The great summer camp shakedown

Paying for slime and losing my mind.

First off, I want to thank everyone for the kind words that flooded my inbox last week. You guys give the best compliments. I also think you are all very pretty and clever. And a big shoutout to Anna, who also sent some exercise suggestions to help with my back pain. (I’m feeling much better, thank you!)

While I enjoy writing about myself and my own adventures, I’d also like to get back to my service journalism roots and offer more financial education in this newsletter. I’d love to hear from you, dear readers. What do you want to learn about?

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No topic is too basic. I promise!

When this newsletter lands in your inbox, it will be exactly one week until my kid’s school lets out for the summer. (I know! So late! I realize that the rest of the country is already deep into summer vacation mode.) June has been pure chaos with so many end-of-school-year activities and school closures and early dismissals. Next week there’s no after school, and two days the school closes at 1. Fun times for working parents! I should revise that: Fun times for parents in general.

The hot topic of conversation at mom drinks last week was our summer plans, though it seems sort of silly to be talking about it now, seeing as I sent the first email about the 2023 day camp season on January 20, a full FIVE months ago. (And at that point I had already missed the window to send my kid to zoo camp.) This year my kid is doing a variety of camps, four in total over the roughly eight weeks of summer break. Coordinating all of these camps could be a full-time job; paying for them practically requires you to take out a second mortgage.