Fitness Friday--The Talk On Edition

My busyness is your gain. You get open posting again! I'm just too busy kind. I did give a suggestion for a topic and you are perfectly welcome to hit that topic.

I'm not. :)

Today I want to let you know how very much organization has affected my fitness plan. I am sitting here with my mouth open, let me tell you. I would have agreed with this statement before:

Being more organized will help you achieve your fitness goals.

But I didn't REALLY "get" it. Now I do.

Since I have been working on being more organized and using my new checklist, I have noticed several things.

1. I have what I need for meals so we haven't been out to eat yet.
2. The kitchen is clean so I can prepare meals. (Yes, we have gotten fast food before b/c the kitchen was such a mess. A few times. Once or twice. cough cough cough)
3. I actually do have time to exercise.
4. Housework, when you do enough of it, is WORK!

I am very happy with how the week has gone and how much I have accomplished. Today's checklist says, "spend time on a craft or hobby." I couldn't be more delighted and with everything I've done, I know it's OK for me to do that one today.

Hope your week is going well too! Can't wait to hear from everyone!

School's Out!!! (Well, Kind Of)

Sweetheart officially completed 3rd grade yesterday!!! Yeah!!!

Here's the strange thing about homeschooling---you decide when they are done. Some moms set a date and wherever they are in the curriculum by that date, that's it. You know, in public school we never once finished a text book so it's kind of like that.

Other parents live in states where they have to count the days so when they reach their allotted number---done! I decided we would be done when we finished math and history. We finished math last week and history yesterday. Yesterday was also the last day for a lot of kids around here so it worked out well.

Since we sort of just fizzed out, finishing one subject at at time, there is no dramatic feeling of "wow! we're done!!!!" So I decided to have a special dinner to celebrate the end of 3rd. I found this free certificate and printed it on nice paper. We are having Sweetheart's favorite meal. I'll also give her the certificate that comes in the back of her Math U See book. And THEN, she will officially be a 4th grader.

Sniff. My baby will be 10 soon!

We are planning to have a great, fun summer. I am going to start using my workboxes in a modified way as I try to figure out how I'm going to use them next year. We will have a theme each week, just like last year.

This year we have chosen:

watermelons--to kick off the summer

First Aid--we wanted to do some biographies and Clara Barton and the Red Cross came to mind. Probably because I did book report on her several different years when I was in school. Why read a new book if you have a new teacher, you know? Plus it's a good thing to study First Aid at the beginning of the summer.

butterflies--there are so many art projects to go with this, we couldn't resist! We will be attending a butterfly display at the museum too.

dolls--this one evolved from a lot of ideas and we mushed 'em all together. The girls love their dolls, there are dolls in every country of the world and throughout history little girls have played with dolls....this is coming up around the week of Independence day.....we have American Girl dolls....why not dress the dolls up in 4th of July costumes and celebrate with them? Whew!

dogs--My niece Gnat loves dogs right now but sister and I didn't really want to focus on "dogs as pets" as Sweetheart wants one really badly but is not getting one anytime soon and neither are her girls for that matter, so we decided to focus on working dogs and famous dogs.

artists--art as a career, famous artists...plus we will try out every kind of art we can think of. Sculpting, painting, etc.

imaginary creatures--My other niece Moose is still on her mermaid kick and the older girls wanted to study horses--again. We said no more! So we decided to study unicorns (our horse alternative), mermaids, fairies, etc. We will be focusing on the imaginary part as some of these things are presented to children as being real.

So every day a theme activity will go into one of the workboxes. In the other boxes will be math practice, handwriting, astronomy (not quite through with that one yet), and fun stuff.

So, what are you doing for "summer school"?

Fitness Friday This Week

Hi Ladies! I see Mr. Linky is behaving again so hopefully we will be able to have a regular Fitness Friday where it is easier to visit each other and offer encouragement!

I've been on an organizing kick around here and obviously that doesn't leave room for me to give you an assignment on time. Ahem....

You guys had such a great time with open posting last week that we will continue that this week. There is so much to talk about, isn't there? But if you want some direction, here's a suggestion:

Literary Encouragement

Tell us about a book, or portion of a book, Bible verses, whatever....something in print that has encouraged or informed you during your fitness journey. Please share!

See you tomorrow unless you have just shrunk away to nothin' since last week.

As that is not the case with me, I'LL be here. (sigh) :)

Becoming Organized, One Check Mark at a Time

Today is my 3rd day using the Motivated Mom's planner. The list of things to do every day never changes, and then there are 4-6 different things for each day. I have 2 friends (one real-life friend and one e-friend) joining me on the checklists and that is very comforting. It's nice knowing that others are suffering through doing the same things I am.

Today's list was VERY ambitious. We nearly died when we saw it! So I find myself cleaning out 1/2 of the top cabinets in my kitchen this afternoon. This something I would have argued in a court of law was not necessary had you asked me earlier. I mean, how can I do something that doesn't even show when there is so much obvious stuff that needs to be done??? (toy room, homeschool room, sewing room...it hardly ever changes)

Well, turns out the cabinet I picked (which I thought was the easy one) was VERY GROSS once I climbed up on the stool. It may take time, but doing small things every day is going to add up to a BIG difference one day. I always put a lot of pressure on myself to do something big and noticeable before S gets home from work, but reality is, you don't often finish an entire room in one day.

Small steps. Little check marks.

And there is still time to do the important things like help the neighbor carry her garage sale stuff inside before the rain starts. And wash the doll clothes that go with the doll Little Bit got from the garage sale. And help Sweetheart paint the horses she got. I may not get every check mark done each day, but I feel like I'm getting more done than I used to.

OH! And the best thing is--one of the daily tasks is "Exercise." I haven't made/had time to do my new DVD yet, but each day I have been able to check off that box (swimming, driving range...). How cool is that?

Insert Catchy Title Here

Remember a while back our girls were lamenting their poor surroundings and wishing they had a "rich house"? Well, that topic came back up yesterday. I probed a bit further with Little Bit and asked her what makes a rich house. Are you ready?

1. Rich houses have flowers (I think she means in vases)
2. Rich houses have stairs.
3. Rich houses have brown floors. (I pointed to our laminate flooring and she said, "but they don't have carpet." We have carpet in the living room. We are sooo trashy.)
4. Rich houses have plants.
5. Rich houses have fancy cars.

Nice to know. I asked her if rich houses have messy toy rooms and that was the end of the conversation.

I'm going to have to watch that girl. Yesterday S swam with the girls after supper while I finished the dishes and ran to the store for some essentials. (Cokes and something chocolate--FF ladies, please ignore that statement. I was providing for my family.)

While they were in the pool Little Bit suddenly announced she was going to go under water. We haven't encouraged her to do that in summers past because of her $2,000 ear tubes but last night she did. In just a few minutes she was not only going all the way under, but swimming down to touch the bottom of the pool and seeing how long she could stay under. S said he got a little nervous at one point because she stayed down a pretty long time.

I can just tell how teaching her is going to be. She will not do a thing for a long time--won't even consider doing it--and then one day she makes up her mind and that's the end. She's a watcher. She watches, listens and absorbs for a long time and then she just does it herself one day. There is not a process of day by day getting better at something for her. It's going to be interesting.

Yesterday my new checklist from Motivated Moms went really well. It was a lot to get done all in one day! I have been wandering around putting out fires for so long, having an organized list of things to get done felt strange. I did things that, to me, could have waited. For example, yesterday's list had on it to clean off the top refrigerator shelf. Well, it wasn't that bad. The homeschool room needs to be sorted, the toy room looks like a tornado went through, and the sewing room floor is missing, but I cleaned off that top shelf because I know if I continue with the checklists, order will begin to creep in. Before I would have never done some of those things because how can I when there is all this mess around?? See? I got not so much done because I was distracted by how much there was to do.

And so I'm off to get started on my list for today. We already cleaned the bunny house out. Ug. And guess what I have discovered? Little Bit is all about cleaning. She LOVES to help me with housework. Sweetheart, not so much. She does her chores, but more often than not her work is sloppy and has to be done again. Cleaning and housework just doesn't really appeal to her (mostly). But when we are dealing with the pets--Little Bit is strangely absent and Sweetheart is right there in the middle sweeping up poop with a smile on her face. Maybe she should marry that farmer when she grows up like she plans to. Kids are so different from each other.

Have a great, productive day Ladies!!!