July's To-Do List

My lovely friend and photographer Amanda Truth reminded me that today is July 2^nd…and my “to-do” blog post is overdue.  I’ve really enjoyed doing these the past couple months, if only because I actually think about what I am/am not accomplishing throughout the month.  I am a nerd who enjoys personal accountability.  Well…I’m just a nerd in general really.

June was our first full month of being married.  Everyone keeps smirking and asking questions like, “how’s married life?” like they know some kind of deep, dark secret about how much married life stinks but they kept it from me and now, I must be experiencing all that horrifying marriedness, right?  Right?  *Insert evil laugh here*

Yeah…not so much.  I love Josiah more every second.  Every day he affirms he is the perfect man for me.  I know there will be hard times - ”this ain’t my first rodeo,” as my dad would say - but I also know if I had to choose one person on the planet to join me in those hard times, he was (and is) the right choice.

June was also the month o’ sickness for me…again.   Apparently, you really have to take all your antibiotics or strep will totally come back.  I also got a pretty decent cold toward the end of the month.  Hmmmph.  Not fun.  I’m taking vitamins now, and I’d love to tell you that I’m getting plenty of rest, but I’ve got some sort of weird insomnia thing.  I haven’t been resting well for like a month now maybe?  I don’t know.  It all blends.

We also had VBS at church this month, and I really loved doing this as a family!!

All this basically just leads up to…I didn’t get as much done this month as I wanted to.

Here goes the official list:

June's To-Do List 

1.      Workouts – Oh yuck.  I did work out more this month. *sigh* However, I’m not claiming this one because I still didn’t meet my goals.  Being sick half the month definitely didn’t help.  I’m hoping I can claim this one as accomplished when July is over.

2.      Keeping track – I think I actually did a good job with this one.  I’ve been eating pretty decently, and even when I don’t, I still write it down.  Therefore, my calories have stayed below 2,000 for the most part…and that’s not bad.

3.      Organize – Notice I partially marked this one out.  I had two wonderful women come over this month to help me organize the kitchen (thanks Dawn and Susan!) and I’ve actually kept it that way!  We’ve also made headway in other parts of the house, but until things are really like we want them, I’m not going to mark this one all the way out.

4.      Finances – Nope.  We haven’t taken control of this either.  With two incomes, we’re not doing remarkably poorly, we just need to be more proactive and we have to start saving.  We’re hoping to have another baby or two and I don’t want to do that without having something saved.  Seriously.

5.      Friends – I’ve totally accomplished this!!  I haven’t gotten to hang with all the wonderful people I’d like to, but I have indeed made time for friends this month even with all the craziness.  Therefore, I proclaim this a “win.” 

6.      Quiet time – This, my friends, is my biggest triumph for the month!  I have gotten into a routine of doing my quiet times in the morning again and I L-O-V-E it.  I look forward to that time every morning, and when I don’t get it I can tell a huge difference.  I am fully aware, though, that this accomplishment is not me…it’s God working in me.  There’s a huge difference.  I’m still claiming it as a victory, though!

Now that I think about it.  I did some stuff that totally isn't on this list!  For example, I got my name changed everywhere on the planet (which is harder than it sounds), I got my new ID, and I was able to send in my birth certificate to finally get my passport...almost like a real grown up!! :P  

Let's take a look at July and see what still needs to be done!

July's To-Do List 

1.      Workouts – This stays on the list this month, and it’s actually monumentally important.  With my ankle/foot in bad shape, working out can really hurt sometimes, particularly afterward.  However, I’m also scheduled to have surgery in August, and that means sitting on my tuckus for a good while.  I need to be active while I can!  Once again, we’re aiming for three x per week.

2.      Finances – As stated above, Josiah and I really need to fully acquire the big picture on this and get everything out on paper.  He added me to his bank account today, and I’ll put most of my check there for expenses and savings, but I’m keeping a portion in my personal account, too.  I feel like keeping ALL the expense paying money in one account will significantly improve our ability to keep track of what’s coming in and going out.  We’ll see….

3.      Organize – Need to do it.  Enough said.

4.      Sing, Sing, Sing – I’m singing a few times this month.  Once at church, once at Warwick Forest Retirement Home, and once at the quarterly breakfast for the Menchville House.  I’m most excited about the latter.  I’ll just be singing and giving a short testimony, but that ministry really speaks to my heart.  The way they take in women (and sometimes their children) and help transform their lives is just amazing.  There’s a lot more I’d like to say about when I sing…but I think that’s an entirely different blog post. 

5.      Summer Bucket List – We printed out some awesome Summer Bucket Lists from Time Warp Wife.  I would LOVE to get…um…let’s say at least TEN items scratched off the list.  Honestly, a lot of them can be doubled up and done at the same time, so this should be easy…and so much fun!!!  Who doesn’t want to roast hot dogs and marshmallows, camp out in the back yard, have a treasure hunt, and go to the zoo?!

6.      Schedule in time to be unscheduled – Sounds kind of contradictory doesn’t it?  All this means is that I want to consciously leave time open…time for us to relax, be spontaneous, or…whatever.  In the past I have scheduled myself silly.  This summer, I want to make sure I leave some time to just BE.  You would think this would be easy, but not for me.  Therefore, it makes the list.

Well, that’s about it.  I hope everyone has a great Independence Day!!!

May's To-Do List

Oh my goodness, it's MAY!  That is just so unbelievable to me.  I'm getting married in 10 days!!!   I also have other little countdown numbers, like my Nana will be here in 8 days and we leave for Orlando to go on our honeymoon in 17 days.  I'm so excited!!!  And I'm not just talking regular excitement here people.  I can barely contain myself.  I feel like I want to scream and jump around...like my whole body is having a party on the inside, but I don't get to party yet because I have things to do and if I mention my wedding one more time and how happy and excited I am the people in my office might take me outside and hang me.  I mean, they're really happy for me, but I'm annoyingly bouncy even when I'm NOT getting married to the absolute love of my life...just sayin'.

So, with everything I have going on, I thought now would be a REALLY good time to take a page from my lovely photographer's book (Amanda Truth Photography) and start blogging a to-do list each month at the beginning of the month.  Each month after this one, I'll also post on what I have and have not accomplished the month prior.  This will 1) allow me to keep track of what I am accomplishing and the areas I need to improve on and 2) will mean I'm blogging at least once per month! Haha...

May's To-Do List

• FOCUS - As hard as it may be, I at least need to try to focus at work.  I haven't been great at that lately.  I feel like I just have SO much going on in my brain.  Normally, I wouldn't consider myself as having ADD, but right now, that's how I feel.  I'm scattered.  I must get this under control.  Despite the fact that I have tons going on every second, I have to focus on what needs to get done at the office.

• Wrap up the little wedding details - I have so many little things that need to be done.  I need to tie bows on the bowls, find some more bud vases (anyone have any?!), and get the little red glass dealies to go in the bowls.  I also need to take a trip to Ulta to get some more mascara and to Kmart to see if I can exchange some things for the reception and then decorate those things (it's a surprise :P).   

• Hair - I bought a Living Social deal forever ago for a shampoo, deep conditioning treatment, cut, dry, and partial highlight for $55.  I swear by sites like this and Groupon.  You can get such great deals!  Anyway, I made an appointment for this Saturday to get that done, and afterwards, I really need to experiment with my hair at some point because I still haven't actually tried out my wedding hair, and this might be important since I'm doing it myself!  

• School - I would really like to be finished with ALL of my schoolwork for the semester by Sunday night.  That may be pushing it, but I have so much to do that I can't afford to waste time.  I don't want to have to finish anything while my Nana and parents are here!!

•  GET MARRIED!! - This one is really a no-brainer, but is way too important to get left off the list.  With it, I'm going to clump packing for the honeymoon and going on the honeymoon.  So there...packing is totally a to-do list item.

•  Workouts - I need to be exercising at least 3 times a week.  Seriously.  It should not be that hard to walk or something three times per week for 20-30 minutes.  I think I'm going to start marking days I work out on the calendar so I can keep track.

• Move - Josiah is doing an awesome job of taking things out of my house and putting them in his.  However, I need to be doing  a much better job of helping in the process.  I'm also going to have a lot of cleaning to do once I get everything moved.

There's SO much more I really want to put on this list...like working on quiet times with my kids, teaching them more Bible verses, learning more of those myself, creating a schedule for the new house, putting everything in the new house away, blogging more often, taking more pics of the kids...just so much, but I have a feeling I need to limit the goal setting for now.  I have so much that needs to get done and so little time in which to do it.  Josiah and I will have the rest of our lives to focus on other things....  :)