I’m writing this at night, after everyone is finally asleep, with the glass of water I forgot about three times today.

April was a lot. Beautiful, fun, and hard and emotional and exhausting in a way that sleep is still not fixing. I have three kids — nine, seven, and two — and last month every single one of them needed me in a different way, at the same time, with everything I had. Some days I gave it. Some days I gave what I didn’t have. Some days the morning was hard and we went outside, touched grass, took a deep exhale, looked at the clouds with some hot cocoa, and called it good.

That’s actually the whole philosophy. But we’ll get there.

What I want to tell you first is that I showed up for my life in April in a way I haven’t needed to in a long time. For my kids. For my husband. For my home. For my notebook at midnight when the house was quiet and I had nothing left to give except the truth. None of it was documented. None of it made the grid or here. All of it was real. All of it filled me back up in a way that no amount of visibility ever has.

That’s the theme this month. Just Show Up. For your life. For your people. For the version of yourself that exists when nobody is watching and nothing is being performed.

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My nine year old had a burnout week.

He chose public school this year, his seven year old brother homeschools with me, which I’ll write about properly another time because that story deserves its own space, and he has been genuinely thriving in it. Friends. A teacher he loves. Obsessed with the school library in a way that makes my book-loving heart want to weep with joy. Eight solid months of choosing that world every single morning and loving it.

Not performing happy. Actually happy.

And then one week he couldn’t stop crying and couldn’t tell me why. Just: I’m tired, Mom. I don’t know. I’m just tired.

He has PDA autism. Which means his nervous system processes the world at a volume most people never have to deal with, and even the things he loves draw from a tank that needs regular refilling. He wasn’t struggling in secret. He was fully, joyfully in it. He just ran out of fuel. If you have a child with autism, you already know what I mean. The crash doesn’t cancel the good months. It just means he gave everything he had to something he loved and his body finally said: we need a week.

I had a toddler, a seven year old who still needed his lessons, and a nine year old in his room with the lights off, crying, and I was running on fumes. So I did what any self-respecting woman who has done years of personal development and inner work and cycle-breaking does in a crisis.

I called my mom.

Sobbing.

Which is unlike me. I’m the eldest daughter, I’m the one she calls, not the other way around.

She came. No questions asked.

I explained autism burnout to her. What it looks like, what it isn’t, what he needed. And what he needed was simple: someone to sit with him in the dark and not try to fix it. No lights. No pep talk. No you’re okay, stop crying, what is wrong with you. Just presence. Just another body in the room saying I’m here, I’m not going anywhere, you don’t have to explain yourself to me.

I watched my mother walk into that dark room and sit down next to my son.

And I stood in the hallway and fell apart.

Because I was that kid once. Crying and not knowing why. Feeling everything too loudly and not being able to turn the volume down. And I was called dramatic. Emotional. Too much. Nobody sat with me in the dark. Nobody told me I didn’t have to explain it.

My mom didn’t know then what she knows now. She knows now because I taught her. Because I did the work, read the books, broke the cycles, sat in the therapy chairs and somewhere in that decade of becoming, I handed her a new language and she learned it.

She learned it for him. She learned it for me, thirty years late, and somehow right on time.

Watching her sit quietly in that room, not trying to fix him, just being there, I felt something in my chest unknot that I didn’t even know was knotted.

Three generations in one dark room. Completely undocumented. Completely everything.

And here is the part I did not expect.

My son, in the middle of his hardest week, still pulled himself out of that room to make his two brothers laugh. He made a cake for his cousins. Not because anyone asked. Not because he was performing okay. Just because that is who he is. Running on empty and still showing up for his little brothers & family without even thinking about it.

That wrecked me in the best way.

Because showing up doesn’t have to be big. It doesn’t have to be documented or witnessed or impressive. It doesn’t have to look like anything from the outside at all. My mom showed up. My husband showed up. My sons showed up. I showed up for all of them and then I showed up for myself, in the small quiet undocumented ways that somehow end up being the most important ones.

A bad moment doesn’t ruin the whole day. A hard week doesn’t erase eight months of thriving. You touch grass. You drink something warm. You tell your kid and yourself: this moment is hard, and this moment is not forever. And then you try again tomorrow.

That’s it. That’s the whole thing.

Life is worth living if showing up and experiencing it is the entire point. Not curating it. Not optimizing it. Not performing it. Just being in it, fully, with the people in your actual room.

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So that’s what May looks like here.

No Mother’s Day hauls. No affiliate links. No perfectly timed summer content. Just me, showing up with what I have left after a month of being needed constantly, emotionally, relentlessly, and lovingly, which is my notebooks and the humble, honest poems I wrote in them when I had nothing else to give.

Every Friday this month I’m dropping one. A poem from April. Not polished. Not strategic. Just true. Each one comes with a digital print you can download and keep. Something for your wall, your journal, your nightstand on the hard nights. A small reminder that the unwitnessed moments count. The dark rooms count. The cold coffee and the grass and the hot cocoa and the trying again tomorrow, all of it counts.

You don’t have to perform your life to deserve it.

Just show up. That’s the whole assignment.

you don’t have to document it to deserve it.
you don’t have to share it to make it real.
you don’t have to be witnessed
to have truly shown up.

just be there.
that’s the whole thing.

With so much love,

Jazmin Montero

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Week 4 of 4 of the More Than Mom challenge. Here’s where I’m at.

This week’s theme is let life be fun again, which is funny because I didn’t show up online the way I thought I would at all.

I had every intention of posting daily updates, finishing strong, being consistent… and then life got full in that very normal, very unglamorous way. The kids needed me, the house needed me, and every time I thought about opening Instagram my brain was like, absolutely not today.

So I didn’t.

And instead of documenting the challenge, I just… lived it and had a very fun week.

Which, looking back, feels very on theme.

Earlier, before everything else unraveled, I got invited to an Earth Day girls night and it was one of those simple, really good evenings. We all brought snacks, sat around talking, and made little herb baskets for our countertops like we were the kind of women who casually keep fresh rosemary alive.

I came home feeling like I had my life together.

My two-year-old immediately corrected that.

He’s been pulling the herbs out one by one, so now I’m replanting basil like it’s my part-time job. I don’t know if they’re thriving, but they’re technically still alive, which feels like a shared accomplishment at this point.

Then I got a haircut.

I asked for shoulder length and curtain bangs, my go to ‘signature’ cut. Just a little refresh. Something safe.

I now have a micro bob.

Not the chic kind. Not the intentional kind. Just… wrong. The length is off, the cut itself is not great, and I fully spiraled for a few days. Voice notes, mirror checks, texting my friends like this is a situation that requires immediate support.

Eventually I got tired of being mad about it.

We had plans to go to the baby animal festival with friends and I almost stayed in that weird “don’t look at me” mood… but I didn’t. I threw on a cute outfit, and just decided to go anyway. Honestly, the hat, the earrings, the tattoos… they were doing God’s work. It was giving edgy mom.

My husband was hyping me up the whole time, taking photos like nothing was wrong, which honestly helped more than I want to admit.

The boys had the best time. They get along so well with their friends, just instantly running off together like they’ve known each other forever. The highlight was the baby goats jumping on our backs and caramel apples, which felt like a very solid definition of fun for this season of life.

It wasn’t chaotic.

It was just… good.

And somewhere in the middle of that, between the bad haircut and the baby goats, I think I got the point.

Letting life be fun again isn’t about everything going right.

It’s going anyway. Wearing the outfit anyway. Laughing a little sooner. Letting the day be good even if something is off.

By the time we got home, though, I felt the whole month hit me at once. I laid down for a minute and woke up the next day.

Fully out.

Luckily, I didn’t marry a loser, so the kids had a cozy movie night, got fed, got to bed, everything handled. We love a capable man.

All of that to say, I didn’t complete this challenge in a perfect, shareable way.

But I lived it.

And that counts.

And if you’re reading this like… wait, I kind of love it here, subscribing is the move. Free is perfect. Paid is generous. Both tell me to keep going.

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Okay but tell me about you for a second

How was your week, really?

Not the quick answer. The actual one.

Did it feel full? heavy? sweet? a little all over the place?
Did anything small happen that you keep thinking about?
Are you feeling like yourself lately… or still trying to find her again?

You can answer with one word, a whole paragraph, or just a random moment from your week. I read all of it and I genuinely love getting a little window into your lives.

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Now let’s finish this out.

Not in a “do it perfectly” way. More like… keep these in the back of your mind this week. Let them soften you a little. Let them bring you back to yourself in small ways.

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This Week’s Prompts

Day 16

What do I want my kids to remember about me?

Easy: Write it out in your notes app.
Medium: Sit in quiet for a few minutes and reset.
Hard: Ask your kids, “What was your favorite part?” and really listen.

Day 17

What am I craving more of in my life?

Sometimes it’s deep. Sometimes it’s literally five minutes alone and a snack you don’t have to share.

Easy: Name it.
Medium: Rearrange a small space in your home.
Hard: Invite a friend over casually. No deep clean. Be brave.

Day 18

What feels heavy that I’m ready to release?

Easy: Name it.
Medium: Write it out and throw it away.
Hard: Say no to something that drains you and don’t over-explain.

Day 19

What does a good day feel like?

Not productive. Not impressive. Just… good.

Easy: Describe it in detail.
Medium: Plan a slower morning for tomorrow.
Hard: Protect half a day for yourself and mean it.

Day 20

What do I love about my current life?

Not the future version. This one.

Easy: Find three things you love right now.
Medium: Take photos of your real life, especially the ordinary parts.
Hard: Tell your family something you appreciate about them out loud.

Because this is your life.

The herbs getting replanted.
The haircut you didn’t ask for.
The kids running around with their friends.
The husband hyping you up when you need it.

This space has never been about becoming a better mom in the way the internet pushes it.

It’s about mothers finding themselves again.

Their joy, their creativity, their voice, their body, their people.

That’s it.

Whatever that turns into for you is yours. A business, a creative practice, a home that feels more like you, or just finally feeling like yourself again in the middle of motherhood.

That’s a wrap on April.

If you’ve been following along, I’d love to know,
which prompt stuck with you the most?

Or just tell me one thing from your life right now. Something you’re loving, something that’s hard, something that surprised you.

I’m here for all of it.

And if this felt like a good conversation you didn’t want to end, subscribing is how we keep meeting back here. Free counts. Paid helps. Either way, I’m really glad you’re here.

With so much love,
Jaz ✨

Week 2 of the More Than Mom challenge. Here’s where I’m at.

On relearning how to play

I am terrible at pretend play.

Clinically. Spiritually. Hand me a dinosaur and ask me to make it talk in a funny voice with an elaborate back story and something inside me just leaves. My kids are nine and seven. They know. They’ve always known. For years I thought this was a character flaw. That good moms got on the floor. That I needed to find the enthusiasm that everyone else seemed to have for a game of LEGOs we’ve built four hundred times.

She never showed up.

And then somewhere around 32, my nervous system stopped being braced all the time. The running-on-fumes version of me started to loosen up. And when she loosened up, something cracked open.

I decided life didn’t need more pressure, it needed more play. And when you actually mean that, when it stops being a cute thing you say and starts being how you move through a Tuesday, you get better at the dinosaur voices. Somehow. It’s embarrassing how much.

But the bigger thing I figured out is this.

Playing WITH MY KIDS and playing with (my kids) are not the same sentence.

Imaginary play. I’m bad at it. Like, really bad. The kind where you hold a stuffed animal and commit to a whole voice and a whole world your kid is inventing in real time. I go flat. Every time. I used to feel guilty about this.

But sit me down at a craft table and I will not look up for two hours. Card games, I’m in. Puzzles, cooking together, putting on a playlist and doodling while they draw next to me. That’s where I actually show up. Not performing. Not waiting for it to be over. Actually there.

That’s my version of play.

Maybe yours looks like that too. Maybe you’re terrible at pretend but you’ll do a puzzle until your back hurts. Maybe you just need to be in the same room doing your own thing while they do theirs and that’s enough.

It is enough.

Bug week. One posterboard. Ten minutes that kind of got me.

My 7-year-old is homeschooled. We do lessons in the morning and then during baby brother’s nap he works on his independent project for the week.

This week it’s the poster.

He picked the Tarantula Hawk Wasp completely unprompted. If you don’t know what that is, look it up and then immediately wish you hadn’t. First grade. Obsessed with deadly animals. Absolutely thriving.

While he works I have options. Dishes. The laundry on the chair since last Tuesday. All the responsible things that would make me feel productive and also slightly hollow.

Instead I grabbed my own piece of posterboard and just started doodling bugs. No agenda. Play with colors. Let my hand move. Zero deliverables. My play theme for the week, taken literally.

He got more into his work, not less. He started narrating Tarantula Hawk Wasp facts with the energy of someone who has been waiting his whole life for a serious audience on this subject. We talked the whole time, not because I was steering anything, just because we were two people making things next to each other.

Together time. School. My play. Three things, one posterboard, zero dishes done.

This is my form of play. I write. I doodle. I do a craft alongside their craft. I am present and I am myself at the same time, and it turns out that combination is more powerful than me trying to be someone I’m not on the floor with an action figure toy.

I am also, for the record, getting marginally better at the dinosaur voices.

Okay. Enough about me.

That’s my update on the challenge this week, and now I want to hear yours.

Here are days 6 through 10. Pick one. Pick the one that makes you slightly uncomfortable and sit with that. Drop how it’s going in the comments, I genuinely want to know.

DAY 6

What would make this week feel like a win?

Not what would look like winning. Not what would make someone else think you had a good week. What would make you exhale on Sunday and actually mean it? One thing. Write it down before your brain talks you into something more impressive.

DAY 7

What do I want to say yes to more?

Most of your yeses are already spoken for. They belong to the schedule and the school run and the seventeen things that have to happen before 8am. Somewhere underneath all of that, there are yeses that are still yours. You know what they are. You keep brushing past them. This prompt is asking you to stop and pick one up.

DAY 8

What would make today feel special?

The medium prompt is to watch the sunset on purpose. Not glance at it. Not half-watch it from the kitchen while finishing a text. Go outside, look at it, let it do its whole thing to you. Free. Four minutes. Works every time. We keep forgetting it’s there.

DAY 9

What version of me am I stepping into?

Right now. In the middle of bug week and the laundry pile and all of it. She’s already here. You can probably feel her at the edges. This prompt is just asking you to turn toward her instead of away.

DAY 10

What feels aligned versus expected?

You know the difference. You’ve known it for a while. You don’t have to fix anything or blow anything up. You just have to stop pretending you can’t feel it.

Noticing counts as doing the work. Always has.

And if you did zero prompts this week. If you just read this far and felt something move a little, a small quiet oh, I know that feeling, that’s real. That counts. You showed up. You let yourself be a person who thinks about her own joy for a minute.

That is not nothing. That is actually everything.

You are not the stage crew of your own life. You’re not running logistics while everyone else gets to have a good time. You are the main character.

Act accordingly.

Week 3 is coming. Going deeper. You’re ready even if you don’t know it yet.

This free vibe check drops every week in April. No paywall, no pitch. Just one mom being honest with another one. If something landed, subscribe and send it to the friend who needs to read this.

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Sit with these and drop your answers in the comments:

1. What does play actually look like for you, your real version? When did you last do it?

2. Where in your week could you do your thing next to your kids instead of for them?

3. What are you saying yes to out of habit right now, and what would you say yes to if you gave yourself permission?

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No links. No affiliates. No funnels.

Just a reflection of what I noticed, loved, and made space for this week.

-- Jaz ✨ from the kitchen table

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✦ I Wish We Could Go Grab Coffee IRL

I’ve been slowly reading Women Who Run with the Wolves by Clarissa Pinkola Estés. Not in a neat, linear way, but in the way life actually allows right now. A few pages while the baby naps, another chapter while my 7 year old finishes his math problems during his homeschool lesson. A dog-eared corner on something that hits too close. And then hours later, standing in the kitchen holding a snack I already forgot I got out, still thinking about it.

There’s a line that made me stop completely:

“within every woman there lives a powerful force, filled with good instincts, passionate creativity, and ageless knowing.”

I’ve actually read this book before. It was given to me by a mentor when I was getting trained in Womb Healing. The first time I read it I thought, wow, this is a cool book, but it didn’t land. It felt like I was reading it for some fictional character. Someone else’s story.

This time, tired, in between kids and life and work and home, it felt like a woman grabbing me by the shoulders, shaking me, and saying it directly to my face.

It didn’t feel like learning something new. It felt like remembering something that had been there the whole time, just buried under routines and the quiet agreement we all somehow sign where we measure our worth in productivity.

And honestly? It inspired this whole letter. Think of it like we’re grabbing coffee, catching up, venting, laughing, and I lean across the table and go: girl. Who you are to your core is a powerful force. You are filled with good instincts, passion, creativity, and incredible intuition. And this has nothing to do with being a mom. This is just who you are.

Because if we were meeting in real life and not behind a phone screen, I promise you honey, I would.

And if that stirred something in you even a little, that’s not because it’s poetic.

I hope it’s because something in you went, DAMN SHE’S SO RIGHT.

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✦ Let Me Be So Real With You For a Second

It’s spring break. All the kids are home. The house has that constant lived-in hum of snacks and shoes and toys migrating from room to room like they pay rent here and honestly have more audacity than I do.

Now I want to be clear, we are never this busy. I am a stick-to-the-routine, homebody kind of girl. My oldest is on the spectrum and transitions back to school after a busy week are no joke, so we are very intentional about not running ourselves ragged for the sake of it.

But this week did not get that memo.

Family coming into town, PTO, birthdays, all of it landed on the same week like it had a group chat I wasn’t invited to. We took the boys on a 3 day trip, hiked for hours, saw family, met new babies, ended up in the ER convinced we were dealing with a broken arm (we were not, thankfully, but my nervous system didn’t know that), and ended the week with pizza and celebrating baby B’s birthday with my side of the family.

Busy but good. Loud but ours.

And still, there was this quiet voice in the background asking what I had actually accomplished.

My self talk went from hero to zero so fast it gave me whiplash. And you know what that voice is? My luteal phase, bestie. She shows up every single time like Kronk’s shoulder angel and devil except mine skips the angel entirely and goes straight to mean girl. She will look at a week where I showed up for everyone in every way that actually mattered and go, b**** but what did you really do though.

Honestly, rude.

If you have ever been in the middle of a full, meaningful, very real life and still found yourself thinking, okay but what did I actually get done, you know exactly how convincing that little voice can be.

✦ What If Nothing Is Wrong?

Okay so here is where my brain went, and I promise it connects. This is exactly how my deep thoughts work. I start overthinking, yap it out loud, and it ends up on your screen. You’re welcome.

In the first chapter of Women Who Run with the Wolves, Estés introduces the Wild Woman archetype. The instinctual part of every woman that knows things before she can explain them, that feels the shift before she has words for it. She says most women have been separated from this part of themselves, not because something is wrong with them, but because life, expectation, and the noise of everything slowly buries her.

And that’s when it hit me.

That feeling of being behind? That voice asking what you actually accomplished this week? That’s not a productivity problem. Babe, that’s the buried part of you trying to get your attention.

Behind compared to what? Compared to whose timeline exactly?

Estés writes about how the wild woman moves in seasons and rhythms, not in straight lines. The problem isn’t that we are behind. The problem is that we have been running on someone else’s rhythm for so long that our own feels foreign.

I don’t feel behind anymore. I feel like I’m in a different season. And those are not the same thing.

You know that feeling? When your life looks the same from the outside but internally something doesn’t land the way it used to. The things that used to fit feel slightly off. Not bad. Just not quite right. Like wearing something that technically fits but you keep adjusting it all day.

Honey, what if that feeling isn’t something to fix? What if it’s actually the update notification?

There’s a line from the book I keep coming back to:

“The doors to the wild Self are few but precious.”

What if this moment isn’t something to push past but something to pay attention to?

✦ The Chapter on the Death Mother

This is where most people look away.

The life you're in? You built it. For a long time that version is exactly who you needed to be. She figured things out, held it together, showed up even when she was running on three hours of sleep and a lukewarm coffee she reheated four times.

And then, without much warning, that same version of you starts to feel a little too small.

She got you here. That's the whole thing.

Estés writes about this in the chapter on the Death Mother, which sounds terrifying but hear me out. She talks about how parts of us have to die so other parts can live. The version of you that got you here was never meant to get you all the way. She was meant to get you to this exact moment where you look around and go, okay something has to change, I just don’t know what yet.

The feeling that follows is easy to misread. It doesn't feel like clarity. It feels like something is quietly wrong. Restless. Disinterest. That low level why does this feel harder than it used to thought you can’t quite shake.

You’re not losing the plot. You’re just bigger than the one you wrote. It’s growth happening before you’ve had time to make a plan for it.

It doesn't need a plan. It just needs you to stop calling it a problem.

And if you want to dog ear one thing from this entire letter, let it be this:

The restlessness is not the problem. The restlessness is the invitation.

✦ We’re FREAKING Doing It

If you’re reading this thinking this is exactly how I’ve been feeling, good. That means this wasn’t just me yapping into the void again.

You’re not doing it wrong. You’re not lazy. You’re not falling behind.

You’re in the middle of something, sweetie. We both are.

Which is exactly why I want to leave the free version of this right here, because what comes next I've only said to myself, until now.

I’m going to tell you exactly what it was on the other side of this wall.

If that’s not a reason to subscribe I don’t know what is.

✦ the good part is below, come on in

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Okay, hi. Welcome to week one of April’s challenge.

If you’re new here, I’m Jazmin, and this is my little corner of the internet I call Fresco Magazine. I help moms go from surviving motherhood to actually enjoying their lives again, through prompts, creativity, community, and a lot of real talk.

Every month I pick a theme and we live inside it for a bit. Talk about it. Try things. Notice what shifts.

This month’s theme is More Than Mom and we’re doing a whole challenge together, a month of rediscovering our joyful identity. And this time I didn’t just want to write about it. I wanted us to actually do it.

This month I’m trying something I’ve never done before and I kind of can’t believe it took me this long.

So here we are. No pressure, no catching up, no falling behind. Come as you are, take what you need, leave the rest.

As I write this, my toddler is running laps around the counter with the dog, my oldest is deep in some elaborate craft situation he’s been engineering for two hours, my middle is outside on the trampoline with the hose in 60 degree weather by choice, and I’m on my computer in the family room trying to finish this before someone needs something.

It’s loud and honestly I love it.

That’s actually why this month means so much to me.

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✿ A Decade, Two Kids, A Few Menty Bs, and a Baby Who Changed Everything

My baby turns two this month.

If you’ve been around here for a minute, you know I am fully, unabashedly a mommy. A mamacita. All in. But that version of me didn’t just appear. She was built slowly over a decade out of some really hard seasons.

I became a mom young. Early twenties, two under two, with a miscarriage in between. I met my husband and within months we were engaged, married, and figuring out how to be parents mostly at the same time, with almost no idea what we were doing. Which, looking back, is a lot.

I was raised in Mormon culture where the path was very clear: marry young, marry a return missionary, have babies. I took it seriously. I wanted that life. And then real life started and nothing was as clean as the plan.

We left the religion. We had to figure out who we were outside of everything we’d been handed. We grew up together inside a marriage, inside parenthood, in real time. It wasn’t always pretty. But we built something real and I don’t take that lightly.

What I don’t always say is that when I had my first two boys, I was deep in postpartum depression. The kind where you’re there but not really there. There are whole seasons I barely remember, stretches that feel like they happened to someone else.

I was so young, so anxious, so lost. Somewhere in that I found birth work and therapy and community and slowly I came back to myself.

That season deserves its own piece honestly and it’s coming. For now just know it was real, it was hard, and I made it out.

Years later, when life felt more settled, I told my husband something that surprised even me. I want one more baby. Not to start over, to experience it with my eyes actually open this time.

And then my angel baby came.

I still got prenatal depression. That familiar uninvited guest showed right up, punctual as ever. But this time I recognized it. One night of insomnia, intrusive thoughts crawling in, and instead of spiraling I paused. I know this feeling. I’ve been here before. In the morning with tears in my eyes I told my husband everything and called my midwife. I didn’t let it sit inside me.

I got support right away and it helped so much. The medication helped, the awareness helped, having people around me who actually understood what was happening helped. It was still hard but it didn’t take me under.

✿ Why more than a mom. Why joyful identity.

My baby is turning two and I want to say this clearly: I didn’t fail as a mom back then. I survived something real. And this time I got to be present for all of it, the late nights, the tiny moments, all the in-between stuff that goes so fast. I loved it.

Last year I hit burnout, not because motherhood was too much but because I was saying yes to everything and everyone and had nothing left. So I pulled back. Focused on my home and my people and myself. It’s been the most fun year, quieter, more mine.

And that’s the thing nobody tells you. Joy doesn’t announce itself. It just quietly shows up when you finally make a little room for it.

I share all of that because this challenge didn’t come from a place of having it all together. It came from the other side of not. From surviving postpartum, from burning out, from quietly finding my way back to myself and realizing oh, this is what joy feels like when you stop white knuckling everything.

Joy isn’t a personality trait you either have or you don’t. It’s something you find your way back to. I know because I did it more than once.

That’s why this month exists.

If this feels like a good conversation you don’t want to end, subscribing is how we keep meeting back here. Paid costs less than a coffee and unlike coffee it won’t make you anxious.

✿A full month of joyful identity

So here’s what we’re doing this month. A full month of joyful identity prompts, three levels every day so you can meet yourself wherever you are.

Easy is something to notice. Medium is something to do. Hard is something to actually live out loud.

Do one, do all three, skip days, come back whenever. There is no falling behind.

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✿ Week 1 Prompts: Day 1-5

Day 1 — Who am I becoming right now

Easy: notice what feels different in this season Medium: make 3 messy affirmation cards, not to be good, just to make something with your hands again Hard: dance in the kitchen for a few minutes, yes it feels silly, let your body lead

Day 2 — What feels like me again

Easy: what parts of you are slowly coming back Medium: sit outside for 10 minutes, no phone, just exist Hard: have a no-phone dinner, be fully present where your feet are

Day 3 — What would I do if I stopped overthinking it

Easy: just name it, you don’t have to act yet Medium: wear something you actually love, stop saving outfits for later Hard: plan a simple at-home date, nothing fancy, just intentional

Day 4 — What do I miss about myself

Easy: notice it without making it heavy Medium: watch something nostalgic, reconnect with that version of you Hard: have a living room picnic, make something ordinary feel fun

Day 5 — What does fun look like right now

Easy: not what it used to be, what actually feels good today Medium: make a playlist for your current mood, let it shift the energy Hard: let your kids plan a fun hour, release control a little

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✿What to expect in April

This month alongside the daily prompts I’m also dropping a poetry piece, an illustration, and our spring family fun guide. The kind of stuff you print out and stick on the fridge. All of that lives on Fridays for my paid subscribers.

On that note, and a friendly reminder that a paid subscription costs less than a latte once a month. If this column brings you comfort, curiosity, or a moment to exhale, supporting my work means more than you know.

Let’s do this together.

As always, from the kitchen table and with mucho amor,
♥ Jazmin

Mami. Overthinker. Creative. Writer. Human. Not a robot.

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☁︎Welcome to Keeping It Fresco

Hi, welcome back, or if you’re new here, hi, I’m Jazmin, and this is Keeping It Fresco.

Every month this magazine drops around a single theme. Essays, poems, art, and practical guides you can actually use.

This month’s theme is More Than Mom and I am so excited about this one.

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☁︎April Feels Different This Year

April is what January wishes she could be. It’s the first iced latte after a long winter, messy buns, bare feet outside, the door finally open. It’s the sun hitting your face and you’re like… wait, I’m so back.

It’s bike rides after dinner, your kids a little feral in the best way, staying out longer because no one wants to go inside yet. It’s the group chat lighting up about a mom’s night and you actually go, staying out a little later because your partner’s got bedtime and you don’t have to rush home.

It’s sitting on the porch peeling an orange, watching the kids run through the hose like it’s the middle of summer even though it’s barely 60 degrees. It’s everything thawing out: your home, your energy, your mood. Like life is opening back up… and honestly, so are you.

That’s exactly the energy I’m building this month around.

☁︎I’m the Girl of the Family and I Own It

I am a mom of boys and let me tell you I love being the girl of the family. And I take that job seriously and I also refuse to be boring at it. I make themed dinners. I tie ribbon on the candles and the curtains in my house. I decorate every single season. I love joy and I love creating it and I love that my boys are growing up watching their mom do that. Watching me be a full, creative, alive person who happens to also be their mom.

That’s the thing nobody really talks about. Motherhood can be one of the most creative, expressive, joyful seasons of your life if you let it be. If you stop waiting for later and start making something of right now.

Last year I burned out and got quiet. This winter I rested and I meant it. And now I’m back, I feel like myself, and I had an idea I wanted to try with you.

☁︎The Conversation Nobody Is Having

So much of the content around motherhood is about how hard it is. And it is hard, we’re not pretending otherwise. But there is a version of this conversation that is about how fun it can be. How playful. How creative. How full.

There comes a point where the most powerful thing you can do is just enjoy your life out loud. On purpose. In front of your kids. Without waiting for permission.

That’s where we are. That’s what this month is about.

☁︎Here’s What We’re Doing This Month

The theme is More Than Mom. The challenge is a full month of Joyful Identity.

Not a program. Not a self improvement project. Not another thing to be good at.

Just a month of small moments where you choose yourself on purpose. Where you laugh more than you manage. Where you feel like a full person living a full life and your kids get a front row seat to what that looks like.

I’ll be doing every prompt right alongside you and documenting all of it over on Instagram at @keepingitfresco because this is not content I’m handing you from a distance. We’re doing this together and it’s going to be really fun.

☁︎How the Prompts Work

Each day has three levels so you can meet yourself wherever you are.

Easy is a question to sit with. Something small that shifts your thinking. Coffee and a quiet two minutes and you’re done.

Medium is a small act. Something intentional, something creative, something that makes your day feel a little more like yours.

Hard is something you actually live out. A real experience, a real moment, something worth remembering.

Do one. Do all three. Spread them across the whole week if that’s what life looks like right now. Come back whenever you want. There is no falling behind because this is not that kind of thing.

☁︎ How to Follow Along

Every Monday a new free article drops here on Substack with that week’s vibe check and fresh prompts. Come here when you want to slow down, read, and feel something.

I’ll also be sharing our weekly vibe check over on Instagram at @keepingitfresco I’ll post the week’s prompts as a carousel you can screenshot, save, and send to your friend with a “we are so doing this.”

Both free. Both every Monday. Both made for you.

Lets be friends on IG!

☁︎Want the Full Experience?

Paid subscribers get the whole thing every single Friday, a little care package landing in your inbox. This month that means two poems, a deep thought article, an illustration drop, personal rituals, a hosting guide, and a monthly reflection. Everything extra. Everything beautiful. Everything made to go alongside this challenge and make this month actually feel like something.

If you want in, the button is right below. We would love to have you.

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☁︎She’s Still In There

You were a whole person before you were a mom and you still are and honestly she is so fun and we are bringing her all the way out this month.

Let’s freaking go.

Subscribe so you don’t miss a thing. Week 1 prompts drop Monday April 6th right here and over on Instagram at @keepingitfresco. That’s where we start. That’s where we find her.

See you Monday.

As always, from the kitchen table and with mucho amor,
♥ Jazmin

Mami. Overthinker. Creative. Writer. Human. Not a robot.

P.S. Let's make this extra fun. Tag your bestie, share this with her, and drop a comment letting us know you're joining in. The more the merrier and honestly this is so much better when we do it together.

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Last April, everything in my life came to a complete stop.

Not gradually.
Not during some reflective journaling moment.

In a doctor’s office.

On my baby’s first birthday.

One minute we were celebrating the end of his first year. Cake, balloons, the familiar chaos of three boys running around the house. The next minute we were hearing words no parent wants to hear.

Possible surgeries.
Long recovery.
The chance his hand might never function the same.

Trips were canceled. Plans dissolved. The spring we had imagined disappeared overnight.

Our world narrowed to one question.

Is my baby okay?

And here is the part that still feels surreal.

The injury doctors expected would lead to surgeries and permanent damage healed.

His hand recovered.

As if nothing had ever happened.

Even now it feels like one of those moments where life quietly rearranges your perspective.

Because while my son healed, something else became impossible for me to ignore.

It was not my body that made me stop.

Life did.

Or God.

Or the universe.

Whatever language you use for the moments that pull the emergency brake on your life.

Because sometimes we push past every signal our bodies send us.

We override exhaustion.
We ignore overwhelm.
We carry one more thing and then another.

Until life steps in and says it for us.

Stop.

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✿Burnout Does Not Always Look Dramatic✿

Before that moment, I thought burnout looked like collapse.

But burnout usually arrives quietly.

Your life looks good from the outside.
Your calendar is full but meaningful.
You love the people you are showing up for.

You are just tired in a way sleep does not fix.

For a long time I thought that was simply adulthood. Just motherhood. Just what happens when you care deeply about people and build things that matter.

But this past year taught me something I wish someone had told me sooner.

Burnout rarely comes from doing things you hate.

It often comes from doing too many things you love without ever asking if you actually have the capacity to carry them all.

Motherhood has a way of teaching that lesson.

Sometimes gently.

Sometimes by slamming the brakes.

✿Friendly reminder: a paid subscription costs less than a monthly latte. If this column and the guides I share here bring you joy, subscribing helps support the time and care that goes into creating them.

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✿A Year of Quiet Repair

The past year has not been dramatic.

There was no big reinvention.

Instead it has been a slow process of repair.

Learning to say no without over explaining.
Protecting time with my family.
Organizing my life in ways that support my energy instead of draining it.

Slowly remembering how to check in with myself again.

For a while those changes were subtle.

Until winter arrived.

✿The Moment I Knew Something Had Changed

I noticed the shift sometime in November.

Nothing dramatic happened.

One evening I was standing in my kitchen making dinner while the kids talked over each other and the house did what houses with children do.

And I realized something surprising.

I wasn’t overwhelmed.

The noise wasn’t too much.
My calendar didn’t feel suffocating.
I wasn’t counting the hours until bedtime.

Life felt manageable again.

If you’ve ever been burned out, you know how big that feeling actually is.

Because burnout rarely looks like falling apart.

Most of the time it looks like holding everything together while quietly carrying more than you were meant to carry.

Your life works.
Your kids are loved.
Your responsibilities are handled.

But somewhere along the way, your capacity quietly disappears.

Standing there in my kitchen that night, I realized the weight I had been carrying for so long was finally lighter.

Not because my life was easier.

But because I had stopped carrying things that were never mine to hold in the first place.

And the shift came from one simple practice that helped me see my life clearly again.

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✿Five Signs Your Check Engine Light Is On

Before burnout arrives, life usually sends signals.

1. You feel overstimulated by small things.

2. You are doing everything right but still feel exhausted.

3. Small decisions suddenly feel heavier than they should.

4. You crave quiet space more than usual.

5. You feel like you are managing your life instead of living it.

If you recognize yourself in any of these, nothing is wrong with you.

Your capacity may simply need more care.

If you’re feeling stretched thin right now, you might want to subscribe and save the next section.

Inside I share the practice that helped me rebuild my life after burnout, something I now call ✿The Soft Joy Capacity Check✿

Paid subscribers also get a simple digital guide you can use to walk through the process yourself.

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✿The Soft Joy Capacity Check

The biggest lesson this year taught me is simple.

Capacity is not something you conquer.

It is something you respect.

For most of my life I thought strength meant carrying everything well.

Motherhood taught me something different.

Strength sometimes means knowing what is actually yours to carry.

This small exercise helped me reset my life when everything felt too full.

✿Step 1

Pause before saying yes.

Before committing to something new, ask yourself three questions.

Do I have the time for this?
Do I have the energy for this?
Do I have the emotional space for this?

If two of those answers are no, that is usually a sign your capacity may already be full.

✿Step 2

Add one soft joy ritual to your day.

Soft joy is not elaborate.

It is simply a small moment that makes life feel gentle again.

Examples might look like:

• coffee outside before the kids wake up
• music while cooking dinner
• a short walk with your kids
• reading one extra bedtime story

Joy does not need to be big to matter.

It just needs to exist.

✿Step 3

Do a weekly capacity check.

At the start of the week ask yourself:

What matters most this week?
What can wait?
Where can I simplify?

Protecting your energy allows you to show up fully where it matters.

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✿Want to walk through this practice for yourself?
Download the Soft Joy Capacity Reset Guide here. It includes additional exercises and journaling pages you can print or save digitally and return to whenever you need a reset.

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✿The Soft Joy Reset Exercise

If life feels heavier than it used to, try this small exercise.

Grab a piece of paper and draw three columns.

Label them:

1. Must Hold

2. Nice to Hold

3. Not Mine to Hold

Now list everything currently taking up your energy.

Then gently sort them.

✿Must Hold
These are the things that are truly yours. Your children, your health, your home, the work that supports your family.

✿Nice to Hold
Things you enjoy but that are optional. Social commitments, projects, activities that can expand or shrink depending on your capacity.

✿Not Mine to Hold
Expectations that quietly crept into your life. Responsibilities that belong to someone else. Things you said yes to because you felt like you should.

Most burnout happens when the Not Mine to Hold column becomes too full.

Protecting your capacity is often less about doing more.

And more about releasing what was never yours to carry.

You are allowed to live a life that supports you.

Not just one that impresses people.

✿Let’s Try This Together

If you have been reading this and quietly thinking this might be me right now, you are not alone.

Most parents are carrying far more than anyone was meant to carry.

Schedules.
Responsibilities.
Expectations that multiply every year.

The past year reminded me of something simple.

A meaningful life does not come from doing more.

It comes from protecting what matters.

✿The Invitation

This space is where I am documenting that process.

Not as someone who has everything figured out, but as a mom learning in real time how to build a life that feels seasonal, grounded, and sustainable.

Each month here we explore one small shift together. Sometimes it is family rhythms. Sometimes capacity. Sometimes creativity.

The goal is simple.

Build a life that actually feels good to live inside.

If this essay resonated with you, I would love for you to join us.

Subscribe below and come along for the monthly challenge.

You are always welcome here.

As always, from the kitchen table and with mucho amor,
♥ Jazmin

Mamacita. Overthinker. Creative. Writer. Human. Not a robot.

✿P.S. If this essay made you think of another parent who might need a little breathing room right now, feel free to share it with them.

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♥About Fresco Magazine

Fresco Magazine is a space for women becoming themselves again.

Through essays, reflections, poetry, and thoughtful prompts, we explore motherhood, creativity, healing, and the quiet work of remembering you are a whole person, not just a role.

Think of it like sitting at the kitchen table with a friend who gets it.

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♥ A Thought to Start the Month

Before we get into this month’s theme, I want to share a line from my journal this week that I keep coming back to:

Motherhood has made me softer.

It has also made me more certain.

Both can exist at the same time.

Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about what it means to build a life that actually feels good to live inside of not the version the internet sells us, but the one that unfolds in the ordinary rhythms of our homes.

The dinner table conversations.
The chaotic bedtime routines.
The quiet moments when you realize your kids are growing up right in front of you.

Somewhere in the middle of a very messy February, I had a small realization about the kind of life I want to build, the kind of energy I want to move through motherhood with, and the kind of space I want Fresco to be for the women reading it.

And like many of the things that show up here, that realization slowly turned into this month’s theme.

But before we get to that…

♥ The Way I Like to Start Each Month

At the beginning of every month, I like to give myself a theme and a small personal challenge.

Not in a rigid, productivity-obsessed way.

It’s more like choosing a lens to move through the month with, something that makes everyday life feel a little more intentional and a little more playful.

Instead of drifting through the weeks reacting to whatever motherhood throws our way, it becomes a quiet question guiding the month:

What kind of energy do I want to move through life with right now?

Then whatever I create here, poems, essays, family guides, hosting ideas, deep thoughts that arrive late at night, tends to follow that thread.

Last month’s theme was stepping into a little bit of “that girl” energy. Not the hyper-optimized internet version of her, but the quieter version. The woman you admire when you imagine the life you’re slowly growing into.

If you read last month’s issue, you already know how that experiment began.

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♥ February’s Plot Twist

What I didn’t expect was that February would also include our entire household getting taken out by a rotating cast of illnesses.

First a stomach bug that traveled through all five of us like a small touring production.

Then just when we thought we had sanitized the house like we were performing a domestic exorcism…

Influenza A showed up for the sequel.

Needless to say, the month did not unfold quite as chicly as I had imagined.

The aesthetic museum visits never happened.
The handwritten letters to friends never quite made it to the mailbox.

Instead the vibe of February was mostly:

herbal tea
couch snuggles
and aggressively wiping down surfaces like we were fighting a supernatural force.

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♥ What Filled My Cup Anyway

But something interesting happened during all that unexpected downtime.

Without the pressure to keep up with the version of the month I had imagined, I started doing things simply because they filled my cup.

I painted for fun, even though the painting is messy and my baby splashed paint across part of it.

My son and I started working on a dragon painting for his bedroom, and halfway through I realized we had stumbled into one of those quiet mother-son moments you wish you could bottle forever.

I wrote more poems than I expected to.

I junk journaled.

In the small pockets of healthy days I had, and luckily I barely caught any of it so I could take care of the boys, I snuck a little moment of connection and met some friends for a quick pedicure.

I snuggled my babies on the couch while they were sick and tried to memorize those small moments that pass too quickly.

My nine-year-old asked to cuddle before falling asleep one night and I had one of those quiet mom realizations: there will be a last time he asks for that someday.

Which immediately made me want to cancel every productivity expectation I had for the week.

And somewhere in the middle of all of that, I quietly accomplished a few things I had been putting off for months.

I finally built out my design portfolio, something I had been putting off for months, and ended up landing a design gig with a new local marketing company that’s opening.

It was actually on my vision board for 2026, and somehow it happened only two months in. Manifesting, apparently, works both hard and soft.

None of it happened in the glamorous, productive way I had imagined for the month.

But it happened steadily. Gently. Without burnout.

And that realization is what led me to this month’s theme.

☘︎March’s Theme: Capacity & Soft Joy

Looking back on February, something surprised me.

Even though our house felt like it had been hit with every illness known to modern parenting, I never felt completely unraveled. A few years ago, a month like that would have sent me straight into survival mode.

But this time felt different.

Somewhere between caring for sick kids, canceling plans, painting messy flowers at the kitchen table, and stealing small pockets of connection with friends, I realized something.

Because I had been living within my capacity, there was still room for joy.

Not the big glamorous kind the internet loves to show us, but the soft kind. The kind that shows up in quiet moments and reminds you that your life is still good even when it’s messy.

So instead of a productivity challenge this month, we’re trying something gentler.

March’s theme is Capacity & Soft Joy.

A small experiment in noticing what we can actually hold in this season of life and protecting the little things that make it feel good to be alive inside it.

♥♥♥ If this kind of conversation resonates with you, you’re exactly who Fresco was created for.

Each month here we explore a theme together, small experiments in living more intentionally.

You can subscribe and follow along if you’d like to be part of the journey.♥♥♥

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♥When Life Exceeds Our Capacity

Because the truth is, most mothers I talk to right now are tired in a very specific way.

Their days are full, work, parenting, school schedules, friendships, emotional labor, and the invisible logistics of running a household.

And somewhere along the way we started believing we should be able to carry all of it alone.

But flowers don’t grow alone. They need the sun, the rain, the soil, the bugs.

Modern motherhood quietly sells us the idea of self-sufficiency, and it’s one of the fastest paths to burnout.

What surprised me last month was realizing that even in a house full of sick kids, I never felt like I was about to snap.

I was tired, yes, but not overwhelmed in that familiar edge-of-burnout way.

And I think it’s because over the past few months I’ve been slowly practicing something simple:

living within my capacity.

Small rhythms.
Clear boundaries.
And pockets of joy that actually refill my cup.

The version of myself I admire most these days isn’t the one doing the most.

It’s the one living with intention.

And that’s what I want to explore with you this month.

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☘︎The March Experiment

Instead of a productivity challenge this month, I want to try something gentler.

For the next few weeks, pay attention to your capacity.

Not the version of your life you think you should be living.

Your real life.
Your real energy.

Then choose one small pocket of soft joy you’ll intentionally protect this month.

Maybe it’s doing a craft for fun.
Maybe it’s protecting your morning coffee ritual.
Maybe it’s hosting a cozy dinner with friends.

Or maybe, and this might be the most radical one, it means saying no.

Not people pleasing.

Canceling plans you secretly dread.

Letting something wait until next week.

Protecting your energy like it actually matters.

Because it does.

Small things. But meaningful ones.

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☘︎ March’s Journal Prompts

✿What in my life currently exceeds my capacity?

✿Where in my week could I create a small pocket of soft joy?

✿What version of myself am I slowly becoming?

♥What You’ll Find Inside Fresco

Each month inside Fresco we explore a theme together.

Along the way I share essays, poems, family guides, hosting ideas, journal prompts, and the small rituals that help life feel more grounded and joyful.

Think of it less like a magazine you read once and forget, and more like a growing library for modern motherhood, something you can return to when you need perspective, creativity, or simply the reminder that you’re not navigating this season of life alone.

♥A Little Library for Becoming

Motherhood has made me softer.

It has also made me more certain.

Both can exist at the same time.

My dream for Fresco Magazine is that it becomes a place mothers return to when they need thoughtful conversation, creative inspiration, and the quiet comfort of knowing someone else is navigating this season of life alongside them.

A little library for becoming.

I’m so glad you’re here.

As always, from the kitchen table and with mucho amor,
♥ Jazmin

Mami. Overthinker. Creative. Writer. Human. Not a robot.

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☁︎ Monthly Deep Thoughts

Each month at Keeping It Fresco, I follow a theme through poems, essays, art, rituals, and small creative experiments. It can read soft or girly at a glance, but this space was never about aesthetics or metrics; it’s about impact and identity in motion. The real question underneath all of it: how do women, especially mothers, become themselves on purpose while life is already loud and underway?

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So this month’s Deep Thought, or my working thesis, is this:

☁︎ We assume our future self is basically “us, but better.”
☁︎ But our self-image is mostly inherited agreements we stopped questioning.
☁︎ Psychology suggests our future self is meaningfully different from who we are now.
☁︎ Which means waiting to become “That Girl” later makes very little sense.
☁︎ We can start embodying her now by expanding who we allow ourselves to be.

Or, in less academic terms: oh wait… a damn minute. I am That Girl. (Our theme for February)

What I’m reading / listening to while exploring this:
The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz
TED Business podcast: You Don’t Actually Know What Your Future Self Wants (Shankar Vedantam)

☁︎ The stranger you’re becoming

I was listening to the TED Business podcast episode You Don’t Actually Know What Your Future Self Wants with journalist Shankar Vedantam (linked here).

He explores the idea that our future self isn’t just an older version of us, but, in meaningful ways, a totally different person.

We are always becoming new versions of ourselves.

The part that stayed with me most was this:

When we look back at past versions of ourselves, we easily see the difference.
We usually do it with compassion, too.

We say:
“I was doing the best I could.”
“I didn’t know then what I know now.”
“I was a different person.”

We accept that. We move on.

But when we look forward?

We assume continuity.
We imagine our future self as us, just improved. Upgraded even!
More confident. More successful. More stylish. More patient. More healed.
More That Girl.

We extend compassion backward…and pressure forward.

And that’s where this month’s theme started spiraling for me, in the best way.

☁︎ The “That Girl” illusion

For the past ten years, in the spaces I’ve held for women, healing circles, co-ops, events, and those long conversations where the real things come out, there’s one thread that appears again and again:
women comparing themselves to some imagined future or external version of who they “should” be.

More like her. Less like this.

One day I’ll be that confident.
One day I’ll dress like that.
One day I’ll show up like that.

And the wild part?

The women saying this are almost always already incredible, vibrant, thoughtful, creative, alive in ways they genuinely cannot see from the inside.
(I include myself fully in this.)

The Four Agreements would call this an inherited agreement, a quiet belief about who we are allowed to be, formed somewhere along the way and rarely questioned. So we measure ourselves against an imagined “That Girl,” without noticing the comparison itself was learned.

We are all looking at each other thinking:
She’s That Girl.
While privately believing we are not.

It’s honestly a little tragic.
And a little absurd.

Like a room full of women thinking everyone else is her, and they’re somehow the exception.

Or, put another way:

Like a room full of women assuming everyone else got the confidence package at birth.

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☁︎ The Ship of Theseus (aka: are we even the same person?)

In the TED talk, Vedantam brings up an old philosophical thought experiment called the Ship of Theseus:
If you replace every plank of a ship over time, until none of the original pieces remain… is it still the same ship?

He uses it to talk about identity, and it landed for me immediately.

Because biologically, we are also constantly being replaced.
Cells regenerate. Neural pathways shift. Hormones change.
We birth new versions of ourselves, especially postpartum. Don’t get me started.
We are cyclical. Experience rewires perception.

The girl you were at 12 is not the woman you were at 25.
The woman you were at 25 is not you now.
And the wise goddess you’ll be at 65 will not share all your current desires either.

We accept this easily in hindsight.
But somehow not in foresight.

We recognize change once it’s behind us,
but resist it while it’s ahead of us.

So when we make promises to our future self, we’re essentially making agreements on behalf of a stranger.
Vedantam says this outright, we’re making plans for someone we won’t fully recognize yet.

Which reframes everything:

If your future self is a stranger…
why are you assuming she has the same limits?

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☁︎ So why do we wait?

If our future self is genuinely different, then waiting to become her makes much less sense.

We tell ourselves:
“I’ll show up like that when…”
When the kids are older
When I’m more confident
When I heal more
When life is calmer
When I become her

But what’s often happening underneath is this:
we’re holding our future self hostage to our current self-image.

We assume we have to stay inside today’s identity boundaries until time upgrades us,
as if growth is something that happens to us, instead of something we participate in.

The Four Agreements describes this as the image of ourselves we learned early, the story of who we are and aren’t, quietly running the show long after it stops being true.
So we wait to feel different before acting different, not realizing the waiting is what keeps the identity in place.

But identity doesn’t change by waiting.
It changes through exposure. Experience. Permission. Action.

Or, more plainly:

You don’t become her later.
You become her the moment you stop asking your current identity for permission.

Looking back over the last ten years of my own becoming, it wasn’t the big leaps that changed me. It was the small, daily choices, the moments I stretched, tried, showed up before I felt ready.

Which led me to something both obvious and radical:

You can be an active curator of your future self.
Not someday. Not after everything aligns. Today.
One choice at a time. One small act of becoming a day.

So instead of waiting to become her…
what if you mapped her, and started now?

☁︎ Reverse-Engineer “That Girl”

Step 1:Brain dump her (page 1).
No editing. No perfection. Stream of consciousness.

Prompts: Who is she now? What does she prioritize? What does she no longer tolerate? How does she move through her day?

Step 2:Map her day (page 2).
Write her 24 hours, hour by hour.
What is she doing at 9am / 2:30pm / 7pm?

Step 3 :Map your real day (page 3).
Same thing. Honest + unfiltered.

Step 4: Compare + highlight the bridges.
Circle the 3 easiest differences (lowest-effort shifts).

Step 5:Pick ONE shift.
Make it embarrassingly doable. Start today.

Step 6:Repeat for 14 days.
Daily. No drama. No catching up. Just practice.

Step 7:Anchor it to an existing moment.
After drop-off / after coffee / before bed.

Step 8:Stack slowly.
When it feels normal, add one more. Then another.
Until your ordinary day starts matching your imagined one.

You’re not becoming someone new. You’re practicing being her.

☁︎ The paradox

If our future self is different… then the only way to meet her is to let ourselves change now.

Which means:
You don’t become That Girl later.
You become her by expanding who you allow yourself to be today.

And the funny part?

Your future self may look back at you, right now, with the same compassion you offer your past self:

“She was doing the best she could.”
“She was braver than she knew.”
“She was already becoming me.”

Maybe the quiet truth is this:

You’re not behind in becoming her.
You’re already on the way.

☁︎ Let’s talk about it

If you’re a glitter-crafting, curiosity-led, identity-expanding girlie like me, I’d genuinely love your thoughts.
Becoming is more interesting when we do it together.

If this kind of deep, joyful becoming is your lane too, you can subscribe below.
For now it’s free. Next month, Keeping It Fresco moves into a paid space, less than a latte, part magazine, part studio, part ongoing identity evolution.

I’d love to have you inside.

Leave a comment below & lets chat.

As always, from the kitchen table and with mucho amor,
♥ jazmin

Mom. Overthinker. Creative. Writer. Human. Not a robot.

If you liked this one, I picked a few more for you to enjoy.

Hi love. Come in. Sit down. Take a breath.

January took approximately 6 weeks and at least 3 personality shifts. It was loud and relentless in that very specific way where every headline, every reel, every person with a ring light and too much confidence before coffee seemed deeply committed to fixing your nervous system, your body, and your bank account, before breakfast, from your phone, with a course, obviously, and preferably in seven days or less.

Respectfully? No.

We survived. And the Bad Bunny concert is THIS Sunday, which honestly feels like a spiritual milestone. Eyyyy! Catch me dacing in my mom’s sala to celebrate.

Okay, Jaz. Chill out.

What I came here to write, for February’s challenge, is this thing I keep noticing, both in myself and in the women I deeply love.

As I was reflecting on January’s challenge and thinking about what I wanted to focus on for my own character development this month, it hit me: we already know how to do things.

We have the information. We’ve listened to the podcasts. We’ve saved the reels. We even have Notes apps full of wisdom we were absolutely convinced would change our lives if we just reread them someday.

(We did not reread them. But they’re still there. Waiting. Judging us.)

It’s not that we’re missing insight. It’s that insight alone doesn’t actually help when you’re trying to be a human person inside a real, messy life.

What’s missing is support while we try. Witnessing. Someone to sit next to us while we figure it out, rather than shouting instructions from the sidelines like it’s a group project we didn’t ask to be in.

I don’t want this space to be another thing you have to keep up with. I want it to be something you come back to. Like that friend you visit when you need to sit on the couch, drink something warm, laugh a little, and say out loud, “Okay. I’m not crazy. Same.”

February isn’t about learning more. It’s about letting what already matters to you actually take up space in your life. It’s about attention. About choice. About deciding, gently, imperfectly, what gets to shape you and what you’re done treating like an afterthought.

Becoming the main character of your story doesn’t mean consuming more content or reinventing yourself before Monday. It means noticing where you’ve been living on the margins of your own life and stepping back into the frame. Not dramatically. Not loudly. Just honestly. In a fun way.

In the way where you remember who the hell you are. That you’re sexy, yes, but also quirky, thoughtful, funny, and tender. That you’re a girl on this planet for the first time too, figuring it out as you go. That you’re allowed to take up space without apologizing for it or earning it first.

This isn’t reinvention. It’s remembrance. It’s embodiment. It’s coming back to yourself with a little sparkle, a little confidence, and that quiet internal moment of, oh yeah… her.

And with that said, let’s freaking goooo. Let’s get February started here at Keeping It Fresco.

February Vibe Check

Lets set the stage. February feels like bold cherry red and bubblegum pink paired with the grey of your favorite sweatpants. It’s deep chocolate brown and weighted blankets, but there’s lipstick on the nightstand now, because we’re still tired, but we’re trying and we are feeling a little spicy.🌶️🌶️🌶️

We’re still eating comfort meals. Still looping Bad Bunny’s DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS and Put Your Records On like they’re a coping mechanism we’ll unpack later. Still moms. Still human.

But we are officially done being optimized. Done being sold enlightenment wrapped in beige linen and urgency. Done being told we’d feel better if we just tried harder or bought one more system.

This month is about small pleasures. Sending your best friend a reel at midnight that says, “This is so you.” Enjoying things without earning them first.

Yes, even with kids. I have three boys. I would not lie to you.

The vibe still works with children in tow. We’re making Valentine’s cards without stressing. We’re leaning into nostalgia instead of perfection. Remember 90s classroom Valentine’s parties? Construction paper. Stickers. Emotional chaos. We get to relive that joy with them now.

This isn’t another thing on your to-do list. It’s something you get to enjoy. And if the cards are store-bought? That’s queen behavior.

February is Bell Hooks’ All About Love on the night stand. It’s finally making that reservation you’ve been “meaning to.” Writing love letters to friends, to your kids, to yourself. Eating dark chocolate with a heating pad on your period. Putting your phone on silent at 5pm. Taking yourself on dates.

Because despite everything happening in the world, all we really have is right now, and that deserves our full presence.

Now for the moment we’ve been waiting for… drum roll please.

February’s Challenge: Wait a Damn Minute… I Am THAT Girl

This isn’t a makeover. It’s not a personality transplant. And it’s definitely not a one-time pretend.

This is about practice.

January taught us discipline. Devotion. How to keep promises to ourselves even when it’s inconvenient. February gets to build on that, but with more pleasure, more joy, and way less grit-your-teeth energy.

The idea is simple: instead of waiting to become the version of yourself you admire, you start living like her now, in small, repeatable ways. Not perfectly. Just consistently enough that your nervous system starts to believe you.

Here’s how we’re doing it:

Step 1: Pick one “THAT girl” version of you per week.
Not the whole fantasy. Not the aesthetic. Just the version of you that feels most alive. Feel free to use your Vision Board for inspo.

Step 2: Name one specific thing she does.
Not her body. Not her vibe. The action.
She writes handwritten letters. She dances in the kitchen before coffee instead of doom-scrolling. She lingers over her thoughts. She takes herself on solo dates without apologizing or panicking.

Step 3: Put it on your calendar.
Schedule it. Decide when it happens. Treat it like a practice, not a mood.
You can choose one thing per week, or one small thing you do every day. Joy loves repetition. That’s how it becomes a habit.

Step 4: Track it in a way that makes you smile.
Add a sticker. Circle the day. Make a tiny note.
Not for productivity. For proof.

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My February lineup (feel free to steal this energy):

Week one: the girl who writes handwritten letters on cute stationery. It’s scheduled, and the photo is literally glued to my vision board from Pinterest.

Week two: the girl who writes poems like the feelings are pouring out of her pores and her notebook can barely keep up.

Week three: the girl who takes herself on solo dates without anxiety. There’s a photo on my vision board of a chic girl at an art museum mid–spiritual awakening. It’s on my calendar. I’m doing it.

I chose these three because they aren’t new dreams, they’re old loves. Things I used to do and genuinely loved before life, adulting, babies, hormones, existential spirals, and survival mode slowly pushed them to the side. This isn’t reinvention. It’s remembering.

Plot twist: I was never lost. I was just busy keeping everyone alive. Surviving, lactating, and dissociating.

💌 If you’re in, hit subscribe, tap the heart, and tell me in the comments which “THAT girl” you’re starting with. At the end of the month, I’ll pick one of you, reach out, and make you a hand-illustrated drawing, because honestly? This should feel fun.

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Why This Works (And Isn’t Silly)

Every woman I know is THAT girl. Every single one. And every single one thinks she’s not.

January was about holding things together. February is about permission.

When you stop waiting to be “ready” and simply try on the thing you admire, something shifts. You don’t become someone else. You remember yourself.

And honestly? Every woman I’ve ever met is the main character. The one people are drawn to. The one who makes rooms warmer just by being in them. I think you’re America’s sweetheart. A national treasure, truly. And it’s about damn time you believed it too.

Pretending changes things. Ask me how I know.

What’s inside February:

✍🏽 Two original poems, because feelings deserve art

💌 A family-fun Valentine’s guide (sweet, doable, zero perfection required)

🎈 A hosting guide for a very 90s-inspired Valentine’s party with friends and their kids

🎨 A coloring page of Bad Bunny lol (for your kids… or lets be honest, for you)

📎 Digital downloads & guides you can use immediately or save for the exact day you need them

💭 Real time essays exploring what it actually means to be that girl in real life (not the Instagram version)

The through-line:
This isn’t about becoming someone new. It’s about supporting who you already are and taking up space, even when you’re tired, covered in boogers, or stuck behind Karen in the pickup line.

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Where We’re Headed

By the end of the month, my hope is this: you feel less like you’re chasing a version of yourself and more like you’re living alongside the one you already are. Less pressure. More joy. More moments of, oh… same.

If this feels like sitting across from a friend who tells the truth, laughs with you, and hands you something useful without making it a whole thing, I’d love for you to stay. Pull up a chair. Subscribe if you want. We’ve got February. Vamos!!

With love,

Jaz

PS: If this made you smile, nod, or whisper same, that little heart button actually matters more than you think, and subscribing just means you get to keep your seat at the table. Tell me which “THAT girl” you’re starting with, and at the end of the month I’ll pick one of you, reach out, and make a hand-illustrated drawing of you. Because joy deserves witnesses. 💌

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P.P.S. One more thing, especially if you’re a mom. I want to say this clearly so you don’t miss it: this month isn’t for your kids. This one is for you. Yes, there will still be sweet family things and memories being made, but this isn’t another way to be a better mother or do more for everyone else. It’s permission to take up space again, to choose yourself without guilt, to remember that you are a whole person, interesting, creative, sensual, curious, outside of caregiving. You are not a supporting character in your own life, and you don’t need to earn rest, pleasure, or self-expression by burning yourself out first. This isn’t about fixing yourself; it’s about letting yourself be the main character inside the life you already have.

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Okay. Hi. I’m home.

Not home like I just walked in the door, but home like I finally exhaled after a long, overstimulating trip where I kept thinking about my to-do list the entire time.

This is the first What I Noticed & Loved of the year, and it feels like the kind of catch-up you have with a friend where you keep interrupting yourself with, “Wait! One more thing,” and somehow all of it matters.

Each month, I gather what I noticed, what I loved, what shaped me, and what I’m carrying forward. It’s part reflection, part roundup, part identity check-in. Less life optimization, more how did that actually feel.

You’re welcome to do this alongside me. Or you can just read, nod, and think, yeah… same.

Either way, I’m really glad you’re here.

If you read this and thought, oh, I like it here, subscribing and hitting the heart on the bottom of your email is the move.

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January’s Personal Reflection: Devotion

(or: the month that politely asked me to stop running)

January asked me to stay.

Not loudly. Not dramatically. Just persistently. Like a cat sitting directly on your chest.

This month wasn’t about creativity in the sparkly, Pinterest sense. It was about learning how to stay with myself when the spark faded. When the idea stopped being new. When boredom showed up with snacks and asked, so… what now?

I gave myself a creative challenge: to treat my life like a magazine. Not just writing pieces, but editing my attention. Choosing what made the cut. Deciding what deserved a full spread versus a single paragraph in the back.

Then I added a theme: My Kitchen Table Is Magic.

I thought it would be cozy. Candle-lit. A vibe.

Instead, it turned out to be… discipline. Which honestly was rude.

I followed my plan, not my mood, and I wish I had a cooler way to say this, but that one decision cracked something open.

I have AuDHD. I’ve known this for a while. But knowing something intellectually and actually building your life around it are two very different sports.

It wasn’t until I deleted social media in December that I realized how fragmented my attention had become. How quickly I reached for dopamine instead of depth. How often I confused stimulation with satisfaction.

January started strong. I was inspired. Motivated. Very main-character about it.

Then around day 16, my brain said, okay but what if we … don’t.

I was bored.

The kitchen table stopped feeling magical. I didn’t want to write about it anymore. I wanted novelty. I wanted to scroll. I wanted to abandon the theme and chase something shiny that would light me up faster.

So I re-downloaded Instagram.

And wow, within days, I felt it.

I wasn’t creating. I was consuming. I could feel the difference in my body. My energy dipped. My anxiety crept back in. I felt weirdly behind, even though nothing had actually changed. I’d open Google Docs, stare at the cursor, and close it like we were in a silent standoff.

Writer’s block. Resistance. Discomfort.

And for once, I didn’t leave.

I stayed.

I sat at my kitchen table and let myself feel what I’d been avoiding, the grief, the helplessness, the heartbreak I’ve been carrying about the world and our country. I sobbed. I stared at the portraits I illustrated of my grandmothers hanging in my home, like they were waiting to see what I’d do next.

Eventually, I wrote.

That sitting turned into an essay about them.
That essay turned into a deeper understanding of what the kitchen table actually holds. That understanding turned into poems, printables, guides all still rooted in the same theme.

Somewhere in the middle of all this, I realized something important: I desperately want to be out there, shoulder to shoulder with my community, fighting the good fight. But this season of my life, motherhood, babies, sleepless nights, means my resistance looks different.

It looks smaller. Quieter. Closer to home.

It looks like my kitchen table.

And somehow… I did it.

January now holds about eight pieces, poems, essays, printables, a hosting guide, all orbiting the same theme: My Kitchen Table Is Magic. I didn’t get to printing the magazine (my baby decided to cut all four canines at once, which is frankly villain behavior), but digitally?

It exists.

January became an issue of a magazine, not glossy, not perfect, but lived. Written between feedings, boredom, tears, devotion, and staying.

January didn’t make me more productive.

It made me more dedicated.

Things I Noticed & Loved

Part One: Things I Noticed & Enjoyed

This month, joy showed up when I stayed present and let plans bend instead of break, which is not my default setting.

Just like Pam from The Office, I felt God at Chili’s.

I was supposed to host a vision board party at my house. The day of, the school nurse called, one of my boys was throwing up. Old me would have spiraled. Cancelled. Sent twelve apologetic texts. Tried to reschedule six adult women’s calendars like it was an Olympic sport. Cried. Obviously.

Instead, something wild happened.

I stayed calm.

We pivoted to Chili’s.

We sat in a booth with scissors and glue, crafting vision boards over chips and queso like it was the most normal thing in the world. Our server hosted us like royalty. Strangers stopped to admire our work. We shared dreams and laughed until it felt… sacred. Unreasonably meaningful for a chain restaurant with a lava cake menu.

Another thing I noticed and loved was following my plan, not my mood. Literally.

Back in December, I dumped my entire mental load, meals, chores, rhythms, writing blocks… everything into a Week A / Week B plan and taped it to the fridge. No more mental juggling. No more standing in the kitchen wondering what’s for dinner while everyone asks me a million questions at once.

My nervous system noticed.

My PMS week and period week came and went without tears. Without crashing out. That alone shook me.

Discipline didn’t kill my joy.
It made room for it.

I also loved playing dress-up with my husband and going to an 80s-themed murder mystery party, which I now fully endorse as a life practice. Themed gatherings turn an ordinary night into something playful, memorable, and just unhinged enough to feel alive.

With my days steadier and my nervous system quieter, my inner world had more room to wander, which made what I read, watched, and listened to feel richer and more immersive than usual.

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Part Two: What I Watched, Read, Listened To, & Bought

What I read:
I read One Dark Window and Two Twisted Crowns by Rachel Gillig and became fully obsessed the kind where real-life responsibilities feel deeply inconvenient. Gothic fantasy, slow-burn romance, intrigue, devotion, and a literal monster living inside the main character’s head. A friend of twenty years gifted them to me, and I’ve decided that giving someone books and confidently saying “you’re going to love these” is a love language.

What I watched:
I watched Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein and was completely enchanted. The way he treats death, reverent, devotional, unafraid, reminded me of the catholic churches I visited as a child in Costa Rica, where Jesus, the saints and angels aren’t sanitized. They’re emotional. Bloody. Alive. The Telenovela drama of it all. The beauty and decay side by side felt familiar in my bones.

One line has been living rent-free in my head:
“To be lost and to be found, that is the lifespan of love…”

Was it motherly? Romantic? Something holy and unnamed? I couldn’t decide and I loved not having to.

What I listened to:
A longtime friend (not the same one, but they are twins, which feels important) recommended an app called Activations. She warned me it was cheesy and impactful, which sealed it. I listen while washing dishes like, hell yes, I’m meant for abundance, while scrubbing scrambled eggs off a pan as my baby splashes nearby.

What I bought:
That same friend got me hooked on Naturium. I struggle with dry skin and redness, and The Smoother Glycolic Acid Body Wash has been quietly excellent. I love when something simple does exactly what it promises. Chef kiss.

Things I Noticed & Loved

Part Three: What I Hosted, Crafted, Ate, & Made

What I hosted:
Family Fun Friday, something we do every week, hit differently this month when I realized it was our third month in a row of keeping it.One board game (Sushi Go Party), a hearty soup, cozy vibes. We rotate who chooses each week. It’s unfussy and consistently one of the best parts of our lives.

What I crafted:
Less with my hands, more with my attention. Poems. A creative journal. Junk-journaling with my boys, scraps, tape, markers everywhere. Just making because we were together.

What I ate:
Really well. Steak Sundays became a thing, my husband choosing a cut, opening a bottle of wine, taking his time. It ruined all of us, including the kids, for mediocre food.

What I made:
Space. To be present. To enjoy routines instead of rushing through them. To let small rituals quietly become the structure holding everything else.

Part Four: February’s Theme & Creative Challenge

January taught me devotion, how to stay when the novelty fades.

February is devotion plus practice.

Not hustle. Not self-improvement. Practice as in the small, repeatable acts that shape who you are when no one’s watching.

And yes, we’re going to romanticize the hell out of it.

January was about staying.
February is about returning, again and again, with fun.

Four weeks. Four playful identities:

✉️ Hand Written Letter Woman:
The woman who still believes words on paper mean something.

☕ Coffee Date Woman:
The one who treats a solo coffee like a sacred appointment.

🖼️ Art Museum Woman:
You know the Pinterest woman with the slicked-back ponytail staring at art like she’s having a spiritual experience, that’s the assignment.

✍️ Poet Woman:
The woman who writes because she has to, not because it’s good yet.

I’ll explore these through essays, guides, hosting, poems, and practice, and let you watch it happen in real time.

If you’re curious how it unfolds, that’s your cue to tap the heart and subscribe.

- Jazmin

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Author’s Note

This essay includes reflections on postpartum depression, intergenerational trauma, addiction, illness, and migration. I share these stories with care and respect for the people who lived them, and for those who may recognize pieces of their own lives here. Please read at your own pace, and step away if you need to. You are not required to hold all of this at once.

The ordinary is where the work remembers us.

The Ordinary Magic of the Kitchen Table

This January is my second month here, but my first full month showing up consistently. Writing regularly. Creating for joy. Letting myself make things without rushing them toward productivity or perfection.

I’ve been sitting with a question:
How do I grow something intentionally, without losing its soul?

Because I want the hosting guides.
I want the color.
I want the creative ideas, the whimsy, the fun.

And I also want the humanity.
The compassion.
The justice.

So this month, I chose an ordinary thing and decided to stay with it. To let it hold all of that complexity.

My kitchen table is magic.

Not because it’s extraordinary, but because it isn’t.

I love the idea of slowing down and focusing on something simple as a creative compass. So many of us walk around thinking,

I wish I were more fun like that mom.
I wish my house looked like that Pinterest photo.
I wish my life were interesting enough to share.

Comparison hums beneath everything now. Sometimes loud, sometimes barely noticeable, but always there. And I’m starting to believe the most radical thing we can do is log off long enough to interrupt it. Because once you disconnect consciously or not you start to notice something surprising:

Your life is already beautiful.
Already worth writing about.
Already made of the stuff dreams are made of.

Everything I’ve shared here so far has been bright and colorful, crafty ideas, hosting guides, poems tucked between the practical. And I love that. I believe in play. I believe in beauty. But I also feel a responsibility to go deeper.

There is so much heartbreak in the world right now. And some days I don’t know how to help. I worry that making cozy things - vision boards, rituals, poems, might feel tone deaf.

Like I’m arranging flowers while something is burning.

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So this is me writing with my heart exposed. Letting grief and gratitude sit at the same table. Making room for joy without denying the weight of what’s happening around us.

I was inspired to write this after reading an essay about family culture, about how what we practice inside our homes becomes the world our children inherit. Around the same time, I saw a simple graphic that read: If you have a gift that can bring more healing and hope to the world, now is the time to use it. If you have a gift for whimsy and wonder, now is the time. If you have a gift for community and connection, now is the time.

Those words settled somewhere deep in my chest.

Because I don’t know how to fix what is breaking globally, but I do know how to tend something locally. I know how to build small, colorful corners of care. And I hope this space can be that: a place for mothers who feel deeply, who want quiet evenings at home and joyful creativity and conversations about justice, dignity, and compassion. A place to share light without denying the darkness.

I’m 32. I’m a stay-at-home mom, and I’ve been a mother for over a decade. I’m navigating having a baby, not as a first-time mom, but as someone who knows how hard this can be. Eight years ago, after my second child, I fought for my life through postpartum depression. I’ve lived the exhaustion, the identity loss, the quiet darkness so many mothers carry. And I’m also on the other side of it now. I love motherhood deeply. It brings me so much joy. I feel enormous empathy for those still surviving it because I remember what it took to get here.

I know the dark. I’m not afraid of it.

And I still choose the light.

This is the lens I’m looking through, and now I’ll show you where it comes from.

Which brings me back, again, to the kitchen table.

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I am a child of immigrants. The first woman in my family raised in the United States. And the first mother in a long time who simply gets to be a mother.

My father’s mother had nearly a dozen children. My grandmother, Luzmilda.

Several of her children died. They lived in extreme poverty in Costa Rica, in a small house with dirt floors. She worked on a coffee plantation while pregnant until the day she gave birth. My father told me stories of her being beaten for letting him go to school instead of working. Of walking miles barefoot on dirt roads.

He also told me about the joy, of his mother & her friends working together, children in tow, surviving collectively.

And then there are the stories that still catch in my throat: how my grandmother was sold as a child. How my great-grandmother married a man who would only marry her if she sold some of her children. Luzmilda was one of them.

This was two generations before me.

Did they have language for postpartum depression?
Did they have time to sit with their children’s big feelings?
Did they have space for self-reflection?

Did they ever think their kitchen table was magic?

Did they, despite everything, still find small moments of laughter between bites of food, children talking over one another, stories told loudly, hands passing plates back and forth?

Because despite the heartbreak threaded through these stories, my father and his brothers and sisters talk about my grandmother as if she were the best, kindest, happiest mother of all. They remember her warmth. Her humor. Her presence. Not as a woman defined by what she lacked but by what she gave.

My mother and her sisters grew up in a home shaped by addiction. Abuelita Tere was brilliant, sharp-witted, fiercely independent, a nurse, a feminist, a woman who carried so much responsibility. She was also married to a man whose drinking, womanizing, and drug use fractured the safety of their home. By the time my mom and her sisters came home from school, Teresa was often already exhausted. Sometimes she took pills and put herself to sleep not out of neglect, but out of survival. There were things she could not fix, and this was how she endured them.

I hold so much compassion for her because of that. Because living alongside addiction leaves its own kind of residue. It shapes how love is given, how energy is rationed, how much a woman can offer on any given day.

And still, this is what matters, my mother and her sisters speak of Abuelita Tere with so much love and joy.

I was lucky. She visited me when I was a baby, and I got to know her, really know her, before Alzheimer’s took hold. Years later, I brought my oldest son home to Costa Rica to meet her when he was just one year old. Even as the disease softened her memory, there was still recognition in her touch, in the way she looked at him.

In her old age, my abuela was loved and cared for tenderly. She was surrounded. Even as pieces of her slipped away, she was held.

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So no, being a stay-at-home mom doesn’t feel small to me. It feels sacred. Because what if my grandmothers’ version of the dream was simply this:

to mother their babies with love, even inside lives that asked too much of them?

My mental health struggles don’t disappear in this context, but I recognize the profound privilege of even having the capacity to name them.

To say: I’m carrying too much.
To seek help.
To rest.

When I say my kitchen table is magic, I mean it because I get to do what my grandmothers could not. I get to sit at the table day after day without fearing hunger, violence, or abandonment.

So when I’m standing in my kitchen eating grilled cheese with my three boys, one crying, one talking over the other, one asking for more, I feel overstimulated. Overwhelmed. My nervous system buzzing.

And still, I pause.

Because sometimes the dream really is this simple.

A quiet life.
Being here.
Being present.

I ache for the mothers who don’t have this safety. For immigrants who are afraid. For families bracing themselves right now. I come from the eggs of those mothers. These are not distant ancestors. They are close. They are recent. They live in my body.

So how does writing help?

I can’t save the world. But I can tell the truth.
I can refuse to numb myself to the ordinary.
I can document what safety looks like when it finally arrives.
I can honor the lives that made mine possible.

And if peace ever comes, I don’t think it will arrive loudly.

I think it will look like this:

Food passed hand to hand.
Stories told slowly.
Children feeling safe enough to ask for seconds.

That’s the magic I’m writing toward.

That’s the work I know how to do.

— Jazmin Montero

With so much love, from my kitchen table.

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For my abuelitas Luzmilda and Teresa,
whose love lived between bites and stories.

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In December, I found myself cosplaying as a ’90s / early-2000s mom for 2 weeks.

You know the one.
The vibes. The outfits. The energy.

So now I’m wondering…

what if, in January, I cosplay as a magazine editor?

Just for fun.
Just to see what happens.

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But first, hola! I’m new here, and before I get ahead of myself, I want to build a little trust.

I’m not a fancy writer. I’m not an editor. I don’t have a master plan or a perfectly articulated identity. I’m a stay-at-home mom with three boys (9, 7, and 1), writing this from my kitchen table simply because it brings me so much joy.

I became a mom young. By 22, I was married, had a mortgage, and two kids under two. If you’re from Utah, that might sound normal. If you’re my family in Costa Rica or Quebec or friends in other states, it sounds… unhinged.

For a long time, I wondered who I might’ve become if I’d spent my twenties “finding myself.” Maybe a creative director. Maybe a children’s book writer or illustrator. Who knows?

I don’t sit with that question in regret anymore. I’ve grown really fond of the life I have. But I do believe some dreams don’t disappear, they just wait.

When my kids were old enough for school, I thought: This is my moment.
I had a job I really enjoyed, went back to school & finished my degree. I fell in love with studying people, how they think, what they need, what they quietly struggle with, and imagining how to turn that into something real.

And then life intervened.

My son went through a season of intense panic at school. It was heavy in a way that tightens your throat when you try to explain it. So we slowed everything down. I quit my job, and I homeschooled my two older boys for three years. I didn’t want learning to feel scary or curiosity to feel like pressure. We chose gentleness. We chose regulation. We chose each other.

Eventually (August 2025), that season passed. This year, he chose to return to school, and now he’s thriving. Truly. I could cry just typing that.

And on the other side of survival mode, I found myself in a quiet I hadn’t known in a long time, asking:

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What now?

Both big kids are in school full-time. I’m still home. I also have an 18-month-old I’m deeply obsessed with (yes, he may or may not share a name with Bad Bunny).

I don’t know what my next move is. But I want it to feel intentional. Aligned. Alive.

So instead of rushing to figure it out, I decided to return to something small and slightly ridiculous: a dream I never quite let myself try.

I’ve always wanted to create an online space where people have permission to explore their creative identities outside of what everyone (online + offline) says they should be doing. A place to be human. To create. To play. To experiment.

I’m building it here. On Substack.
Not for profit. Not for growth.
Just for the joy of making something again.

Because while I don’t always know who I am outside of caretaking, I do know this: I’m really good at following through on creative ideas.

Even in seasons when I felt like I had no “real” identity, career, or fancy title outside of being a mom, I was always creating, gathering people, learning new skills, saying yes to ideas just to see if I could bring them to life.

I put together a postpartum conference during postpartum depression because it felt like a creative challenge. I found ways to get my art into galleries. I built a community that grew through word of mouth and weekly gatherings. I painted a mural downtown, because why not? I illustrated, authored, and self-published an affirmation deck (pre-AI), just to learn how.

For a long time, I framed all of that as being “all over the place.” As proof that I’d sacrificed a career to motherhood.

Now I see it differently.

I see curiosity.
Follow-through.
Creative courage.

So here I am, on the other side of survival, kids in school, a baby on my hip, and for the first time… not ashamed that I love a good creative challenge.

Maybe I’ll go back to work. Maybe not.
But for now, I’m giving myself one creative challenge each month, and documenting it here.

I’ll take it seriously. And also not seriously at all.
None of the ideas will define my worth.

Keeping It Fresco is just a home.
A digital scrapbook.
A place to practice being alive again.

So here we are.
January 2026. I’m 32. I don’t know what’s next.

And for the first time in a long time, that doesn’t feel scary.

It feels open.

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January’s Creative Challenge

I grew up obsessed with Family Fun magazines in the ’90s and early 2000s. The monthly themes. The crafts. The recipes. The way each issue felt like a tiny world you could live inside for a while. I still have and use my Family Fun books!

Every issue had a focus.
A feeling.
A through-line.

That’s what I’m craving right now, not another goal, system, or reset. Just a lens. Something joyful to hold the month with.

So instead of resolutions, I’m giving myself a creative challenge.

The challenge is this:
for the month of January, I’m going to be the ✨magazine editor of my own life.✨

I’m publishing here on Substack as if January were a single issue of a magazine, one I’m making in real time. Essays, notes, observations, little experiments. Nothing polished. Nothing optimized. Just honest noticing.

The theme of this month’s “issue” is My Kitchen Table Is Magic, inspired by an essay I wrote last month that wouldn’t let me go. It felt like the right place to begin, grounded, ordinary, and quietly sacred.

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So this month, I’m inviting myself, and you, if you want, to try something simple:

✨ Be the magazine editor of your life.

That’s it.
No fixing. No optimizing. No becoming a better version of yourself.

Just noticing. Just paying attention. Just letting something small feel meaningful.

Start with three gentle steps:

1. Name your theme.
Silly, poetic, dramatic, anything works. You can even borrow mine, because I genuinely believe your kitchen table is magic too.

2. Choose three things you’ll pay attention to this month.
Not to fix. Just to notice.

Maybe it’s:

• Food

• Feelings

• Kids’ quotes

• Tiny joys

• Messes

• Rituals

Pick what feels alive right now.

3. Play around and document it through the lens of a magazine editor.
Nothing fancy. No rules. Just awareness and curiosity. See what happens when you treat ordinary moments like they’re worth observing.

As for me, I’ll be making little things inspired by this theme, an essay, a family fun guide, a hosting idea, a poem, maybe even a coloring page. No pressure to finish. Just letting it stay playful and alive. And i’ll share it all here just for the joy of it.

I’m also going to make a few spreads I won’t share here, little pages documenting each of my kids this month. Their words, their quirks, the tiny things I don’t want to forget. At the end of January, I’ll print it all out and keep it as a small family heirloom.

Will I print it like a magazine? Maybe.
Will I just print it at home and stick it in a three-ring binder?

…Probably.

And honestly, that feels perfect.

If this sparks something in you, take it and run with it. Make a Canva spread. Start a junk journal. Write notes in your phone. Or just sit at your table one night and think, Huh. This is kind of magic.

Interview your kids like they’re celebrities.
Pull quotes from their strange, brilliant observations.
Celebrate tiny wins like they’re headline news.

Motherhood is awkward. It’s tender. It’s strange. It’s repetitive and holy and confusing and funny, all at once.

This month, I’m choosing to navigate it with a little more joy, curiosity, and play.

Welcome to January.
— Jaz

Written from the kitchen table while my baby watches Paw Patrol, devours a peanut butter sandwich, and contributes by aggressively smacking my keyboard with jelly-covered hands.

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If this made something click for you, you can subscribe to read along this month, or reply and tell me your theme. I’d love to know what you’re holding January with.

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What I Noticed & Loved

What I Noticed & Loved is a monthly roundup of the good things in life and the sentiments I’m carrying into the upcoming month. Imagine we’re catching up over coffee, and we both are gushing about what we have been noticing and loving.

Please subscribe and comment what you are noticing and loving too!

At the end of each roundup, I will announce the creative challenge I give myself for the following month. Feel free to do the challenge with me, or not. It’s all just for funsies, really. Something to keep me, me, outside of being a caretaker.

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With that, the first month of the year has officially arrived.
(And we all agree that happened really fast, right?)

Stepping into December, I was genuinely looking forward to my boys being home for winter break. We’ve homeschooled for three years, and yes, we’ve always taken a break but this one felt different. It was their first public school winter break, and something about that shift cracked open a memory in me.

It made me think about being nine and how I spent winter break.

Watching movies we rented from Blockbuster.
Running errands with my mom.
My parents hosting dinner parties that stretched late into the night.
Sleep overs with my 3 best friends. (We name our selves PB4L (Peaceful Bitches For Life)
PBS Kids on repeat, because my parents never subscribed to cable.

And looking back now, I realize something: they had a really healthy relationship with technology.

Early 2000s.
It existed, but it wasn’t everything.

I can’t imagine what it would’ve been like to be introduced to the online world or cell phones in my late 30s or early 40s, instead of growing up alongside it. I’m in awe thinking about how the only place my mom probably got her Christmas inspiration was from the occasional episode of Oprah or flipping through a magazine in the checkout aisle at the grocery store. Imagine being a mom and not being bombarded by an endless loop of reels and influencers.

That realization planted an idea.

I wanted Christmas break to be just as fun and meaningful for me as it was for my kids. Because yes, this is their childhood, where Christmas is magical and full of wonder, and it’s also my first time on this planet. I love the magic of Christmas, and I get to experience it through the lens of motherhood, not just through memories of my own childhood.

So what did I do?

I challenged my husband and myself to delete all of our social media: Instagram, TikTok, Facebook. All of it.

That part wasn’t a secret.

What was a secret was the creative experiment I quietly gave myself next.

From the first day of Christmas break through January 1, I decided I was going to literally cosplay as a ’90s/early-2000s mom.

No algorithms.
No trends.
No endless scrolling.

Just vibes I half-remembered and a version of childhood I didn’t realize I was still missing.

And let me just tell you, it was THE best Christmas, holiday, winter break I’ve had in my nine years of being a mother.

Part One: Things I Noticed & Enjoyed

I really enjoyed taking my challenge literally: a ’90s/early-2000s Christmas.

Things I did:

• All social media deleted. No scrolling. No doom spirals.

• Landline logic: if someone needs me, the phone will ring. Phone stays on the counter. All notifications off except calls and texts.

• Screens ok, but make them nostalgic. ’90s–early-2000s shows, movies & video games on repeat. PBS Kids on heavy rotation.

• The kitchen table always had a board game or puzzle in progress.

• Pajamas until noon. Real clothes optional.

• Boredom allowed. Creativity encouraged.

• One shared computer. Take turns like it’s dial-up.

So what did that mean?

Instead of catching up on the latest season of Emily in Paris (bonjour, Gabriel 😉), I watched Friends and Gilmore Girls for the first time ever.

Board games, card games, Uno, and Clue, on repeat.

What décor was trending for Christmas 2025?
No idea.

I decorated using what I already had, added even more color with paper chains, and tied bows on everything using my collection of spare ribbon.

It was magical.

I never felt rushed.
I never wondered if my house was cute enough.
If I was doing enough to keep the Christmas magic alive.
If we had the latest toys.

Not once.
And I loved it.

If you think your clothes are ugly: delete social media.
If you think your house is ugly: delete social media and get off your phone.
If you think you don’t have enough things: get off social media.
If you think you’re a bad mom: get. off. of. social. media.

Get it?

I noticed something that left me in awe.

It was the first time in my nine years of being a mother that I wasn’t online, not on Instagram, Facebook, or whatever platform.

The first time I wasn’t following the latest mommy blog or wellness influencer.
The first time I wasn’t bombarded with reels telling me to comment GOOD ENOUGH MOM to get a guide on how to be better or more mindful.

I had the headspace to be the mom I’m meant to be.
To enjoy what I have.
Who I am.
And the life I’m creating.

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Part Two: What I Watched, Read, Listened To, and Played

This part was honestly so fun, because usually the only thing I’m watching is my phone.

Hear me out, yes, I’d put on Christmas movies with the kids, but every twenty minutes I’d be picking up my phone to scroll.

So was I really watching it?

My screen time used to be so high and so embarrassing… but also the same as everyone else’s, so maybe not that embarrassing.

Because, girl, look at your screen time. Right now boo, I’ll wait!
See? Same.
No shame here.

Deleting social media cleared the space for something else.

Almost every night (which sounds excessive, but it was the holidays, so whatever), we watched a movie from our list. Dad was home, he rarely takes PTO, so we did what the animals do and hibernated & watched movies on the couch.

We went on a Batman kick and started from the ’80s. One of my son’s middle name is Rocky, so of course we watched Rocky, which inspired my older boys to build the scrappiest makeshift gym in the backyard. Branches stuck into cinder blocks from the garden beds. Homemade weights. Absolute commitment.

I also started The Artist’s Way. I’m only on week two, but I’ve been doing my morning pages and writing so much.

When the kids said they were bored?
Cool. We have board games. Go grab one.

No social media in sight.
Heaven.

Here’s what filled the space instead:

Reading: The Artist’s Way
Listening: the Moulin Rouge! soundtrack and Destiny’s Child’s 8 Days of Christmas
Playing: Clue and Ticket to Ride
Watching: both of my sons’ puppet skits (on repeat), all the Christmas movies, and a very cozy lineup of rom-coms

And somehow, without trying, it all felt slower. Fuller.
Like we were actually there for it.

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Part Three: What I Hosted, Crafted, Ate, and Made

I decided to document this because this is my oxygen.

This year, I’ve prioritized doing at least one thing from this list every month, something that pours back into my cup. But in December, with both my boys and my husband home, I somehow managed to do all of it. Insert eye twitch lol.

My middle (7) had a hard time sleeping many nights, so we’d cuddle in my bed while I drew whatever he could think of.

Heavy lids. Quiet giggles.
A sheriff goldfish.
A princess robber snake.
Doodles of our favorite pastries.

My husband is a wonderful cook, and on Christmas morning he made the simplest breakfast, but it tasted so good and felt so special.

It was his favorite Christmas tradition as a kid. The fact that it traveled through time and landed in our kitchen with our own kids felt incredibly whimsical.

Best waffle and Italian sausage of my life.

Crafting all the Christmas things.
Volunteering with my baby at both kids’ Christmas parties.
Making the cutest ornaments.

When it comes to hosting, this is my go-to formula if you want to host without a sitter and still want it to be fun for everyone.

Not just something for kids.
Not something where adults have fun and kids feel left out.

The formula:

• Cook together as a family

• A board game

• Everyone brings their favorite snacks

• Bubbly for everyone: Martinelli’s for kids, yummy wine or cocktail for parents

Using this formula, I hosted twice during the holidays, and it never felt overwhelming.

Christmas Eve: Costa Rican tamales, kids and adults included. Clue while they cooked. Lounging, snacks, bubbly, and tamales for dinner.

Everyone left full. Relaxed. Happy.

New Year’s Eve: same formula. Two families in addition to mine. Nine kids. Six adults.

We cooked sushi, beginners, all of us. Kids included.

We ate. We played. We yapped.
We rang in the new year.

And not once did it feel like I was doing too much as a host.

PLEASE STEAL MY FORMULA.
I’m a believer in cute dinner parties with kids, because not everyone has a babysitter.

What I ate (my favorites of the month): Belgian waffles, big, fat, juicy Italian sausage, Costa Rican tamales
What I hosted: Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve
What I crafted: Gingerbread houses, hand made Christmas ornaments with my boys’ classes
What I made: this Substack (lol), poems, and lots of fun doodles with my kids

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Part Four: Things That Inspired Me

I feel inspired, relaxed, and creative, while also still wanting to hibernate, create quietly during nap times, and not run full speed into New Year goals.

I’m actually waiting until spring for that, which surprises me. The holidays usually leave me burnt out. Feeling inspired and rested is new territory for me, and apparently I’m struggling to articulate that clearly, but you get it.

So here we are. January.

The kids go back to school tomorrow.
The baby is napping.
I have my cold coffee.

And instead of scrolling, I’m here, writing and creating. I’m inspired.

Lately, I’ve been really inspired to find my personal style again. In college, I had so much fun with quirky thrifted outfits, and somewhere between becoming a young mom, Utah culture, and wanting to fit in, I started dressing only in what was “in style.”

And honestly? So far, it hasn’t brought me joy.

So in January, I want to challenge myself to build outfits using primary colors, using only what I have, like this mood board.

It’s gloomy and dark outside. Why not dress like a chic box of crayons?

Ooooh… should that be the name of this Substack?
Chic Box of Crayons.
I love. I’m obsessed?

Focus.
(Sorry, not sorry. ADHD over here.)

For a while, I was pursuing freelance illustration, but that got paused when I found myself pregnant again after six years. Now that beautiful baby is 18 months old, I want to get back to it, this time with children’s lit in mind. I’m completely clueless on how to do this, lol. But I’m inspired. Inspired to draw, write stories and try again.

I keep coming back to the work of Maurice Sendak (Little Bear, Where The Wild Things Are) and Richard Scarry (Busy Town) the instant nostalgia their illustrations give me is chefs kiss.

The smell of old library books, the memory of seeing the stamped card inside the cover showing every kid who read it before you.

Spending hours in the kids’ section.
Stacks of books.
Reading all of them.

Chills.

And finally, the quote that helped me stay inspired & commit to this entire challenge:

“I will never have this version of me again. Let me slow down and be with her.”

Before I close this out, I’m curious, what did your December look like?
What did you play, notice, eat, watch, or make? I genuinely want to hear all about it!

I’m carrying all of this with me into January, slowly, without rushing it. And instead of setting big goals, I’m giving myself one small challenge to stay connected to what brought me back to myself.

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January’s Creative Challenge

In December, I cosplayed as a ’90s/early-2000s mom.

So now I’m wondering…
what if in January, I cosplay as a magazine editor? Imagine! Ah, how fun!

I LOVED the Family Fun magazines and books in the ’90s and early 2000s. The monthly themes, the crafts, the recipes, the articles that were fun when I was a kid and somehow still feel fun now as a mom. (Yes, I still have my books.) Every issue had a focus, a feeling, a through-line. It gave you something to live inside for the month.

And that’s the part I’m craving.

Themes give shape to creativity. They narrow the overwhelm. They turn “what should I make?” into “what fits this story?” Magazines don’t try to do everything at once, they pick a lens and explore it from every angle. Essays, activities, visuals, recipes, stories. All connected. All intentional.

So for January, I’m pretending Keeping It Fresco is a magazine.

And the theme is:

MY KITCHEN TABLE IS MAGIC

This month, I’m challenging myself to create a full “issue” around that idea. I’ll start with a mood board very 13 Going on 30 energy, when our hero saves the day, obviously. Then I’ll follow whatever wants to come through:

A family fun guide.
A hosting guide.
An essay.
A short story.
A poem.
Maybe even a coloring page, because if I’m serious about my I want to be a full-time illustrator dream, I might as well put it to work.

Who knows? We’ll see what comes of this idea in February.

No pressure to make it perfect. No pressure to make it profitable. Just letting it feel whimsical, playful, and alive, like opening a fresh new issue of Family Fun and spreading it across the kitchen table.

And that’s how I’m stepping into January, not with resolutions, but with a theme.

I wrote my first essay here:

I even made myself an editorial calendar, printed it, hung it up, and decided to treat it like it’s my J-O-B.

Not in a hustle way. In a this matters to me way.

If any of this stirred something in you, I hope you follow it. I’d genuinely love to hear how your kitchen table holds magic, and what this theme opens up for you.

If you’re still here, thank you.

No links.
No affiliates.
No funnels.

Just a reflection of what I noticed, loved, and made space for this month.

Think of this as January’s letter from the editor, written from her kitchen, with crayons nearby, coffee going cold, and kids still home on break.

If you want to stay, subscribe.
If something resonated, share it.
And if you feel like saying hi, please do.

It’s comforting to know there are other humans here, noticing the same small magic.

—Jaz
from the kitchen table

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Okay, hear me out.

I’m pretty sure my kitchen table is magic.

Not in a Pinterest way. Not in a woo-woo “buy this candle and your life will change” way. But in a very real, very scratched-up, very smells-like-toast-and-old-coffee way.

This table has seen things.

I once leaned my entire body weight into it while I was in labor. I remember it clearly, Beyonce’s latest album was playing in the background, my hands gripping the edge, forehead almost touching the wood, breathing through a contraction that felt like my spine was trying to exit my body. The table didn’t move. Didn’t wobble. Just… held me. Like, “I got you. Don’t worry about me.”

Later, a different year, a different version of me, friends sat around this same table cutting out magazine words and glue-sticking dreams onto poster board. Vision boards. The cheesy kind. Except somehow, no joke, every single one of their goals showed up within the year. New jobs. Babies. Moves. Big, scary yeses. The table just sat there like, “Told you so.”

I’ve had heart-to-hearts here with other mothers. You know the kind. Voices low. Kids finally asleep. Someone says, “Can I say something that makes me feel like a bad mom?” And instead of judgment, there’s nodding. Long pauses. The hum of the fridge. The sound of someone exhaling for the first time all day.

Once, this is still one of my favorite memories: my brother sat at the head of the table and read aloud a chapter my then 8 year old son had written. It was Bowser fan fiction. Iconic. Truly incredible. When he finished, my family stood up and applauded like he’d just won a Pulitzer. He was eight. It was Christmas eve. The table remembers.

This table became our school room. When we suddenly found ourselves homeschooling. For three years, I taught my boys to read here, sounding out words between bites of toast, pencil shavings stuck to our elbows.

It became my journal. My altar. My therapist’s couch.
I’ve cried onto notebook pages here. I’ve ripped pages out and thrown them away like they never happened.

I’ve also had the stressful conversations here, the budget ones. The “okay but really, how are we going to make this work?” ones with my husband. Cold coffee. Open laptop. That one buzzing overhead light that makes everything feel more intense than it needs to be.

I’ve found myself again here too, drawing with my kids, crafting absolute nonsense, realizing halfway through that I’m actually having fun. Like, real fun. Not “this is good for them” fun. Me fun.

And somehow, this one still gets me, I healed a piece of my inner child just by sitting here eating dinner with my own kids, listening to them tell me about their day. Who they sat by. What made them mad. What was unfair. What was hilarious. Eight-year-old me is still somewhere under this table listening, like, “Oh. This is what we needed.”

Some nights, when we’re piled up laughing or playing cards, I feel this deep, unexpected peace. Other nights, I swear the table turns into a Michelin-star restaurant and I’m eating the best meal of my life even though it’s technically just eggs.

Some nights, when we’re piled up laughing or playing cards, I feel this deep, unexpected peace. Other nights, I swear the table turns into a Michelin-star restaurant and I’m eating the best meal of my life even though it’s technically just eggs.

This table has held so many versions of me.

The woman eating dinner with her kids.
The girl who needed someone to listen.
And the mother who spent long, quiet hours here, shoulders slumped, hair in a bun that had given up days ago, feeding her baby while the world went still.

So yeah.
My kitchen table is magic.

So if nothing else gets done today,

if the emails wait, the floors stay sticky,
and dinner is whatever you could pull together,

sit at the table.

Listen. Eat. Be there.

You might be raising your kids.
You might be healing yourself.
Most nights, it’s both.

See you next week, same table.

— Jaz

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You’re not imagining it.
And you’re not failing.

This week has weight.
Not because you’re doing it wrong, but because you care.

Somewhere along the way, motherhood picked up the quiet expectation that we will remember everything, coordinate everything, feel everything, and still keep the mood light. That we’ll carry the magic without showing the cost.

But here’s the truth no one says out loud enough:

It was never meant to all live in your body.

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You are allowed to pause.
You are allowed to say, “Not tonight.”
You are allowed to let something be unfinished.

Christmas doesn’t disappear when you rest.
Joy doesn’t evaporate when you ask for help.
Your family doesn’t lose anything when you take care of yourself.

In fact, this is often where the real magic sneaks in.

When you stop holding it all so tightly.
When you let someone else lead.
When you choose presence over pressure.

So if today feels heavy, let this be your permission slip:

Put something down.
Drink your coffee while it’s still warm.
Step outside for a minute.
Let the kids play longer than planned.

You don’t need to carry Christmas alone.

You’re doing enough.
You are enough.
And you’re allowed to feel the joy too.

With Love,

Jazmin from Keeping It Fresco

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