Fall Soft Launch, and Re-Entry After Travel

Before fall wonderfulness completely takes over this space, I have a few thoughts about being home after an impactful trip.

Today kids around here went back to school. I call this the soft launch of fall. The next soft launch dates will be the first day of September, then the day after Labor Day. (These are the rules, friends, don’t look at me like that.)

Then, finally, the season officially begins on September 22, by which time I will have been in Full Fall Mode for several weeks. My house will smell like cloves and apple cider 110% of the time. I will dress in wine-colored sweaters and our front porch will resemble a pumpkin patch-slash-corn maze. It will look like fall threw up on us. If you do not appreciate the ABSOLUTE DELICIOUSNESS of fall, or the entire holiday season (the -ber months, as they call them nowadays), you will want to mute me and come back in January. But I’ll give it a few more days. In the meantime…

Meagan Francis

wrote a thoughtful article about getting back to your familiar routines after a long or immersive trip, and I really related to it. (Here it is!) There’s a another aspect of post-travel re-entry, too, that I experience.

Being away makes me homesick and alert to the great things about home (my bed! my dog! coffee how I like it in my own cup!). But it also makes me see what’s better about the place I’m visiting. I love bringing back experiences and applying them to my regular life. At the same time that I’m craving the familiarity of home, I’m taking notes on how I’m going to shake things up when I get there.

The shake-up can be superficial. If I’m staying with someone, I might admire how they store their mugs, or their heavenly-smelling bathroom soap. I might love the vibe of a hotel or rental house, and wonder how I can let it inform my own attempts at home design.

Hmm, how can I make my house feel like this?

Or it can be important. While traveling my body responds well to living on just three meals a day (no snacking) and lots of walking. I try to adapt when I get home, rather than just going back to my old, unhealthier habits, where I have frequent access to a kitchen and it’s easier to drive than walk.

It was easy to rack up 25,000 steps a day in Scotland!

And the changes can be profound. It’s a cliche, but travel opens you up to new people and attitudes. A trip that challenges you, and is a little uncomfortable or even scary (driving on unfamiliar roads! getting lost hiking! eating strange foods! fumbling through a foreign language! figuring out the public transit system! feeling shy! being thirsty, skipping meals! walking till your feet hurt!) is more rewarding and exhilarating, in my opinion, than a purely relaxing vacation (not that those don’t have their place, too). We come home from these trips more tightly bonded, changed forever, together.

Riding the London Tube like natives.

It can be a city trip, or a rural one (you know my general stance on city vs. country—I love both!), as long as you’ve got to figure some things out.

To bring it back to the mundane, having a break from home gives me fresh energy for it. While traveling this summer, I kept the following lists on my phone:

—“TO DO WHEN HOME FROM SCOTLAND” (which included “paint living room,” “learn how to cut hair on YouTube,” “read Cannery Row and Middlemarch,” “start grinding own flour and meat,” “buy new rose bush,” “do 30-day Mediterranean diet,” “get Sodastream working,” “buy joggers Athleta,” “Ina Garten’s Greek platter,” “try sourdough without fridge rise,” “plan sister-in-law night,” and “invite neighbors over for barbecue.” You’re welcome for that peek into Emma brain)
—“WHAT TO COOK SUMMER 2025”
—“FALL COOKING 2025”
and
—“HOLIDAYS 2025” (soothing to work on while feeling anxious on the plane)

Some backslide is natural and for the most part I’m the same person. I have not done that 30-day Mediterranean diet, nor started grinding my own flour. But I hope that the things I saw, our experiences as a family, and simply the distance we had from our regular routines, have had some sort of positive lasting impact.

Here’s what else is going on:

Checked Out - What I’m reading
These two beautiful, inspiring cookbooks:

And this month’s highlight on a Substack (or two): Beachtown Bohemia by

@oliviajoffrey

and The Ranch Table by

Elizabeth Poett

.

Bulletin Board - Industry news
My friend Claire’s debut picture book is out!!!!! Read more about it here and here, and come to her launch party at Bookshop West Portal on September 18!

Audio-Visual - What I’m watching

From the 641s - Cooking and eating
We still love our weekly CSA box from Terra Firma Farm, but we sometimes fill in the gaps with a farmers’ market trip (plus Trader Joe’s and Safeway, let’s be real). Yesterday I felt quite picturesque skipping home with sunflowers peeking out of my tote bag. (Also picked up a giant bag of walnuts in the shell! Fun fact: Fall is walnut season DID YOU KNOW THAT??)

Neighbor Mandy made jam from her backyard plum trees and left a jar on our doorstep.

Last night’s dinner - corn and broccoli chowder with bacon and avocado, and warm focaccia:

Local Interest
My brother’s partner, Maria Clementi, an incredibly talented and inventive chef, is holding her second annual dinner under the stars in wine country! Maria sources all local, seasonal ingredients (including seaweed she forages herself). Her cooking is mostly vegetarian, but this one will feature pan-seared black cod as the main course. Each of the five courses will be paired with wine from Breaking Bread Wines in Healdsburg. Buy a ticket here, and if you know anyone who might be interested, please share the news!

From the 910s - Travel
We spent five nights (via Home Exchange) in a house on the coast, a bit north of here. The first four days it was blanketed in an atmospheric fog. It looked like this:

Then the last day, the sun broke through, and it turned out apparently this was the view from our deck:

Piper lived her best (and sandiest) life:

And we discovered this deserted beach you can only reach on foot:

This town was also simply swarming with deer. Most days we saw more deer than people. I never tired of it.

From the 790s - Hobbies
I embarked on the most detailed, time-intensive quilt I’ve ever done. I’ve finished the cutting and am now piecing together the blocks. Eventually I will have 16 blocks like the ones below, in different fabrics. Will post updates as I progress!

Neighborhood News
Watch out, Cate’s a senior! Go Eagles!

Grab Bag
In 1974, my parents were living in Glasgow. I was an infant and my older brother was three. They were set to return home, and after their departure, their wonderfully creaky, leaky, freezing historic row house was scheduled to be torn down for university housing (gotta love progress, right?). Knowing it was destined for the landfill, they stealthily removed this stained glass window and tiptoed off with it. It has graced the entry of their San Francisco house ever since. I get all the feels every time I see it.

Seasonal Display
Sweet peas still coming in hot, but growing baby pears on our tree heralding the change of season¹.

Thanks for reading, friends! That’s all for now, but meet you back here in a few weeks for glorious fall seasonal displays and recipes! Please drop me a heart or comment below, if you feel so inspired. Thank you!

1. As I held up and twisted a few baby pears to try to get a good photo, they broke off. SOB!!! We only have about a dozen this year, so the loss hits hard. Whaa.