I spent much of those two weeks thoroughly cleaning and rearranging my dining room, and considering what the rest of the house is going to look like when it's done. That means I:
Got rid of a load of garbage
Mopped the floor and washed the walls
Re-imagined a bookshelf as a pantry (my built-in pantry is too deep and dark for me to see what's inside it)
Re-imagined the pantry as storage for tools and small appliances that don't get used every day (it's a BIG pantry, after all, and perfect for this use)
Emptied out the grungy, algae-filled fish tank and cleaned it
Moved the fish tank stand to the other side of the dining room and set up a bigger tank, which I then filled with my four adult guppies and half million or so babies, as well as a pleco and a cory catfish
Cleaned off the table, and took two baskets of papers and books up to my office, as well as a few stacks of books that had been on the bookshelf
Brought the bar table with the cast iron foot upstairs (with the help of my autistic son), covered it with a nice vinyl tablecloth, and filled it with plants, all properly potted and watered
Put a nice tablecloth on the table
Washed the windows
Took down the faded posters stapled to the walls
Hung some nice pictures
Collected all my art stuff and moved it to the storage space under the fish tank
Arranged my cookbooks, gardening books, and art books on spare space in the new "pantry"
It took me just about the full two weeks because I was doing it in between living the rest of my life, and (or so it seemed) holding everyone else in my universe together. Just the usual...
But now I have a dining room that I like to eat in, plus healthy plants, plus a really nice looking fish tank, plus space to do art and the ability to find what I need in the way of art tools and materials. Add that to the fact that my living room and bedroom are organized the way I like them and occasionally have been know to revert to a "clean and tidy" state, and that's three rooms of the house that are livable. Six to go, including kitchen, entry way hallway and stairs, office, basement and bathroom...
And (surprise, surprise!) I've started a new project. Well, sort of new, anyhow. I came across a reference to doing 101 things in 1001 days, and after looking it up, decided that it might help me keep track of my progress on some of my life goals.
Now I know I started "school" back a while ago, and haven't really reported on any progress since then, but this will tie in with it, so it's not really starting something horribly new. Also, most of the 101 things I picked to be on my list were either on my immediate "to do" list, or have been on my "someday I'm gonna do this" list for a long while. Some others are quite simple and fun things that I never would have thought of doing, that don't take much time, and heck! I'm in it for the experience.
I broke my list down into sections like "Health and Fitness", "Finance", "Writing", etc.
So here's a sampler of my goals:
1) Lose 50 pounds. 1001 days is a workable length of time, and this will get me down to my goal weight. Thanks to the internet, I can develop a plan that will work for me. Related: Participate in the 200 sit-ups project, Get in the best shape of my life, Go without fast food for a month.
2) A bunch of goals that I NEED to do, but have been putting off due to finances: See a chiropractor (I recently injured my back), Get my eyes tested (last time was at least three years ago), Go to the dentist for a check up (last time was years ago--I had to have an emergency filling replacement recently, but no check up or cleaning was done).
3) Getting my finances in order, including goals for becoming stable, putting aside regular savings, donating regularly to my church, and controlling my buying habits.
4)"Go and Do" Goals: This is the largest section, but most of these are one-offs, fun things that will only take a day or two (or even a single session) to complete. But the fun things are here: Sleep in a yurt, Go kayaking, Ride in a hot air balloon, and so on. Also some cleaning goals in here (I might have given them their own section, but I didn't): Give away all my unwanted books, Get rid of 100 things, Clean and organize the house, then Paint the house.
5) Travel goals, because I stay at home too much. I'd like to Go on a Cruise, Go on a Road Trip, Visit a National Park, and Visit a New City, possibly Boston.
6) Food and Eating goals, separate from the Health goals: Make a pie on Pi day, Try a new recipe every month, and so on.
7) Art and Music goals: Learn all of the Suzuki viola repetoire, Learn to draw well enough to Draw a self-portrait, and others.
8) Writing goals: Of course! Participate in NaNo, and win this time! Also NaBloPoMo. Complete the Artist's Way, which I've started a few times and never really finished. Write a non-fiction book, Publish a novel.
9) Reading goals: Not too many of these, because I really don't need goals to motivate me to do this, unless the goal is to actually do other things instead of reading! But I'd like to read the Koran (or Qu'ran), and a book on Buddism that my son-in-law loaned to me a while back. Also, I'd like to read a book in French, and I have two candidates: Harry Potter and guess which book?
10)Photography goals: Picking up this hobby again would bring me great pleasure, especially since digital photography can be so much cheaper (due to lack of film and development costs) than old-fashioned film photography. So I've got a few goals relating to photography.
11) "Make and Build" goals: Again, a category of mostly fun, one-off stuff. The thing that's going to take the time is knitting this sweater, but what ya gotta do, ya gotta do!
12) Learning goals: Taking a Spanish class, Learning archery, Learning how to sew, Learning to Zumba dance. These, of course, tie in closely with my "Jackboot Masters of Everything."
13) Movie goals: Because what's life without a good movie attached? The primary goal here is to attend the midnight premiere of a movie, and I've got the movie all picked out.
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