1.
Read A Book: Thanks to beach reading, I've totally knocked this one out of the park! In June I finished
THRIVE by Arianna Huffington, and two novels
Heaven is for Real and
Silver Siren. In July I read
Mad Dash by Patricia Gaffney and, on the recommendation of a website for Outlander fans,
The Winter Sea by Susanna Kearsley. Both were worthy novels. I have a couple more Kearsley novels on my "want to read" list. I miss Outlander... In August I finished off
Better Than Before by Gretchen Rubin (
Karen's recommendation and I totally agree that I learned a bit about myself in the reading. I'm clearly an Obliger and need someone outside myself to hold me accountable for my goals. The downside of being a people pleaser.) and four trashy summer romance novels. I think it's a record for me!
2. Try A New Recipe: In June I tried a crock pot pulled pork recipe. In July, I contented myself with trying new things at restaurants. I can't remember a specific new recipe to have tried. In August, it was OMG Chicken. Basically bake chicken with sour cream and parmesan cheese on top. I didn't think it was all that OMG - more like meh. :)
3. Declutter: Can you say OVERACHIEVER? This is the one area where I made huge progress. But if you look around my house, you can't see a single thing that looks less cluttered or more organized. How's that? I spent the Summer working on decluttering my digital life. What did I actually accomplish?
- Cleared out work email - from 581 MB down to 556 MB (nearly 500 MB of that is information on a legal matter that I am required to retain).
- Cleared out home email - from 164 MB down to 118 MB (may not sound like much, but that is a LOT of deleted emails!)
- Went through my yahoo email account. It had gotten so unwieldy with junk mail that I hadn't touched it since March. I deleted over 1700 emails and unsubscribed from 46 different companies that were all sending me ads to buy more stuff... I don't need that temptation!
- My downloads folder (temporary storage for all the digital supplies I buy). I hadn't unzipped and filed these purchases in nearly a year! I started with 41 gb of information represented by 25,613 files in 1,652 folders. I filed or deleted until this folder was down to ZERO!
- My digiscrap supplies folder started at 135 GB represented by 73,545 files in 4,653 folders. Then I ADDED most of the stuff from my downloads folder above. I forgot to record the total at that point. Then I started going through and deleting supplies I would never use and consolidating folders. I am currently at 105 GB represented by 63,966 files in 3,367 folders. Given the 25,000 files I added at the outset, this means I've deleted nearly 35,000 files! I'm not through the entire external drive yet, so this number should continue to trend downward. This has been a real lesson in how much INVISIBLE STUFF I own that hasn't been used yet. It has really made me think hard about buying any more digital products!
4. Complete An Unfinished Project: See Decluttering Above. As much of a project as I can take on right now!
5. Improve Flexibility - I'm holding steady at 5" from the touching my toes. (I was briefly at 4" but lost that advantage once my therapeutic massage stopped.) I'm going to have to work a LOT harder to make any progress on this one.
6. Scrapbooking - My Favorite Five - I'm tossing in the towel on this one. I haven't done this since March.
7. Photography - I've been participating in Rinda's Summer Scavenger Hunt. And I took tons of sunrise photos while on vacation. Otherwise, I haven't been doing much in the way of improving my photography skills. Kim Klassen's class is still simmering on the back burner.
8. Art Journaling - The closest I've come to art of any kind in the last three months is making the Altered Art Bottles during the Summer of Color challenge.
9. On the Wellness front - I started this year with such high hopes. This was going to be the year I would finally lose weight and kick my sugar addiction. Instead I've struggled with a sudden and unexplained weight GAIN of twelve pounds over three months earlier in the year, constant hunger, erratic periods (which frankly I am too old to be dealing with!), and a lot of illness this year. I joined a fitness class in June. In August, before my vacation, the teacher retired. I'm still waiting for them to start a new class at a time I can actually attend. My chiropractor just advised me that my insurance will no longer pay for my visits since I am on "maintenance." Not sure how that works since my plan is supposed to have unlimited visits. To say I am discouraged with my progress on the Wellness front would be an understatement. But I'm not giving up.
June documentation.
The OLW assignment was to write out answers to a progress questionnaire. I did it, scanned it, and added little photos of it in my planner.
July's OLW assignment was to add cards about songs that are speaking to us right now. I placed this in the June section because I had the space and they fit better than than in the July pockets.
June Gratitude Page
July documentation
Totally forgot I had completely cleaned up my craft space in July! :)
Shots from my trip to the shore with Deanna.
July Gratitude page.
August documentation. What a month!!! That little bit of turquoise leather is from a new purse.
I had a banner week for steps while at the shore!
The OLW assignment for August was to document things we are grateful for. Couldn't have picked a better month for this one! Since I don't have a fancy cutting machine, I printed the Thankful title on regular printer paper and did some old fashioned fussy cutting.
August gratitude page. And oh yeah - I cleaned out the freezer after the girls went back to school! Lots of really OLD stuff went in the trash. Another project where the decluttering is pretty much hidden.
And there is my summer in a nutshell! I can't believe we are already halfway through September and it is already starting to feel like Autumn around here. I'm so not ready. Are you???
