Hi Reader,

I hope your May is going okay so far. This week, my friend shared some wisdom with me that I wanted to pass along to all of you. As you might have read, my mom passed away last month. One of the surprising aspects of grief for me has been how exhausted I feel all the time, and when I mentioned that, Jenna shared, "The harder you fight the exhaustion, the longer you'll be exhausted." What a simple and obvious truth. But somehow, it is very difficult to remember at the moment.

Let's get to your Friday Five!

1. If you have flies in your house or office: Yesterday I was on a call with a client and she complained about flies in her house, so we chatted briefly about how to get rid of flies. This plug in light thing with a little sticky part has been working wonderfully on this situation in our own home since last summer. So low-key but incredibly effective.
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2. Setting alarms to stay present: I love connecting with others, and one thing that bugs me is worrying about losing track of time to get to the next thing. For example, if I'm grabbing coffee with a friend but need to pick up my daughter from softball practice by a certain time, I hate having to keep peeking at my phone to see what time it is. Or in a meeting with a client where I've got another client meeting shortly afterward. So here's what I do: I set an alarm for 5-10 minutes before I need to finish up. I tell the person I'm meeting with about this - something like, "I have to go pick up my kids from school at the end of this meeting, but I want to focus on our conversation instead of tracking the time, so I'm going to set the alarm on my phone so I can make sure I don't lose track of time!". Then, we can stay engaged deeply in the conversation and enjoy ourselves while letting technology do the work it's better at than our human brains - keeping precise track of time.
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3. Safest swimsuit colors: If you're in the market for a swimsuit for a child or beginning swimmer, consider bright oranges, yellows, pinks, or reds for safety. Read more here and see examples of what different colors look like underwater.
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4. Dollar Flight Club: I'm not sure how I never heard about this until now, but Dollar Flight Club is amazing. I feel like some of y'all knew about this and should have told me before. You sign up for a free account (or the premium is $1 to try, which is what I did). You put in your home airport + a handful of places you'd like to travel. Then they send you ridiculous deals on flight prices (for me, examples have been San Francisco to Costa Rica for $293 round-trip or Oakland to Paris for $497 round-trip). So helpful. Y'all get it and plan some trips!
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5. Check Your Sunscreen: I am embarrassed to admit that I went through our "sunscreen drawer" this week and realized that all but one of the bottles had expired. There was one from 2018 in there.😬 So check your sunscreen and get a fresh bottle to protect yourself if needed. If you have a flexible spending account (FSA) from work, sunscreen is an eligible purchase with those funds! I like to use FSAStore.com for simplicity since everything on their website is fully eligible.

There may be affiliate links in this email which means I may receive a commission if you purchase something through a link. However, please be assured that I only recommend products I have personally used and love!