September/ Slashing my 22 for 22 list

Happy September! Today is officially Back to School. Always lots of feelings- mostly seems like an attitude of “begrudging”, from the boys, if that’s a word. As in, they will go, obviously, but begrudgingly. Reluctantly. (It kind of annoys me that they seem SO ho-hum about back to school…I always found it at least somewhat exciting! Who knows. Maybe it’s them? A boy thing? A modern day era thing?? Dunno. I think they’ll actually be happy once they’re back and with friends, etc.)

To celebrate the last day of summer, I spent the entire day chained to my computer, training our new employee. 🙄 I really can’t complain- it’s going so well, and she is fabulous. Really, this new woman is great. I think she said the words, “This is fun!” multiple times, to which I kind of giggled and was like, “Okey dokey, guess we all define fun differently…. but I appreciate the enthusiasm!” lol! But I’m getting a little twitchy at all the constant interaction. That initial period always = so much 1:1 time, because she literally can’t do much on her own yet. My voice is tired from so much TALKING.

I did sneak out in the morning for 30 minutes and, per their request, took the boys out for a very quick fast food breakfast. At least I feel like we did a little something special to say goodbye to summer break. (low bar, but it worked.)

I also spent a few minutes yesterday looking at my 22 for 22 list, thinking about this final push to the end of the year. (omg, how?!)

I have decided that my 22 for 22 list is, frankly, ridiculous at this point, and not going to happen. I do not even care, and I am rethinking the whole concept a bit.

Instead, I tried to sit back and look at the list from a distance, if you will, and tried to see which items ACTUALLY spoke to me as things I really care about. Here’s what I starred:

• My photo organization project. This feels both valuable and important to me. The digital age is not going away, and this just needs to happen. It’s one of those things that I know will bring me great peace and satisfaction when it’s done- and I truly feel that once I get this “caught up”, it won’t be hard to maintain in real time.

• Cleaning out my storage room. Also simply needs to happen, though it’s been dragging along on the list for several years now. I’m thinking maybe this is a WINTER TIME project, and will require taking a day or two off work and just diving in.

• Getting back to meal planning, in some capacity. I currently do not meal plan, at all. Like, at all. I guess it works, since we eat something everyday and have not starved. But I do see many benefits to organizing this better.

• Keep reading. BUT, I don’t think I really care about reading “x” amount, or even “x” minutes per day. I’ve thought about this. I think what I really care about is that I consistently read, whatever that looks like. Maybe it’s 1 book a month. Maybe it’s 10-20 minutes, several times per week. But I just want to make sure to continue being someone who consistently reads.

• Social media use. I had a goal of trialing different methods of decreasing social media use, and I haven’t done this. I remain undecided here, but it’s important enough to me that I immediately *starred* it. Not sure it’s even “social media use” exactly that bothers me, per se, but rather just the constant phone checking. This causes my brain to feel constantly fragmented and I really, really hate how that feels. So I think I want to shift focus away from just “decreasing social media use” and to “creating a life where I am not tethered to and compulsively checking my phone” constantly.

• Keep walking. Similar to reading, not sure I “need” to have some fancy goal around this. I just want to walk, often, frequently, and ideally outdoors most days. I enjoy it VERY MUCH and it’s good for me.

• Keep exercising (and ideally, get consistently back in the gym!) I know I feel my best when I’m strength training regularly- it’s a proven fact. Now with the new school routines, I’m hoping to sort out a consistent chunk, most days, to fit this in.

That’s my parred down list (which is still a lot, but most of these are more like, “core values”/ ongoing life goals). There are some other to-do items on there that should happen at some point, but you know what, I am sure we will get to them at some point, whether I write them on this list or not. (e.g. find an end table for next to the hot tub. touch up paint at front door. etc.)

The rest of the items I’m just not even going to worry about. Some of them seem silly to me, looking back. (Who wrote “make a home declutter list and work my way through it, especially drawers and file cabinets”? Did you SEE my summer recap from yesterday? When on earth did I think I was going to be cheerfully decluttering my file cabinets?

Okay, time to run- gotta go be the official 1st Day photographer now. This is Ethan’s LAST first day at this school! Next year….HIGH SCHOOL. o.m.g.

Daily Gratitude:

I am grateful the kids are going back to school!! I’m craving some more routine big time right now.