26
On the benefits of bad behavior.
I have a lot of friends who started smoking again on the other side of motherhood (or on the other side of other, often fraught, new identities: entering the C-suite, becoming a divorcée, etc.). Among my mom friends we would often joke about the imagined smoky blend of their next let down (if they were still breastfeeding), or the judgement they likely faced as they were seen lighting up as they walked away from school drop-off. With others, it would be years into motherhood when the need re-emerged, seemingly out of nowhere. But not really.
What I think makes smoking so enticing above other go-to bad habits is that 1) you get to be “bad” in a way that feels safe—you are comfortable with the level of risk involved (it’s a slow burn really), it isn’t mood altering or illegal... And 2) it is entirely for you, the you who was there long before motherhood, and who (despite expectations) continues to exist long after. The you that you are made to feel guilty for still giving oxygen to because she doesn’t seem to carry any of the weight when it comes to upholding the mantle of motherhood. If anything, perhaps she sometimes makes it harder.
I don’t smoke cigarettes anymore and I haven’t started again, but I still have found my own catalysts for this kind of escape-in-plain-sight in my new-ish mom era. And I’m not sharing what the particulars are (at this time at least) because it’s mine—just mine—and I think that mine-ness is a crucial part of it. So much of mothering and parenting is done publicly, and under constant scrutiny. Having a darkened, delicious corner of ourselves that no one gets to monitor, let alone see, can be essential, and is an end unto itself.
And perhaps here is where I lose some of you (if I haven’t already by talking about others smoking while breastfeeding): I think that having a few bad habits actually makes us better parents. There is a dance that all parents are always doing between surrender (to the new) and preservation (of the old). That tension, that both-things-can-be-true of it all allows us to be both bear and cub—both nurturer and nurtured, fixed and growing—and that duality, I believe, is what keeps us whole. What we need in motherhood is less abandonment and more integration; less singularity and more space for ambiguity and complexity. Less imprisonment in some joyless idea of parenthood as sacrificial purity, and more expansive, confused wandering in the plane of our personal identity.
So allow me to support you, my burgeoning, long-established, or just-about-to-become mothers with, of all things, a round-up of stuff. Just some everyday pleasures that are only meant for you, and in that way, feel a bit like smoking, but without the drag. As a reminder, I may earn commission on these things at no cost to you, which allows me to keep doing this work. For the consideration of all my bad-girl mommies (did that statement make you slightly nauseous too? lol):
A perfect sheer silk shirt. See through shirts are my favorite silent act of provocation. It’s easy to forget that you’re even showing so much skin because you are technically covered, which makes you nonchalant and therefore gives the appearance of confidence, which in turn only further boosts your overall aura (this is science lol). I picked this particular shirt because silk organza is one of my favorite fabrics of all time—filmy and sheer, but with teeth. I would wear this with jeans and an interesting flat to pick up my daughter without a second thought. If silk feels too precious for you, there is also this less sheer option from Reformation that has an alluring little sheen to it at a lower price point. It just squeaks by my no poly guideline because it is still 86% Lyocell (below 85% and it would have gotten the axe).
Mothering Myths: An ABC of Art, Birth and Care on BookShop.org, Target, and Amazon. A beautiful, complex compendium on representations of motherhood. Seeing motherhood from a bird’s eye view reminds me that I am not crazy and that it is our culture that needs mood stabilizers.
This bra makes me feel like the sexiest woman alive. I don’t care what I am wearing it under—a t-shirt or a turtleneck—the elongated bustier-like finish is like a pinch of salt to your underpinnings, it adds so much flavor to a foundational piece that would otherwise just be a neutral ride-along (I also love Cuup’s high waisted undies, they are a great segue from all of your postpartum chonies.)
Matrescence: On Pregnancy, Childbirth, and Motherhood anyone who read my second post knows how I feel about this book—it is essential reading to contextualize the identity upheaval of motherhood. Please make space for this! Here it is on BookShop.org and Amazon.
Really fucking joy inducing pajamas. You get to spend money on this, you do not have to default to whatever castoffs are laying about and making you feel like a slug when you wear them.
