Quarterly Goals

It’s definitely safe to say that I missed the chance to write any new year or goal for the year posts this year.  I didn’t post anything until April.  It has been a weird year; not bad, just kind of different.  I like the idea of tracking things, though, and the blog is a great place to do it.  I already keep up with quite a few of my recipes here.  Why not keep up with everything else here?

I recently saw an idea for tracking goals on a quarterly basis.  I love the idea, so I’m going to give it a try.  I mostly like the categories she uses at She Picks Up Pennies, but not all of them apply to my blog, so I’m changing them up a little. 

Here are my third quarter, or July - September, 2019 goals:

 Home:

Clutter has been an ongoing battle for us.  We actually started the year off great, and made a lot of progress in getting rid of things we don’t use.  Unfortunately, though, we’ve slowed down lately in our efforts to conquer our clutter. 

I definitely need to go through my clothes again, so I plan to do that this quarter.  Beyond that, conquering the clutter is a little harder to quantify.  We’ve gotten rid of a lot of clutter and excess things, so have small, random things left.  We’ve also started to reach the point where taming the clutter doesn’t necessarily mean getting rid of things, but it does mean we need to implement some better storage systems, and generally organize some things. 

Health:

I still need to lose more weight, so that’s an ongoing goal.  I’m getting somewhat close to a weight that isn’t where I need to be, but that would be a real milestone for me.  I thought about setting reaching that weight as my goal for this quarter, but I’m trying to break old/bad habits when it comes to weight loss (and gain in my case!), so I’m choosing less focus on a number (though, if I hit that number, I will be thrilled!), and more focus on some of my habits. 

My exercise of choice is the treadmill and swimming laps.  I haven’t done any strength building or weight lifting exercises, so this quarter I plan to incorporate some upper body weight lifting exercises into my weekly exercise.  I’d also like to increase my lap distance.  35.2 laps in the pool at our gym is a mile.  My personal best at one time is currently 20 laps.  I’d like to get that up to at least 30. 

Food is of course a huge part of health, and of losing weight.  My approach so far has been trying to make healthier substitutions for most things.  That seems to be mostly working, so I plan to continue that.  I also need to work on incorporating more vegetables. 

Environment:  

This will most likely be a much longer post or two at some point, but I have a lot of room for improvement here.  I’m finally beginning to realize that sudden, major changes don’t work for me with anything.  I do much better with small, consistent modifications that become habits. 

So my goals for this quarter are to switch from paper napkins and paper towels to cloth napkins and reusable cleaning rags.  Realistically I don’t expect to ever completely stop buying and using paper towels, but I think I can drastically reduce the amount.  My other goal is to compost more.  I’ve never been very consistent when it comes to composting, so I plan to become much more diligent about making sure that compostable items actually get composted rather than trashed. 

Personal/Miscellaneous:

I definitely plan to read more.  Over the years the time I spend watching TV has crept up, which automatically leads to less reading.  My goodreads goal for the year is 52 books; a book a week.  I’m a few books behind, but it’s definitely a goal I can still make, so I plan to be on schedule with number of books read this quarter. 

I also need to focus on reading some nonfiction.  I love fiction, and it will always be my first choice, but I think some nonfiction would also be beneficial.  I read a lot of historical fiction, so I think I may start to supplement that with some nonfiction related to the historical fiction.

I’m also still trying to learn to crochet.  My progress is very slow, but I’m enjoying it.  I think I finally have the single crochet figured out.  I’m currently trying to learn the half double crochet.  At the moment it feels like I will never get it, but as Nick pointed out, I said that about chaining and the single crochet, and I seem to be able to do those now.  My crochet goal for the quarter is to learn two more stitches. 

Blogging:

I’ve barely blogged at all this year, and I miss it.  It seems to always be one of the first things I let go, but I think I’m happier when I write and post on a more regular basis.  My blogging goal for this quarter is to post at least three times a week. 

In looking over my list I kind of feel like the human version of a fixer upper house!  I definitely have a lot to work on. 

As I’m sure you noticed, the pictures aren’t really related to this post.  I took them earlier this year when those flowers were blooming, but never got around to posting them before now.   They’re late, but still pretty.

So what about you?  How do you track your goals and the progress you’re making on them?  Are you working on anything in particular right now?

Thanksgiving Plans

Now that we’re well into the first week of November I think it’s socially acceptable to start talking about Thanksgiving plans.  I love Thanksgiving.  It is, by far, my absolute favorite holiday.  I love cooking for people, so I think a holiday that’s all about being thankful you have food to cook and people you love to cook it for is perfect.

Thanksgiving this year wasn’t looking good, though.  Nick works in a branch of the emergency services, and has to work on Thanksgiving. That’s not unusual.  I  think he’s had one Thanksgiving off in the nine years we’ve been together, so we’ve become pretty good at working around him having to work.  In years past, he has gotten a two hour lunch break, so we’ve had Thanksgiving then.  It worked.  I had everything ready, and people always showed up on time.  Other years we’ve had dinner a little later, when he gets off of work.  This year, though, he’s on-call starting the day after Thanksgiving.  The likelihood of him being called in to work early Friday morning is high.  A late celebration at our house just didn’t seem like a wise plan.  I was pretty upset by the idea of not being able to have some kind of Thanksgiving celebration at least close to Thanksgiving.

This has been a really, really bad year, and I’ve been kind of floundering lately.  Part of me wants to cry myself to sleep and hibernate until 2017 because it has to be a better year than this one has been.  Please.  Part of me also wants to try to do something to somehow try to improve the rest of 2016; maybe the last little bit of it can be a little better.  I just haven’t really been able to come up with a good plan, one that felt right, or that I could get really excited about.  That’s when we came up with our plans for Thanksgiving.

The hospice house that GrandMommy was in is very close to us.  They have a kitchen so family members can cook meals there, and they have a nice big dining room table so people can eat together.

Hospice is an incredible organization, and they’re very welcoming to people who want to do something to volunteer.  We thought about it, and decided to ask the hospice house here if I could cook them Thanksgiving dinner and bring it for whoever might want it.  Losing a loved one is never easy, but I can’t imagine how painful it must be to face that during the holidays.  From a practical standpoint, restaurant choices are somewhat limited on a holiday.

I called the hospice house the day we came up with the idea to ask if I could do it.  I wasn’t sure if they might want references or some kind of background check or something, so I wanted to allow plenty of time for that.  The lady who answered the phone was incredibly nice.  It took a few minutes to explain that, yes, I wanted to bring an entire Thanksgiving meal.  She told me that would be fine, wonderful in fact, but suggested that I talk to the volunteer coordinator just to make sure, and to make things official.

The volunteer coordinator wasn’t going to be in for a few days, so I left my contact information and waited to hear back from her.  Meanwhile, I panicked a little bit.  Cooking Thanksgiving dinner for the hospice house seemed like the perfect plan.  I was very worried that there would be some issue, and I started making lists of people I could ask for references if I needed to plead my case.  Nick promised me he would find me someone to cook Thanksgiving dinner for if the hospice house said no for any reason.

I finally talked to the volunteer coordinator, Elaine, about a week later.  She and I ended up playing phone tag for a couple of days, but it was worth the wait.  She was incredibly nice!  She confirmed, again, that I did mean the whole meal, and we came up with a good time for me to bring it.  The plan is for me to call a few days ahead of time to get a rough idea of how many people might be there.  Elaine reminded me that some families may have other plans, and that some people don’t eat very much when they’re upset.  She also said that the staff will definitely appreciate it, and that surely some family members will too.

So now I’m cooking Thanksgiving dinner for a crowd, and getting to pay it forward a little bit too.  Honestly, I’m hoping there aren’t very many people in hospice care on Thanksgiving.  I’m more than happy to cook for a crowd, but I hope it’s a happier Thanksgiving than that for most people.

Now, it’s time for the fun part of this post!  The food!  I’m trying to go ahead and plan the menu; partly so I can buy things ahead of time on sale, and partly because that’s just how I am with Thanksgiving.  We close at work at noon the Wednesday before, so my plan is to come home from work that day and start cooking and baking.

Obviously, the turkey is the main part of the meal.  Depending on what they tell me as far as the number of people, I may also cook a turkey breast along with the turkey.  Dressing is a must, as are mashed potatoes, and sweet potato casserole.  I’m a good southerner, so gravy (lots and lots of gravy) goes almost without saying.  And more gravy.  Definitely macaroni and cheese.  Cranberry sauce is another must.  Definitely some green bean casserole.  I can’t stand it, but the rest of the world seems to love it.  I always make rice (with pan drippings in place of some of the water, and a package of vegetable soup mix, it’s delicious!) with our Thanksgiving dinner, so I’ll do that too.  I also usually make some sort of greens with Thanksgiving dinner.  Partly because I really like them, and partly because I can feel better about gorging on Thanksgiving food because, hey, I’m eating leafy green vegetables too.  And of course dinner rolls, because you need something else to mop up the gravy with.

For desserts, pumpkin pie is a must.  Depending on the number of people they tell me, maybe more than one.  I’m also planning to make chocolate cupcakes.  Maybe a pound cake.

Now here’s the part where I ask for your ideas and suggestions:

Is there something else I should make?  I didn’t grow up celebrating Thanksgiving.  I’ve embraced it wholeheartedly, but sometimes I still feel like a novice.  I make the foods that Nick and I like, and that the people we’re celebrating with that particular year like.  Is there some traditional/must have Thanksgiving item that I’m missing?  What makes it special for you?  When it comes to greens, do you prefer collard greens, turnip greens, or mustard greens?  I like them all, but I know some people have strong preferences.  I’m open to menu suggestions and ideas.

Now here’s the part where it gets really complicated.  I cannot properly carve a turkey.  Not even close!  Any tips on that?  I’m hoping I can get a friend to stop by and do it for me.  I’m willing to bribe someone with a pie or something.  Any ideas on what a good bribe might be to get someone to come over and carve the turkey for me?

I’ve even considered taking it whole, but I’m afraid that might be inconvenient for the hospice house.  What are your thoughts on that?  Any compelling reasons why you think I should take it whole?

So what about you?  Do you love Thanksgiving?  What are your plans?