WEIGH IN 9-11-17

“One of the worst days in America’s history saw some of the bravest acts in Americans’ history. We’ll always honor the heroes of 9/11. And here at this hallowed place, we pledge that we will never forget their sacrifice.”

—President George W. Bush at the Pentagon in 2008

185/167/135

Down two pounds. Whoo Hooo! Well, technically I was down a pound the day after Bob and I weighed. With Bob gone I eat more of the food I like that he doesn't care for and I don't fix full meals. Mostly proteins here and there with fruits and vegies for snacks. Looks as if he'll be gone until at least the first week in October, possibly longer so I have plenty of time to stay on track and hopefully hit my goal of 165 by October 12th - in time for the Ozark Creative Writers Conference.

I apologize for not getting in here on Friday. I started out running errands and didn't get back until late evening.

The flylady program is working pretty good so far. While I'm still building habits - baby steps - I am making progress. Before I can build a full-fledged routine, I have to get the house back in a semblance of order. I've packed up the girls' toys. I need to pick up another Sterilite footlocker for their beach/ sandbox toys.  Pictured below, I bought ours at Walmart for the Home Depot price. They have inset wheels on one end to make them easy to move around. We chose this rather than standard tubs. They'll make nice 'toy boxes' for the girls' items when they come back and we know at a glance these are their things - separate from home stuff.

My focus for this week is some of the mixed media items in the office. I HAVE to have the office in a semblance of order in time for my brother -in-law and his wife to visit us the week after I get back from conference. 

Whatever you have planned for this week, remember to 

Enjoy the Journey!

Kelly

RECIPE WEDNESDAY - House Cleaning

I know when we think Recipe our mind automatically goes to food. Well, there are recipes for everything - including Housekeeping. So here's my recipe for today. 

CHAOS - Can't Have Anyone Over Syndrome?

FLYLADY is the answer!

Yep, that would be our house about now.  Between everything not being in place the way they should have been before the girls arrived, add in the chaos of a 5 & 9 year old with toys, constant activity and trips the house is a disaster. And shall I remind you, I've never completely put the office together the way I envision it. Angels are not singing when I open the door. Rather, they are hiding in tiny corners for fear any noise might send something toppling onto their angelic heads.

I was a Flybaby several years ago. Marla Ciley's formula was the only thing that kept our home in some semblance of order between a 7-kid daycare and six Girl Scout troops - two of which required me driving out of town an hour each way one night a week.

I came across a post on YouTube the other day that reminded me of the program and I knew that's what I needed right now. I needed to become a flybaby again.

I've spent the past week in bits and pieces putting my Flylady notebook together. Let's do a quick walk-through.

I began with a six-ring planner I found at a thrift store for $2. Just hanging out in the cabinet waiting for a use.

The front pattern is covered with a clear plastic so I slit that at the top so that I could personalize the planner a bit, using papers and embellishments from Simple Stories - Domestic Bliss line:

I used one of their embellishment packs throughout the planner, including the cover... The card actually says "Bless This Mess". Since I'm all about getting rid of the 'mess', I covered the last word up with one of the ephemera pieces:

Come on, you knew there had to be paper crafting involved! 😀

The Flylady system breaks your house down into Zone's - one zone per week. I bought a package of tab dividers. I had to trim them to fit and punch the holes.

What the Flylady system is all about!

There are specific tasks to do each week. 

Once we're past the Decluttering Process no task should take more than 15 minutes.

I've laminated all of the cards I'll be showing you. 

This made the TO DO page a great write on/ wipe off surface. I've slit the holes on both of these cards so I can move them freely through the planner without having to open the rings every time.

I printed the calendar made for a Traveler's Notebook from Scattered Squirrel. The Weekly Planner pages were inside the planner when I bought it. I'll use the weekly pages to make notes of what is on the Zone plan for that week - day by day bites.

Aside from the weekly pages that were in the planner, there was also a two-sided sheet listing each day of the month. I put one behind each monthly tab and will move this from month-to month as I meal plan each week.

ZONE 1 - Kitchen/ Laundry

ZONE 2 - Office

ZONE 3 - Living Room/ Dining Room

ZONE 4 - Master Bedroom/ Bathroom

ZONE 5 - Basement/ Pantry

I'll be using these images as post headers from here on out.

The Keys to flylady are:

1 - Declutter 

     Working within the Zone for that week, spend 15 min. each day decluttering the room

2- 15 Minutes

     Everyone has 15 minutes and by doing things in small bites, you do not get overwhelmed

3 - Routine

      There is a Morning Routine, Afternoon Routine, Bedtime Routine

If you're in a state of CHAOS - I encourage you to check out Flylady and join us! After all, isn't a clean house part of our Journey to Living Healthy?

I'll be back Friday to let you know how the week went. Until then...

Enjoy the Journey!

Kelly

WEIGH-IN 9-4-17

185/169/135

First off, I apologize for no post last week. Sunday, when I usually weigh in and post to the blog, we were a bit busy spending the final few hours with the girls. Monday we drove to OK then Tuesday morning, up to Wichita to meet up with our daughter and hand over the girls. Was a bittersweet weekend. We miss the girls like crazy but I must get back to work.

Thankfully, I am not a stress eater. I tend to go the other direction. Rather than eating constantly, I focus on the multiple tasks at hand and forget to eat. I'm going to focus on that over the next few weeks by setting a timer. Rule of thumb to feed the metabolism and keep the fire burning is to eat something every three hours. Doesn't have to be anything big. A piece of fruit or a spoon of peanut butter will do that trick.

Bob leaves tomorrow and plans to stay on the boat as long as they'll allow. We know things will slow down this winter so we want to build up our reserve for the leaner months ahead. 

The pantry will be fine. I've been canning pints of pasta sauce with the tomatoes from our garden on a weekly basis. I'm averaging four pints a week. While Bob is gone, my first task is to clear the freezer of leftovers - my meals until they are gone - then restock with lean proteins and quick casseroles. 

Quick casseroles are important as I look ahead to November. For the past eleven years, I have taken part in National Novel Writing Month. Nano as we affectionately term the event is a month-long dedication to spewing the first draft of a new novel/ project. I'm hoping to have the mindset to write book 3 of my Seasonal Sisters series or book 3 of the Branson series. I'm spending this month revamping my very first novel - the book of my heart - to submit to Hallmark Movie channel. They've been my target for the past few years and they are finally accepting manuscripts.

So, my September:

      Put house back in order (I'll talk more about this later in the week)

      Get my job as Marketing Director for Oghma Creative Media and Saddlebag Dispatches mag

               on track before my boss boots me

      Polish A Christmas to Remember and submit to Hallmark

      Start fall yard work and begin storing straw for next spring's garden.

      Finish Office organization project (I have company coming in 6 weeks!)

See... no stress ::: gulp:::

Thankfully, most everything will fall into place once Bob leaves. It isn't about him being home so much as I just work better alone.  So, with the girls and Bob gone I can shift into my own schedule and move forward with much more productivity.

For this week:

Getting back into routine with:

       Eating Schedule

       Working Out

       Cleaning Schedule 

How does your week look?  Whatever your plans, the most important thing to remember is to 

Enjoy the Journey! 

WEIGH IN 8-28-17

WEIGH IN 8-21-17

185/167/135

Consistent if nothing else. Good considering the girls and I spent four days in Springfield. The first night we did Chinese, second night was all you could eat crab legs at Hemmingway's Blue Water Cafe in Bass Pro, I honestly can't remember what we did Friday night. The days were a blur of trying to shop for school clothes and spending hours in the hotel pool.

As of today, the girls have 8 days before we put them on a plane with their mom back to home. The house is going to be quiet but my head is already buzzing between wanting to deep clean the house, kick my Stampin' UP! business into high gear and get back to work before my boss has a bigger conniption than he's already having.

Bob surprised me by being at the dining room table with a cup of coffee when I got up this morning. Was not expecting him until Thursday. Was a very pleasant surprise. So the next few days will be a whirlwind of activity, eating out and just enjoying the time we have left with the girls. We learned the hard way not to wait until 'next time'. The journey is too short.

I hope you Enjoy the Journey
Kelly

WEIGH IN 8-14-17

185/167/135

And I'm down again. It's been a stressful week. I've been in a go round with my boss, dealing with office politics (remember, I work from home!) and making sure I get all the grandma time in I can. I'm on the downhill slide to sending the girls back to mama. In the grand scheme of things, none of us here are ready. Even the 5 yr old says she wants to stay. Sadly, she doesn't get it that if she lived here it wouldn't be summer fun and games all the time. Like for the rest of us, real life would have to intrude.

Speaking of real life, I really do need to get back to work. Aside from proving to my boss he did not make a mistake in putting me in charge of marketing for the publishing company (which he has since taken me off the lead but that will change or I'll quit), I have a manuscript to polish and send off to Hallmark Movie Channel. They are looking for stories. I'm hoping I will finally have found a home for the 'book of my heart'.

The stress is taking a toll. Either my body no longer wants to deal with caffeine or the burning hole in my stomach is caused by my job. Not sure which. Maybe a combination. I'm hoping that getting back to a work routine and finally getting things in line with my boss, the lava pool will subside and I can enjoy a cup of fluffy again. For now, I'm all about decaf hot tea and iced water.

As we go into the final two weeks of the girls' visit, there are still a lot of things to do and a couple of things they want to repeat. So I'll work in wee hours of the morning and we'll do stuff the rest of the time.

I'm Enjoying the Journey. Are you?

WEIGH IN 8-7-17

185/ 171 /135

I swear fall has arrived in the Ozarks. The past week or so has been beautiful. I've had the AC off, the doors/ windows open and spent quite a bit of time outside. Maybe that accounts for the one pound loss. Not enough to win me the challenge but I'll get there. $200 is at stake!

I managed to get the base for the butterfly garden in and most of the weed eating done before my weed eater died. I wonder what the life expectancy is on those. I've had this one almost six years. Funny how I can determine how old something is by how old my eldest granddaughter is. She was almost four when we had to buy this one. She'll be ten in November.

Here's the base of the butterfly garden:

The bed is about 4' deep by 16' long.. the width of the garden shed. I laid down multiple layers of newsprint followed by three layers of cardboard. Then I broke two bales of composted straw down into sheafs and laid them on top of the cardboard. Everything was topped off with eight bags of Top Soil. The top soil barely gave me any covering. I think I'm going to add sixteen bags of inexpensive potting soil to the top before adding plants. But I don't have plans to go to town until later in the week. 

I didn't sweat much as the temps were in the low 70's with very little humidity but the 2-3 hours of work gave me exercise, for sure.