Keeping Up With...2021 Goals (Weekly Recap 8/16 - 8/22)

This week marks the end of our summer break and the first week of school. We were supposed to have one more day of fun on Monday, but thunderstorms cancelled our trip to the pool and the boys decided they would rather just stay home and chill than figure out something else to do. Then on Tuesday we ran around doing last minute appointments and errands as best we could because our area got over 4 inches of rain in like an hour and we had major flooding in the area! Thankfully I was able to get AJ safely to the orthodontist and eye doctor, and back home. I then switched things around so I didn't have to drive the rest of the day. We walked up to meet Zak's teacher for the year and then hung out at home getting ready for an early bed time and school tomorrow morning.

Wednesday morning we were up bright and early for our first day of school! Daniel and AJ will (hopefully) be taking the bus this year so I have a little more flexibility in the mornings. Unfortunately Daniel missed his bus this morning because we had no idea that the stop changed for this year. But Adrian drove him to school on his way to work and dropped him off with no problems. AJ had freshman orientation today, with only freshman in the building to learn how things work and where things are. Everyone had a great first day and is looking forward to a fun filled year back in person! I enjoyed my first day alone in the house (even Rocky was at daycare) in what seems like forever! I got a few things done around the house but I mostly relaxed and watched TV.

The rest of the week passed quickly with everyone going to school and work. I didn't start subbing yet this year, I wanted a few days at home to catch my breath so I'll start next week. I got a lot done around the house that I haven't been able to catch up on since vacation. AJ had a very busy first weekend of marching band. Friday night was their first football game. It was an away game and Adrian and I made the drive to watch them. We enjoyed seeing them playing to support the team in the first half & loved both bands at halftime. We then headed home since the other boys had opted not to join us for the game. AJ had a great time and was especially excited that the football team won! Then Saturday morning we were all up early again for AJ to march in the Pataskala parade. He enjoyed marching and we all enjoyed watching him. We were excited to meet up with some friends as well and watch the parade with all of them. It was a hot day, but we made the best of it!

After all of that excitement, we pretty much came home Saturday afternoon and didn't do much of anything. We relaxed in our air conditioning, played board games and video games and watched TV. On Sunday we went to church and then spent the afternoon getting some work done around the house and making sure we were ready for a full week of school. It's going to take us a bit to get adjusted to this schedule, it's been so long since we had such a full schedule. But we are excited to have so much going on!

Here's how I did on my goals this week.

Working on Myself:

• Lose 50 20 pounds by exercising 5 days each week and walking at least 400 miles this year hitting 10,000 steps everyday -  I improved on this again this week and averaged about 9,000 steps each day this week. I hit 10,000 twice this week, it's so much easier when we are in school and I'm on a schedule. I tracked my calories everyday this week and ate really well. Unfortunately, the scale was not kind and I gained 1 pound this week for a total of 8 pounds lost so far this year. I think it was just a fluke thing so I'm determined to stay the course and have another great week this week! 
• Read 15 20 books for fun - I finished "Babyville" this week and it was very good, a typical chick lit book which are always my favorites. I got "The Goldfinch" back out from the library and will continue reading that starting tomorrow.
• Write Scripture(s) every day this year - I have done this all 234 days so far this year. I'm really enjoying this practice so far this year. For August I just picked a generic plan and am excited to see where it leads me.
• Attend 12 6 Zumba jam sessions to improve my teaching skills - I'm pausing this goal at 2 for the year until August September when I'm back to teaching. I will be taking this month to get my stamina back up and hopefully can do a virtual jam in early Sept.

Working on Family:

• Play all 152 of our board games together (either just Adrian and I or as a family) - We were exhausted again after our busy week but we managed to play 2 games this weekend. We played Near and Far which was a new game and thought it was just OK so we'll probably trade it. And we played Obsession which is one of our favorites! We started playing Sat night but were so tired that we left it set up and finished it Sun afternoon, with me just narrowly beating Adrian. So far we have played 108 of our games so far and are still on a good path to finish them up this year!
• Do 10 home improvement/reorganization projects - We are working on cleaning out our basement and spent another 20 minutes down there this weekend. We made another huge dent in the area and filled our trash can with stuff we don't need, including the leftover paint from when we painted the nursery 14 years ago!
• Pay off all of our outstanding credit card debit and don't incur any additional debt - We didn't incur anything this week and are paying the minimums on everything until we get back from (and pay for) our vacation next month.
• Watch 50 movies together and continue watching TV series together - We didn't watch any movies this week since we are back in school and AJ has football games every Friday night. We may try to sneak one in whenever we have a day off from school, but otherwise this goal is on hold until November. We have watched 34 movies so far this year. We are continuing to keep up with our TV shows and finished season 2 of "The Hollow" this week which was very interesting. It wasn't one of my favorite shows, but the boys enjoyed it.
• Celebrate a holiday every day this year - This week we celebrated National Bratwurst Day, National #2 Pencil Day, National Fajita Day, National Potato Day, National Bacon Lovers Day, National Honey Bee and and National Eat a Peach Day. Below are a few picture highlights of our holidays. I'm also chronicling them on Facebook so if we aren't friends there, feel free to add me or follow along at #CelebrateEveryDay