In My Home This Week: What Will February Bring?

 

In my home this week, I am hoping for a better week than last.  For one thing, I am not as ill as I was, neither physically nor temperamentally.  I recognize quite well all the signs of symptoms of an out of balance life once more.  Because we've been ill so much, we've been home for weeks on end with just necessary excursions and no others.  The schedule change for the current training stage of Kate's job has meant missing some activities I'd have liked to participate in and regret missing.  Never mind that I quite reasonably have not been fit to go out in public!  I wanted to go to these things all the same!    The few days we've been well enough to go anywhere, the weather has been miserably cold and not at all conducive to leaving home.  

Well January is nearly over.  While I'm sure I'll find myself in just as much of a mental tug of war with February and any restrictions it might bring, I also have a respite to look forward to in mid-February for at least a few days.  Kate will be testing and then waiting upon a license in order to continue into the next phase of her job.  She'll keep Caleb at home during those days.  She thinks it might be up to two weeks.  I think it will likely work out to less than half of that, but nevertheless it will be a break and one I need and am looking forward to.  Schedules will be all up in the air until after the licensing, and I shall not worry today about tomorrow...So much easier said than done, isn't it?

For this week, it will go on much as last week has done.  I'll have Sunday and Monday Caleb free.  Then Tuesday through Saturday I'll keep him.  I'll need to go fetch Taylor for her usual weekend visit and there's a birthday party for the two February babies across the field.   You see?  I've already jumped ahead from Monday free to a busy Saturday...I so wish I was one of those lovely souls, whom I admit frustrate me, that live in the NOW and never think of the day to come until that day is upon them.  Sigh!

Work: 

I am feeling somewhat better today.  We've had two nights now free of the coughing and the cold seems to be on its final lap.  

Housework plans for this week are mostly to just get back to my monthly routines, focusing on one set of rooms each week and keeping up with the simpler daily routine cleaning.  

I must move my second bird feeder.  After watching that crazy squirrel swinging about on it in such a wild fashion, I truly feared it would come crashing to the ground.  It's a heavier feeder than the one at the back of the house and has glass in it.  

I also must get the pansies potted up and the rooted items on the kitchen windowsill and the roses simply must be pruned while we're still having freezing temps or they will be ugly and wild looking come spring when it's time to bloom.  

It's also necessary to bring our checkbook up to date and prepare for a new month.  That task will best be done Sunday or Monday when there is no Caleb here to distract me.

And that is absolutely all I shall plan for the week.  Anything extra is gravy.

Kitchen:  

Not so many leftovers coming into this week as last.  Some cooked chicken breast in milk gravy, a few stems of broccoli that might be made into something (John won't eat broccoli soup), and the remains of a roast chicken from today's main meal.  So this week we're basically starting from scratch.

We must go to the grocery this week.  There is no fresh fruit in the house, and some of the produce is quite gone, like onions and green cabbage and while I can live without cabbage another week, I can't imagine cooking at all without any onions in the house.  There's no fresh milk, no eggs, and if I make one more loaf of bread which I most assuredly shall do come Monday, there will be no more flour in the house.  So, you see, it is quite necessary to get to that grocery and pick up a few items at least.

It is not however, a week for going crazy and stocking up.  I shall try to tweak my list down to the necessities.  Grocery day proper isn't until the following week.

Whole Roast Chicken with Potatoes, Butternut Squash, Apples and a wee Onion

Cherry Braised Beef Shanks, Mashed Potatoes, Green Beans

meal out with John somewhere

Chicken, Broccoli and Rice Casserole, Green Salad   A good recipe for those broccoli stems and some of the cooked chicken breasts from last week.

Chicken Noodle Casserole, Green Peas with Mushrooms, Pear Salad  Using the leftover roasted chicken.

BBQ Beef Ribs, Potato Salad, Collard Greens

Tuna Cakes, Fries, Slaw

Personal/Leisure:  

I'm doing better with the moisturizing project.  My hands look and feel so much better.  Now I'm concentrating on daily grooming of my hands.  Ragged nails are not pretty.  I'm slowly trying to incorporate good grooming habits back into my routine.  I shall ask one more time, why are good habits so easily broken and forgotten while bad ones linger on and on?

I didn't complete my full spa routine last week, though I'd meant to do it in increments.  Never mind, I shall work on that as well.

You know how I said I feel out of balance?  Well so is my marriage at present.  John has escaped feeling ill by hiding in front of the tv set in plain view and I have utterly ignored him.   Not good for either of us.  All my good intentions of spending quality time with him flown right out the window the moment we both got these second colds. 

I'm going to insist we spend a little quality time together each day, if only 15 or so minutes where there is no Caleb or any other family member to distract us one from the other.  And ask for a proper date this week during our free day.  And make plans, something John is loath to do, for our free time during the following week.  I might not can escape to St. Augustine as I'd so love to do but there are plenty of things we can do.  We might even take one of our infamous miserable picnic dates now that it's chosen to be wintry outdoors, lol.  

And that all seems like quite enough for one week mixed in with all the usual stuff that you must wash, rinse and repeat daily and the unplanned things you can't account for in a week's time, agreed?