The Latelies {2025} // July and August Edition

~ Tracy Erler

Vol.1, Issue 6 // Mostly everything we’ve read, watched, played, and listened to these two months

Summer is ending! What in the world is going on? At the end of May, Summer always seems to stretch before me with so many potential adventures waiting, and now here we are as it winds down. Technically, there’s still 20ish days of summer depending on when this rolls out and since September 22nd is the first day of fall. But my niece and nephew are the last kids to return to school (the first week of September) and the older daycare kids have moved onto Kindergarten and TK, and so it feels like Summer is ending.

I’ve also, for the past four Summers including this one, have marked them by which Stephen King novels I’ve read and movies I’ve watched. I can’t believe my fourth one (the fifth one overall!) has ended.

It has been quite the Summer, and I’m so thankful for it. I’m also, so thankful for the stories we read, watched, listened to, and the games we played.

Reading // What a glorious two months of Story! Have you read any of these? Which one or two or three (heehee) are you curious about?

Watching // Sharing the movies and shows and anime playing in the Hobbit Hole

  • Avatar the Last Airbender (2005-2008) // Halfway through Book 2 I believe! Well, that was in July. As August ends, we are starting Book 3! I’m nervous and excited to see how this show ends.
  • Gurren Lagann (2007) // “Overall, I thought it was decent slash okay.” He finished this mid-July.
  • The Prince of Tennis (2001-2005) // He really likes this one so far! “And  a little more rarely, I like the intro song.” – Ant. There are 178 episodes and at the beginning of the last week of August, he is 12 episodes in.
  • Firefly // I finished this today! I watched episode
  • The Outsider (2020) // I watched episode one, “Fish in a Barrel”, with the Stephen King Summer group and it was scary but sooo good. I’m so curious about the novel and the rest of the books that SK’s character Holly Gibney makes an appearance in.
  • Paddington (2014) // I watched this twice. The first time on my own because Ant seemed really hesitant. But, upon watching it, it’s creatively written and produced and it’s funny, so I had Ant watch it with me anyways. It’s a fantastic movie!
  • Paddington 2 (2017) // I really wanted to watch the second movie before the third one at our park’s movie night, so I asked Ant if I could have the next two movie nights to make this happen and he agreed. (Obviously, he got three movie nights in a row! We’ve watched two so far!). This might be the best sequel in existence of sequels. I laughed, I bawled, I loved. A Paddington fan for life. This movie is magical.
  • Ralph Breaks the Internet (2018) // We had our Azzie date mid-July and we always let the kids pick a movie. This was Azzie’s pick. Not my favorite sequel (lol). I just…Ralp fighting Evil Ralp at the end hits hard. But, my reasoning for not wanting to see this movie again is not Azzie’s responsibility, so we forged ahead. It still hit hard for that reason and for a different one this time around (long distance friendships *sobs*), but it is so creative and very funny. While I’m not adding it into my movie-watching rotation, I am glad I have seen it again.
  • Paddington in Peru (2024) // The third Paddington movie under the stars at our local park, the last Summer Movie Night of the year. It was so fun! I think the director was different and the movie felt more adventurey, but it was still very much a Paddington film. I did cry at the end. I’m adding all three of these films to my wish list.
  • How to Train Your Dragon (live action, 2025) // Family movie night with Voylerwood Clan! It was loud and we talked a lot through this movie. Thankfully, we were at home and Ant had to skip out because he wasn’t feeling well. What I saw and heard, it is a very well done remake. I’d have to watch it again to really take it in.
  • Ratatouille (2007) // Ant’s first of three-in-a-row movie night picks! We (spoiler alert!) juuuust finished recording Disney Dreamlight Valley this week and Remy is featured in the game, and so he chose this film. *sigh* it’s just sooo good. Classic Disney movie.
  • Pulp Fiction (1994) // We tried, you guys, we tried. We will sometimes do these movie quizzes on YouTube—where you have to guess the title by the scene or music or something, and this movie is ALWAYS in them. Always. Along with The Godfather and Interstellar haha. However, we made it like 20 minutes before having to turn it off. Samuel L. Jackson’s character was phenomenal and I was really curious how they were going to connect it to the opening scene in the diner, buuuut there were a lot of unnecessary f-bombs in that first 20 minutes. We don’t love cussing, but in stories we understand that writers and directors can make that choice, and we’re okay with it if it seems to support the story, fit a character, etc. This felt like too many for us personally. So, Ant chose *drum roll, please*…
  • Monster’s Inc. (2001) // This film! The fourth Pixar film. Wow. Only the fourth. This is classic Pixar. It’s so good, you guys. We hadn’t seen it in so long.
  • People You Should Know (2025) // The first season (?) of Mike Rowe’s new show on YouTube. He travels around the states and interviews people who are making a difference in the working world. I’ve watched episodes 1, 2, and 4. I accidentally skipped episode 3 and will watch it soon!
  • Critical Role: Vox Machina // Ant finished episode 80, the one where Vox Machina are trying to figure out what to do next and Pike has Doty draw each member of VM to help Tary learn their names. He also started episode 90; shenanigans ensure in Vasselheim!

Listening // Favorite tunes we’re dancing to and maybe a podcast or too. (Also, we wrote a birthday song to the tune of “DK Rap (from Donkey Kong 64)” and miiight’ve dressed like ’90’s rappers =D)

I really want to include songs that I’ve discovered thanks to my Release Radar, so I figured it would be easier to make a “new discoveries” playlist:

Obsessed with these new releases by Dave Barnes. An album release is coming, but I don’t know when it is!

And Walker Hayes’ newest album 17 Problems

Here’s some songs that Ant has especially enjoyed these past couple months:

Podcast episodes:

From The Way I Heard It With Mike Rowe:

Playing // The games we’ve played this month. Wow, did we play a lot!

  • Wordle // puzzle #1,503 solved with word FRILL, bringing the streak to 17! Successfully solved puzzle number 1,534 with word PETAL, bringing my streak to 48 *confetti*
  • Waffle // Puzzle #1,288 solved. Holding onto #wafflesilverteam! Streak on 8/31/25 is 53, and I’m back on the gold team!
  • Dead of Winter // A mostly co-operative zombie apocalypse board game. The players are all make up a band of survivors, and we play through the game as if we’re searching deserted buildings in the town for supplies—like the library, school, hospital, gas station, etc. It’s sooo hard and yet super fun. There’s also a fun twist of a secret betrayer. So we each have a card with 1-3 secret objectives (even if you’re not the betrayer). We’ve never won this game. I’ve never been the betrayer. I won as the betrayer! Such a great moment =D
  • Maracaibo // Players are playing as explorers in 17th Century Carribbean. It’s such a fun resource-collecting game. It’s in my top games for sure! Ant and I played this again as a two-player game in mid-August while I was housesitting and it is a great two-player game!
  • Silver & Gold // From Board Game Geek’s website: “Flip cards, complete islands, and score points in this Flip ‘’n Write”! It’s fun!
  • Ant and Rob had a game day and got to play Monumental, Architects of the West Kingdom, and Overboss.
  • Patchwork // Ant and Azzie played this for the second time. A two-person quilt-building game.
  • Through the Desert // Placing camels around oases on a board designed like a dessert.
  • Forest Shuffle // A card game where you’re building a forest with trees, plants, birds, bats, rodents. One of my favorites!
  • Architects of the West Kingdom // Ant really wanted Lauri and to play after playing this with Rob earlier in July. Players collect resources to build buildings, hire apprentices, all to gain the most victory points.
  • King of Tokyo: Power Up! // Classic monster board game! We actually played one round of Speed-okyo (where we try to beat the game in 10 minutes or less). We haven’t played either way in years, so it was fun to play again.
  • Pyramix // Players are pulling apart a pyramid made of dice and trying to collect the most of one of the four colors. We played with Rob and Renate and it was mine and Ant’s first time playing. It was so quick, we played two rounds!
  • Thunder Road Vendetta // A car racing board game where shenanigans and chaos ensure. Helicopters, guns, accidents all waiting to happen!
  • Arcs // I feel like Board Game Geek describes it best with this: “Lead a spacefaring society through an epic saga.” There’s a lot of little details to remember but just think space battles and you’ll be okay! Only our second time playing this, but I enjoy it a lot!
  • Scrabble // Yay Scrabble again! The score was 233-219, Ant. It was our second-closest game; we were neck-in-neck almost the entire time. Some of my favorite words we played: BLEEDS, YEAST, TINTED, VERGES, GRIDLOCK, and KOW.
  • The episodes of Disney Dreamlight Valley we recorded this month // We beat the story quest! We did not expect Episode 14 to be our final one of this game, but here we are. Two games won and recorded in juuuust under a year of starting this YouTube Channel. WOW. We are recording a bonus episode during this last week of August, but it’ll go live in September.

And there we have it! A month’s worth of stories and games in various forms. Your turn! What did you read, play, listen to, or watch in July? Is there something else you enjoy that you do more regularly than one of my latelies? Did you knit, bake, sew something, or hike somewhere this month?

My hope for these monthly roundups is that you find something—book, game, music, or movie-wise—that piques your interest. If you have any questions about any of it, feel free to ask!

Share to the extent that you’re comfortable 🙂 I’d love to hear from you!

Happy Summer, my friends!

Leave a comment