Pop Culture Diaries: Carly Riordan
This week: an influencer and mom works on her son's Halloween costume while watching Gilmore Girls, listens to audiobooks, and watches Claire Saffitz recreate Uncrustables
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This week:
Name: Carly Riordan
Occupation: Influencer
Week Covered: October 13-19, 2024
SUNDAY
After what felt like a never-ending jam-packed summer, we are gloriously home for most (maybe even all) of fall. I’ve been trying to channel my best “90s mom” energy to create a magical and memorable (but not over the top) childhood for my two boys, Jack (3) and Rory (8 months). We have a rare day of zero social plans, which are my favorite kinds of days. I get a slow start to the morning, as I sleep through my alarm and my husband takes the first shift with our oldest. This means I miss the window to make the loaf of sourdough bread I was meaning to make, but the extra hour of sleep was more than worth it. Our big morning activity is a trip to the playground, where we plan to set up shop until it’s time to come home for lunch. I let Jack pick out a show to watch on my laptop in our bed (a real treat!) while I nurse Rory. Jack chooses “Meekah,” which is a spin-off of “Blippi” from the front page of Netflix Kids.
I have about ten minutes to sit alone enjoying my morning coffee. I got an alert that there’s a new installment of Oh Eight, one of my favorite Substacks, so I read that while I savor my coffee from my Ember mug– the only reason why it’s still a good temperature at this point!
The four of us head to the playground, scooping up breakfast from our go-to bagel shop on the way. Jack sings “Hot to Go!” by Chappel Roan the entire way there and it proceeds to get stuck in my head for the remainder of our visit to the park.
After lunch and settling the boys in for the afternoon nap, I take the next hour to decompress. I doomscroll a little on TikTok (I watch and rewatch all of Aspyn Ovard’s recent videos trying to figure out what it all means?! I have followed her Youtube channel for well over a decade!) and then finally put my phone down and pick up my Kindle to read the novel I’ve been slogging through: Long Island Compromise. We get a text message from my sister in law that they have an extra two tickets to see Encanto: A Sing Along Concert at our local theater so naptime is cut short and we seize the opportunity!
I realize I have seen Encanto before, but the sing-along component is quite fun. While I’m not a huge Disney person, I can’t stop thinking about how I would 100% go to a sing-along concert for Sound of Music or another movie like that. (Now I’m singing Encanto and not Chappel Roan, by the way.)
I pull my laptop out to edit photos when the boys are asleep. I find a recording of a conversation between Lauren Graham and Kelly Bishop at the 92nd Street Y to promote Bishop’s memoir The Third Gilmore Girl (I finished it on Saturday) and listen to that while I edit.
MONDAY
It’s a holiday so Jack is home from preschool. Later we are getting together with my in-laws to take family photos. I bring the boys to my gym where they play in the nursery (by the way, this is my number one mom hack, hands down) so I can squeeze in a workout. I am totally hooked on the SOTO method– it’s been a game-changer for me getting back into a workout routine postpartum. I downloaded a 20-minute Triple-A class and get to it. It doesn’t matter how many SOTO classes I take, they always surprise me with how difficult they are. I am shaking by the end of the twenty minutes. I fill up a cup of coffee (they gym has pumpkin spice today!) and run up to hop in the shower.
While I blow dry my hair and do my makeup, I start a new audiobook. I selected All the Colors of the Dark, which is a “Read with Jenna” pick. Her book picks are almost always wins for me so I trust the stamp when I see it on the cover of the book. I cruise through thirteen chapters listening at 1.2x speed, already hooked. It feels right to listen to a thriller in October.
After family photos are done (whew! A success!) and after putting the boys down for a late nap, I scroll through Elin Hilderbrand’s Instagram feed for more reading inspiration. She reads a lot and always shares the best books. I add Enter the Aardvarks to my TBR list. Unfortunately, our schedule is off and Rory is struggling to nap, so I put him in the car to drive through Starbucks and call my mom to hear how their hurricane clean up is going. Rory falls asleep (woo hoo!) and so I pull back into our driveway where we hang out until he wakes up. I sit in the front seat reading Long Island Compromise with the Kindle app on my phone.
The boys play in the playroom while I fold laundry and we bop to a Raffi playlist on Spotify. I love listening to children’s music (maybe a hot take?) and there’s something extra special to me listening to the music I grew up listening to. Though we listened to Raffi on cassette tapes in a boom box, this is the ultimate nostalgia.
Mike is watching Industry in the family room while I get a loaf of sourdough ready to proof overnight. In between stretch and folds I find myself paying attention even though I haven’t been watching. I think I might try to catch up with him so we can watch it together. Finding a show to watch together is always a challenge! We have such different interests, but it’s one of our favorite nightly traditions. If we don’t have a show lined up, we almost always end up watching cooking shows on Youtube– Claire Saffitz is my favorite.
My dough is resting in a bowl under a wet tea towel and I’m back upstairs to work for an hour or two. It’s one of the biggest blessings that I’m able to create my own schedule for work. I work almost every night right now and while I’m very tired, I am extremely grateful for the flexibility. Tonight, I’m working on a blog post for tomorrow and putting together a Canva collage. I split the screen on my Macbook (I’m working in bed) and pull up Shelby Church’s latest vlog. I love her channel!
TUESDAY
Mike drops Jack off at preschool this morning and I have some time to get my sourdough out of the fridge to finish stretching and shaping it before baking. Rory is playing on the ground with some toys practicing his crawling and I listen to the What We Said podcast episode that dropped this morning. Jaci and Chelsey are so funny and they’re both in similar stages of motherhood as I am so I always love their personal anecdotes as well as the listener stories that people submit. Over the past couple of years I have gotten so into podcasts– they’re perfect to tune into when I can’t focus completely on a book and I kind of love how it feels like you’re in a conversation with friends. Do I find myself wanting to chime in and add my own input?! MAYBE.
I take Rory to his gymnastics class in the middle of the day. It’s my favorite activity with him and the music is always bopping. Today the class kicks off with S Club 7– a huge throwback for me. My sister and I were absolutely obsessed with S Club 7 as kids. We watched the tv show once during a very rainy beach vacation if memory serves correctly and we were instantly hooked. The two of us, and our friends, were constantly choreographing dances together and I think a good 75% of them were to S Club 7.
One of the things I look forward to the most with my boys is reading during bedtime. Even on crazy days when it feels like everything is hitting the fan and falling apart and we’re all hanging on by a thread, we can count on books at bedtime. Tonight Jack picks out Jack and the Beanstalk, a library pick that we have read so many times he can recite it by heart already. We read a couple of Halloween books next. Room on the Broom was our favorite last year and it still reigns supreme and The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything is new to our repertoire.
I get into bed myself to needlepoint. I recently finished Rory’s stocking, a huge undertaking that took all of my needlepointing energy. I have two projects that I’m working on now and tonight I decide to stitch a custom canvas of our house tonight. (The other canvas is a Chili’s matchbook!) I prop my laptop up to watch some television while I stitch. I am working my way through Call the Midwife and I’m almost caught up to the last season. Call the Midwife is such a cozy, very British television show with a cult following. I started watching it at the beginning of this year and have just fallen in love with the characters so, so much. Even though the topics can be a lot to handle (think any and everything related to women and women’s health), I find the show so relaxing and uplifting.
WEDNESDAY
I’m up at 4am to nurse Rory and I open up TikTok on mute to try to stay awake. I’m watching videos with captions and a video talking about a new docuseries called “Anatomy of Lies” pops up on my FYP. I have a running list of television shows and movies that I want to watch because I have a terrible memory and if I don’t have a list of things to watch I’ll end up watching the same movies and shows over and over again. I haven’t heard of this story though– a writer from Grey’s Anatomy lied about a bunch of things, including faking cancer. I somewhat recently listened to the “Scamanda” podcast with a similar story, so I am intrigued.
My alarm goes off at 5:15. I usually don’t get up this early, but Mike is leaving for a trip and I have to get ready before the boys wake up so I can handle the morning solo. I am pretty into my audiobook already (sometimes it takes a while to get into one so this is exciting and a good sign!) so I’m excited to listen while I’m doing my least favorite activity: blow drying my hair. My boys sleep in longer than expected so I actually have time to sit in bed, hair and makeup fully done, with a cup of still-hot coffee (thank you Ember mug) and my Kindle! Major mom win; though I’m annoyed that waking up early really is worth it.
I am working through a list of tasks for various sponsored campaigns that are due this week. During mundane tasks, like steaming clothes and setting up my cameras, I listen to Elin Hilderbrand’s podcast “Books, Beach, and Beyond.” It’s probably my favorite podcast right now and I’m a little sad to realize it’s the final episode of season two. However, it’s with Ina Garten as part of her memoir promotion so I can’t wait to listen. I listen on and off all day and have a few minutes left, which I’ll save for tomorrow.
Since Mike is out of town, once the boys are asleep, I get started on prepping the pattern for Rory’s Halloween costume. I print the digital download from Etsy and watch Claire Saffitz recreate uncrustables while I cut the pattern pages.
THURSDAY
I sleep through my alarm but wake up on my own with a start. I’m shocked to find both of my boys still sleeping. I tiptoe downstairs and brew a cup of coffee. In a few minutes, they’ll wake up so I take the gifted silence and read The Weekly, a fantastic installment of Gabby Whiten’s Substack. It feels like the old school magazine spreads I used to love in the early aughts.
This is a busy workday for me, but I still want a little background noise while I’m on my computer. My husband usually works from home, but since he’s out of town, I do something I rarely do: I turn on cable news. I used to watch the news religiously and stopped during the pandemic, preferring to consume my news content by reading. My mental health is better for it! I instantly regret it as I get a pit in my stomach whenever I do this… but with the election coming up, I just couldn’t resist. It does serve as good background noise though– I forgot just how frequently they play commercials, especially midday.
I have a little more work to do after the boys’ bedtime and I stream Netflix with a split screen. I have watched Gilmore Girls straight through a number of times and find it to be the ultimate comfort show. It hits different during the fall.
FRIDAY
My to-do lists on Fridays are usually a mile long. This is the day when I try to get everything done that has slipped through the crack during the week before heading into the weekend. I used to work a lot on weekends, but I realized I was never giving myself a conscious break. With kids now too on a very traditional schedule with preschool, I like giving them my undivided mom attention. If I have to work, I’ll make sure it’s during their naptime or (as a last resort) after bedtime. Because of this, I find myself with my nose down scrambling to cross everything off. While driving, I listen to my audiobook and that’s about it!
After Jack and Rory go to bed and with Mike on a red eye heading home, I have the evening to myself. A rare Friday “treat” for me! I'm still working on Rory’s Halloween costume. I take over the kitchen island– a really natural craft table in my opinion! It’s the perfect height– and start to cut out the pattern, iron the fabric, and then cut the fabric. This is pretty mindless so I start to rewatch Tell Me Lies on Hulu. I watched it when it originally came out and didn’t even realize a second season was coming out. Everyone is talking about the show right now though and I want to watch… but I figured a rewatch of season one (because I can’t remember anything apparently!) is not a bad idea. It does start to come back to me and I realize that Catherine Missal, who plays Bree, looks very familiar. I’m pretty sure she was on a reality show as a kid that my sister and I watched??? I can’t find anything about it on Google though. Something on Oxygen where her sisters were all trying to become actresses but the talent scout gave her the star role? I cannot be the only one who remembers this!! This question nags at me all night while catching up on the show!
SATURDAY
In the middle of the night, I pull up Real Simple magazine while I’m nursing Rory. I love that I can read magazines with Kindle Unlimited on my phone. It’s not exactly the same as holding a magazine in my hands, but it certainly scratches the itch!
Mike arrives home (woo hoo!) and after Jack’s soccer class, I drop them off at the smoothie shop in town. I head home for a few hours of quiet in the house while they hit up the playground before lunch. I take this time to really crank through the majority of Rory’s costume. Yes, I thought I chose an ~easy~ sewing pattern that I could whip through in an hour. Yes, it’s taking me hours longer than expected. It has a lining though, and I have to admit that the costume looks and feels like something Pottery Barn Kids would sell. Unlike needlepointing, sewing tends to take up a lot of my mental energy with problem solving and creative thinking. Instead of watching a show, listening to a podcast, or listening to an audiobook, I opt for music today. I listen to Sabrina Carpenter’s Short n’ Sweet in its entirety and then switch to (drum roll) a playlist called “ICONIC Broadway BOPS” on Spotify. After listening for about an hour, I can confirm it’s boppin’. I have already been counting down the days until Wicked launches in theaters and now I truly cannot wait. I rarely see movies in theaters anymore, but I will be prioritizing seeing this one on the big screen!
Pop Culture Round-Up: Carly’s Week in Review:
Books:
Taffy Brodesser-Akner. Long Island Compromise
Jessica Anthony. Enter the Aardvarks
Kelly Bishop. The Third Gilmore Girl
Julia Donaldson. Room on the Broom
Chris Whitaker. All the Colors of the Dark
Linda Williams. The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything
Magazine:
Movies
Music:
Chappell Roan - “Hot to Go!”
Raffi playlist (YouTube Channel)
Sabrina Carpenter’s Short n’ Sweet
“ICONIC Broadway BOPS” on Spotify
Newsletters:
Oh Eight (Gabby Whiten’s Substack)
The Weekly, a fantastic installment of Gabby Whiten’s Substack
Podcasts
Books, Beach, and Beyond (Elin Hilderbrand’s podcast)
What We Said podcast episode (Full podcast available here)
Shows
Social Media
Elin Hilderbrand’s Instagram
Tik Tok:
TV:
YouTube:
Lauren Graham and Kelly Bishop at the 92nd Street Y
Claire Saffitz recreate uncrustables
Keep up with Carly!
Follow more of Carly’s pop culture recommendations (and more) on Carly’s Instagram TikTok, or Website. She also just dropped her gift guide (which is amazing!)
Call Me! (or not!)
I’d love to hear from you! Drop your thoughts in the comments to share with the Landline community, or reply to this email to contact me. You can also find me on Instagram, or email me. I don’t have a dedicated phone line yet (just like in my youth), but maybe someday I’ll achieve Claudia status and get a Landline.
Thanks for reading!
This is a free post for subscribers of Landline. Consider subscribing to the paid plan to get my weekly email of recommendations and links, a podcast episode, and more! You can also help me spread the word by sharing it with a friend who would love it. Thank you for being a friend!
Note: All books referenced in Landline can be found in my bookshop.org storefront from which I earn a small percentage of all books purchased.
There is a Sound of Music sing-along at the Hollywood Bowl every summer, and it's just as magical as you would hope it would be.
Thanks for letting me do the series!!