In My Home This Week: Whew!

In my home this week...

...I am shocked at how quickly May is going.  The month is half gone!  I feel like I've worked hard all month long and yet I'd be hard pressed to show you any amount of work done.  This despite decluttering all sorts of computer things and blog list and emails and old blog posts that I can't print off nor keep forever apparently after I lost something like ten years of work that I'd saved.  I've been slowly shutting down two mail accounts while I move to a different server and that's meant countless account updates and email updates, etc. 

I've been finishing up books I'd started reading and writing countless posts for Charm School.  I think I have two weeks of posts to go on that score and we'll finish it off.  I have appointed tasks to do each day and each week and the house and yards are looking spruce.  I've knocked out a lot of my shopping tasks which is saying something because I don't really spend a lot of time contemplating shopping nor making time to do much of it.  So yes, May has flown past and I've been busy working away.


What's more Spring is passing quickly by as well.  The skies are bright until nearly 9pm each day now.  It makes me work longer and harder and I'm rising earlier now that it's daylight by 6:30am.  I have witnessed the loveliest of sunrises on those mornings when I take time to stop and watch.  Sunrises are the very best accompaniment to coffee first thing each day.

Our little bird that  nested on the back porch these past three springs finally appears to have raised a little family to fledgling status.  She spent a whole week chirping away and dancing up and down the porch railings and calling out to them.  I looked in the nest Friday morning after a quiet morning and they were all gone.  No more little birdies.  No more Mama calling them to come fly away.  Now we move the old metal cabinet off the porch.  Yes, we left it alone just for her to raise that little family.  She's had such hard luck with her nesting that we hadn't the heart to be the reason of another failure.  I'm curious if she will find a new spot to nest on the back porch next year.

As we pulled up to the house today, I noted to John that I really wanted the front landscape of the house to look as nice as the back part does.  I suggested we skip making the flower bed about the old tree stump and concentrate on the body of the house first.  I think I just made up my mind to work on a summer project.  Oy!

Mother's Day here was just lovely with texts, phone calls and sweet Facebook posts.  John made a big fuss too which is unusual.  We agreed long ago that I wasn't HIS mother and that arrangement suited us both but this year he not only purchased a glittery card for me, he made me an elaborate meal with all my favorite sorts of things including a dessert to follow things up.  He wouldn't hear of me doing a thing and was a little perturbed when I stepped into the kitchen to clear up but honestly, it was just a matter of rinsing and loading dishes and wiping off the one counter and stove.  Less than five minutes and done. 

At church today I did my level best to sit properly, to walk with correct posture, etc.  Ladies, that is hard work when the body is unaccustomed to it but I'm not giving up.  I'll get these muscles trained and my posture corrected, yet.    Charm school has been, in it's own way, as rigorous as boot camp!  I may sound like I know it all in reading the posts, but I assure you that I'm learning and training as I go and it's intense.  There's plenty to learn, yet. 

...I plan my work:

I have several posts to finish  for next week.  I've a full week of posts ready to go for this week.  I think one more week will finish us off for Charm School but we'll see.  It may well last through the end of May, but I'd really like to finish it up since that last weekend is a holiday weekend.

I want to work on my shoebox meals this week.  I've saved a couple of spice and prescription bottles to use to add seasonings to.  I want to write out a menu card to put in each box and see what else is needed to complete those I've started.  Then these will be ready to pull when I need a desperation menu plan.

I want to go over my bookcase once more.  I have that one shelf of unread books that really does need to be culled. 

If it is decently cool I mean to go out to the shed early and pull things for a donation box.  I did find my 'lost treasures' last week but I was too busy to contemplate actually culling things in the shed.
If things go well perhaps I can also drop a donation off at the thrift store, too.

Plan out two weeks of menus to finish out May.

Continue working on my summer menu.  I haven't found any cooler summer meals yet, but I plan to pull the June vintage magazines and hopefully will find a few ideas.

Make the other two sundresses into skirts.

Set up another week of outfits.  Cull closet items.  I need to be more ruthless.

We have a supply of a few of our prescription medications, mostly Metformin.  I want to use them in order of about to expire date instead of randomly.  I'll be using stickers to put dates on in bigger numbers so I'll know at a glance what we've got and when it needs to be used.  John just gave me a couple more shoeboxes and I may use one of those to help better organize them all.

...I plan meals:

Hot Dogs, Fries, and Cupcakes....I had another meal in mind entirely but John wasn't on board with it at all.

John made dinner for me: Steak, Baked Potato, Salad with fancy lettuces, cottage cheese and a pesto vinaigrette (be still heart, be still) and apple pie for dessert.  It was super!

on my own x3

Tuna Pasta Salad, Saltines, Tomato Soup
I'm going to try and make less of this recipe instead of the usual 'we're feeding a family of seven from this' proportions.  I will put some in one of John's work lunches which will make him happy.

Italian Sausages, Mixed roasted vegetables, Crusty bread and Green Salad

...I do not plan leisure...


I'll take it where I can find it this week.  I want to do too much and planning in quiet time is not going to see it all accomplished.   I'll take time out for a spa morning though towards the end of the week because my current pedicure will be two weeks old.

With John working three days I'll be up extra early three mornings and that means an early bed time for at least two of those nights and possibly the third as well.  That will sustain me and then we'll have the weekend to recover.

2 comments:

Lana said...

Happy Mother's Day! Nothing went as planned here today but it turned out nice anyway.

Debby in KS said...

Terri, have you noticed with your better posture that you're finding some new muscles? I remember noticing that!! Especially in the area of my core, from my stomach around to my back, just below breast level.

Mother's Day was so beautiful that we decided to go for a drive after church. We went on a housing quest to see what's out there in case we decide to downsize. I had jotted down a couple of addresses in nearby towns and went looking. What an eye opener that was!! One house that I was completely smitten with was by far the nicest home on the block. The house next door has spilled garbage cans with tons of beer cans littering the driveway. Across the street were a herd of Harley choppers with guys sitting around a card table in a grass forest, smoking and drinking beer at 11am. It all looked surreal!!! I can guess why the people are moving!! And all that wasn't counting the rumbles of the train tracks just behind the nearby hedge row. No, I'll be eliminating that area from my hunt!!! These might've been the nicest guys in KS, but between the starting cycles, the train, and the clatter of beer cans rolling back and forth in the driveway, I'd have lost my mind.

I'm back to my decluttering frenzy. It's only Tues. and I'm already tired!!

The Long Quiet: Day 21