Organizational and Health Goals

Today was a gross, wet day

My bike ride was slightly less than pleasant.

When I got to work I had a warm shower and changed into a sweater – so cozy!

So – I am in Vancouver for another 8 weeks. Then I’ll be gone for 3 months (2 months in Nashville, one month of travelling around the states), and then I will return to Vancouver (or home as we also call it). There are a few things we need to do to get Nashville-ready. There are also a few things I want to do to get Nashville-ready.

1. Organization.
Our house is in desperate need of some organization. Now, as I’ve posted here before I’ve put into place some great organizational systems. However when we return home from trips we suck at putting things away and every time we come home for a weekend away our house gets less and less organized. Coupled with the fact that Paul and Karen don’t know where most of our stuff belongs on a daily basis, our stuff desperately needs to be resorted into its homes. On top of that I managed to organize almost all of our bedroom, but not our closet. This closet has slowly grown out of control, and since I’m TERRIBLE at putting laundry away our room as also hit an all time low. Everything in our home is half organized, and it would only be a short time in each area to sort out but as a whole it’s overwhelming. It drives me nuts – and yet life is so busy that by the time I get home, even doing a 20 minute tidy up seems like too much. We have managed to figure out how to make our home look tidy and clean when people come over – and most of the time it stays that way. It’s just that when you go a bit deeper, into a closet or hunting through storage you’ll see that it is chaos contained rather than organization reigning.

The top areas to conquer in this category are:
• Bedroom (closet and beyond)
• Bathroom (towels & toiletries)
• Pantry (sort into types & label – freezer included)
• Kitchen (goes with Pantry – need to figure out the best system for all food and container storage)
• Storage Room (Craft center and beyond)
• Bookshelves & Movie storage (resort into types)
• Spring clean the house (Deep clean bathroom, kitchen, etc. Dust house)

Plan:
• Pay friend to deep clean my bathroom since that seems to be above my head
• Deep clean Kitchen while friend does bathroom since that will be motivating
• If time permits, tackle storage room with paid friend
• Tackle one section of book shelf or movie storage a day (just one shelf a day for 8 weeks until they are done) – dust and sort books/movies on that shelf
• Tackle one room in the house each weekend that I am home (4 weekends)
• Tackle lighter jobs one per week (Ie towels and toiletries in bathroom)

Before Pictures:
(and oh my word, I can not believe I am putting these on the internet, I’m appalled at the state of my bedroom)

Bedroom

Closet

Bathroom

Pantry

Kitchen

Storage Room

Bookshelves & Movie Storage

2. Health.

When I was regularly riding my bike I was doing really well health wise. I only lost 10 pounds (my goal had been 20) but I went down from a size 14/16 to a size 12, which was a wonderful treat. Then I hurt my back and couldn’t ride for 2 months. And since I was in pain and I turned to comfort food. I’ll admit, I thought I’d gained back everything I lost, but this morning I weighed in and I hadn’t! I can still fit my size 12’s AND I am still 4 pounds lighter than when I started back in September. Now that I can ride my bike again though, I have some goals to meet. Now that Paul is out of the house, I’m really going to have to change my eating habits…he often helps keep me in check when reaching for that bowl of chips, or will very helpfully finish food on my plate so the temptation to keep eating is gone.

And no, theer will be no before and after photos for this one. I’m not that vulnerable!

Goal:
• 2 pounds of weight loss a week.
• 15 total pounds of weight loss in 8 weeks.
• Dress size 10-12

Plan:
• Bike Ride /daily commute (1 hour of actual exercise)
• Stretches/Work out (15 minute each morning of exercised geared towards stomach weight loss and core strengthening)
• Food – continue to eat salads for lunch & make lighter dinners & find a better daily breakfast

• Water – drink more water!

• Track all food & exercise, using weight watchers point system
• Weekly, Monday, weigh in’s in change room at work. Chart weight in Excel Spreadsheet

Speaking of bike riding….I haven’t ridden in two months. This is my first week back. I forgot about how painful the first week was as you build up saddle toughness –oh man, sitting is now very painful! I am keenly aware of my behind at all times. This is not a particularly pleasant experience. The worst moment is when I get on my bike in the morning – my body has had time to relax and forcing myself to sit and keep peddling for the first 5 minutes is soooo tough. I can’t wait until those muscles re-form!

3. Pack / Have house renter ready.

The next goal is to pack for the trip, and everything we aren’t taking must be packed away and locked into our storage room so that our house is renter ready. We hope to rent our place, furnished. So we just need to put away personal things. I will do this the last weekend in May (since before that I”ll need much of the stuff) and I will make food in advance for dinners and lunches for the last week of May so that the house can be ready for the 1st of June.

• Pack for Nashville
• Pack up rest of stuff

I’m writing this because putting my plans down on paper always helps – and I feel silly writing things out just for me, so blogging it helps take away the silly feeling. And also blogging it adds a level of accountability – I told you I would do this, I already needed to do this, therefore the odds are higher that it will all get done – and not just in the last weekend.

I’ll also be updating my progress as I go – because that always helps you get ready to do more!