New Year!

Hard to believe it's 2010! Seems like 2009 only just started but here we are and I have lots of plans for this coming year.

Number one is getting healthy. I've been hm-hawing about it for a while now and have gotten more in shape but I've neglected working on my eating issues. I know I don't eat enough fruits or veggies so this is a high priority this year. I'll eat more of the good things and less of the bad, but without getting hung up on cutting everything out of my life. I'm sorry sometimes I want a slice of cheesecake and that should be fine. Dieting doesn't work. Lifestyle changes and being positive are my goals.

Number two is getting my business going. This time next year, I will have had at least 6 months of experience and survived my first christmas selling online. This is taking longer than I thought to get going. It's moving forward though so we're going to keep positive and keep moving.

Number three is to spend less time zoned out in front of the tv and more time enjoying my hobbies (scrapbooking, writing, photography, designing, whatever). I've got the gift of lots of free time so I need to use it better. Getting healthy and getting my business going will incorporate my hobbies too. I'm going to start a scrapbook/journal to write/bitch whatever about the coming year and get back into a photo a day blogging.

Every week I'm going to blog here at least once. I'm going to blog on my sparkpeople site and get involved in the groups/teams there. I'm going to spend more time doing stuff with my husband and I'm going to enjoy life.

On that note, I'm off to update my sparkpeople site my.sparkpeople.com/ANOTHERAMANDA.

Week in the Life. (Update)

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. I'm a firm believer I just wish I could figure something I liked that was also quick and healthy because I don't want to get up any earlier on the mornings I go into work than I already do. (I know, I know cry me a river.)

Usually I exercise every weekday morning before I do anything else (eat breakfast, whatever). I need to get it out of the way or I'd never do it. I'm getting better at that whole thing though and I'm beginning to actually enjoy it... sweating and all.

At work, I have a wonderful office that has a heavy sturdy door that locks. Unfortunately, I will be loosing the office and being moved to a cubicle in the coming weeks as the guys have hired another golf architect and little me doesn't need an office as much as he does. I will cry rivers of tears those last days - but everything must end.

After work yesterday, I read Photo Freedom again and have started the process of sorting all of my albums and photos from the last few years. I will also need to start working on my computer storage as well. I have loads of pictures but finding anything isn't always easy. I'm hoping Stacy Julian's bookStacy's Blogwill help.

If you're interested, Photo Freedom is a system for sorting, filing and managing one's photos for scrapbooking and crafting. I know too well how frustrating it can be to be working on something and spend half the day looking for an image (or five for a project). I discovered this particular joy when I was creating my friend's birthday present (an album with pictures from our entire friendship spanning more than 20 years). IF only I had had some easier way. I have the gist of Stacy's system but it was only recently - too late to save me any time for my earlier project. (Note to self - upload pictures of album).

After many readings over the past week or 10 days, I have started sorting my albums by decade (a sort of presort). Our apartment isn't equiped with loads of space so I know the next few steps will be agonizing. I am looking forward to the day when I can just flip through a drawer or an album or a computer folder and find exactly what I wanted.

While Stacy's Library of Memories (known to followers as LOM) might be time consuming in the set up, the idea of it makes it worth all the agony of sorting and organizing. If only I could hire someone to do all that for me - but I'd miss half of the point and I've already found that out.

Just doing the initial sort, I found some wonderful pictures that I had forgotten about that made me laugh or were bittersweet since my dad's passing. I know I will only ever have more photos and the longer I put off doing the grunt work the harder/longer the sorting process will be. My husband and I had some good laughs over pictures we had taken early in our relationship. It was an amazing experience.

After the sorting into years, Stacy recommends using a limited number 3-up albums to hold a collection of these photos that will be "active" scrapbooking - current events if you will. I already have a collection of albums and pages from back before I scrapbooked and everything went into 4X6 pages from centuries plastics so I will be repurposing the albums I already have since I don't care much about looking pretty in this case. While I'm rearranging these albums, I will start pulling images for the 4X6 drawers I purchased today (they should be here on Monday - Yeah!) for Stacy's category drawers where she puts photos she wants to scrap but are no longer in the active albums. These drawers have four different themes "us", "people", "places" and "things" - I'm not sure if I will keep Stacy's categories or not we'll see once I start using the system. Stacy also uses "cold storage" for images she doesn't want to get ready of but doesn't think she'll scrap when she cleans out her storage albums to move in new photos.

I'm excited about the process but dreading the actually nitty gritty work. I know the results will be worth the cost in time/money but I'm anxious to get it all out of the way and move on to my next thing.

Enough about that. I'll post more as I get going.

Before work today, I ran a bunch of errands and tried to get the cement off my car from the works going on in the apartment complex. It didn't come off in the carwash so I went into the office and talked to one of the managers. She'll be getting back to me tomorrow or Monday I guess with what the contractor has said/suggested. I hate dealing with that kind of crap but I also want my car to look as pretty as it did before the cement landed on it. It could be worse though.

Week in the Life. (Update)

Well, my week is going pretty well. Quiet as usual - but quiet doesn't mean bad... I learned that earlier this year.

Saturday, I met Kathleen for lunch at Michelle Marie's. Awesome! I had a delicious lemon bar after lunch (chicken salad sandwich) and then took this mini chocolate overload cake home to share with T. Yum. That makes a good day any way you slice it.

Laundry day. Sunday. Uck. But it has to get done at some point so I might as well get it over with. While the laundry was going, I made a dent in sorting my scrapbooking stuff... I wish I had an actual room to devote to it and my computer but maybe some day... I also sorted out my books and material to send some to Amy and I will donate the rest to the library.


Monday after work I did more cleaning and took a relaxing walk around the neighborhood. I'm beginning to look forward to my afternoon walks. Time to think and just stretch out and observe life around me... golfers, kids, animals... plants. Dinner was yummy chicken tika masala at ShangriLa (and garlic basil naan).


Today was busy. I did my exercising this morning and then had to go to the bank because paychex messed up our direct depoists at work. Then I ran over to the mall to get my clinque products and grabbed some shirts at old navy before picking up lunch at quiznos and heading to work for the afternoon. Work itself was slow but I managed to keep awake.

I'm going to go read a bit before I go to bed. Night.

Walks.

If I could sum up the best way to clear my head, it would be a nice walk. Well a walk anyway. I just got back from another one. I generally take one a day Tuesdays/Thursdays because I work the afternoons. Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays might bring one or two or more depending on my mood, the weather and whether T wants to take on when he gets home.

I never really thought about it before but I just feel better after a walk. When I had my dog as a kid, I'd spend so much time walking (and talking to the dog) that whatever issues/problems I had would be solved. Other times, I'd come up with stories to write or various other imaginings.

Having a bad day? Take a walk.