June 2023 Goals

 

A new month looms.  It's been my experience, that once we hit June, time flies every single year.  January is fresh and new, February and March generally drag a bit, April is a new season and then we have May.  Time travels at normal speed it seems in those months but June...June is like a fast forward of the year.  

I accomplished enough of my goals in May that I am quite satisfied to begin a new month.  I'm hoping that we're going to have a fairly mild month.  We shall see.  I will tell you that come the hot months of the year, what gets down is entirely and fully dependent upon how hot it is.  Outdoor jobs and indoor jobs are all affected by weather once it gets hot and icky.  Truth, I get far more done in January than I generally do in July.   June is a month that can go either way.

First let me remind you of the daily FOUR questions:

What's for meals today?  I actually ask, what's for lunch, what's for dinner.  But I've been asking myself at night 'What's for breakfast tomorrow?'

What can I 'produce' today?  Production is in the eyes of the beholder.  Perhaps I take cuttings from a plant to root for more plants.  Perhaps I make a freezer entree while I'm making dinner.  Maybe I sew a new batch of napkins or I forage for berries.  It all counts!

What can I do in my Zone area today?

What can I accomplish of my monthly or weekly goals today?

Those four questions were motivational to me all last month and I want to keep using them through this month as well.

Now on to the goals themselves:

Start to clear the kitchen cabinets out.  It would be terribly inconvenient to completely empty the kitchen just at the moment.  As far as I know we aren't going to be doing any work at all until sometime in July.  It all depends on how the contractor's current job goes and when the cabinets are delivered.  

However, I can continue to clear out the things I don't typically use on a daily basis.  There are lots of those sorts of things in the cabinets like deep casseroles and the stock pot, etc.  Those can certainly be moved to the shed or packed up.

Start to clear our bathroom cabinets.  This is less intensive work than the kitchen will be but there are a few things that can be cleared out now and stored elsewhere.  

Of course, both of these activities are also good opportunities to declutter.  

Do something with the kids.   The dates keep changing for when I might have the other children.  I'd suggested this past weekend that I'd like to just go on and have them one day a week anyway, but I was told it wouldn't be necessary.    I've looked at the schedule for this year's reading program and it's just not a great year.  I expected the repeats (magician, reptile rescue, story time) but the activities aren't themed, the prizes are 'meh' and the schedule for our local libraries simply will not jive with my schedule when I might could take them.  AND both libraries are now closed on Saturday. 

BUT I want to do something with the two boys especially, though I would love to do something with the two 3-year-olds as well.  I'm still wrestling with this one, but I'll put it to prayer and see how things come about.

Get all the birthday cards, gifts and such attended to in a timely manner.  2 down.  Only 5 to go.

Practice using the pressure cooker/canner. Pull out the hot water bath canner and use it as well.  Peaches are soon going to be coming into market.  I'd like to can some of those.  I've been buying canned peaches for years but if I can do my own with fresh purchased locally grown...I'll also say that canned pie filling would be nice to have on hand.  I won't buy canned pie filling because there is so little fruit compared to the thickened liquid, but I can alter that if I do my own filling.  

Attempt dehydrating.  I don't have a dehydrator yet but I'm looking to purchase one in the near future.  I'd like to dry some fruit and mushrooms, that sort of thing.  I can often buy mushrooms marked down and I thought, why not dehydrate them?  Well why not?!

Learn to use the gas grill.  Buy charcoal for the older grill.  Grill one meal a week.  Yes, three goals in one.  But I definitely want to work on this and the three do tie in together.

A sort of pantry challenge...Years ago I used to do the All You challenge.  Back then it was $25 per week per person and the challenge lasted all month long.  I thought I'd like to try this once more.  True, I have more family at home at present, less opportunity to shop, etc.  I think I can manage this challenge fairly well and perhaps get some money set aside to stock the pantry as well.

Stock the pantry.  Yes, I'm going to actively look at just what I need in each category and systematically start working my way through building my pantry back up once more.  This may mean I do some of it myself (canning, dehydrating) and some of it may be commercially purchased items.

I've thought long and hard about this and I'm going to start with the bare basics first.  Cornmeal, sugar, flour, green beans, applesauce, garlic, salt, etc.  Again, some of these may be home produced and some may be bought at stores.  I want to be practical first, then I'll look at stocking the nice to have items like sesame oil or liquid smoke, etc.

Plant as I'm able.  I'd like to have my planters set up and put out some of the stuff that is acceptable for planting at any time planted.  I want to be sure and be ready to plant fall crops, too and so the sooner I can get started with this the better.  I mostly need soil and seeds.  I have planters and such that I can repurpose for planting.  I'm determined to begin somewhere.  Right now it's herbs and eggplants, tomatoes and onions but I'll add in what I can as I can.

Here's the thing.  I have to do most things in small bites.  So I'll just work at it a little all along and do what I can as I can using what I have and eventually I'll be fully productive.  But if I don't make a move to get started, I'll never get where I hope to one day be.

Try four new recipes and make four of the oldest recipes I have that we haven't used in a long while. 

Continue to seek out and purchase items needed for our renovations.  Today we bought the kitchen sink and drain.  Last week we got the stove hood vent and the kitchen sink faucet.  Aside from hardware, we are doing as well as we can with the kitchen at present.  We still need a bathroom faucet, a shower kit and the shower fixtures, which includes the curtain rod or a sliding door, etc.  We'll have to choose flooring but need contractor measurements to know how much to order.  AND I want to get enough flooring to do the back bathroom as well as our master bath.  I've already found an affordable vanity for the guest bath as well that I'd really like to buy even though it's not the same high quality of the others we've bought.  Truth, I'm looking at the future and don't expect we will use that bathroom as much after this year.  Or so I hope.

Plant flowers or propagate fresh ones or seeds.  I just want flowers!  I'm going to try and focus on getting a couple of perennials planted this month as well.

I know I've planned heavy this month.  There are a million things I want to get done.  Some of these goals may well end stretching over several months, on repeat.  I'll just keep working steadily at all of it.