Speaking of Easy

Happy Memorial Day weekend! I’m joining Friday Favorites this week and re-committing to the blog. I’ve finished my Spring semester at one college and only have finals at another, so for me, it feels like a new year! So, this Friday Favorite is my last of this (academic) year and I’m once again joining A Little Bit of Everything and Momfessionals for all the faves!

I guess I’ll go chronologically. Last weekend, my daughter went to the prom at a friend’s high school. My mother-in-law was in town so she got to be with us when we met up to take photos and overall, they had a great time. It was such a nice group of young human beings!

I also donated a bag of food for Stamp Out Hunger where our mail carriers pick up donations for our local food banks. There is so much need in our local area, so this felt like an easy give.

On campus this week, a colleague gave us the head’s up that there was a mama owl and babies on campus, so we walked over and saw them! So cool. My friend went over there later and got way better photos of the babies, but here are my photos.

The week ended with me getting my grades in for University classes (woot!) and a three-day weekend! We went to the Farmer’s Market this morning (I didn’t take any photos – I really should have though) and we talked with a young woman who has an old school typewriter and will write poetry on it for you for a donation. I bought a Zine from her to support her because I thought it was such a cool thing to do. We talked to another woman who was weaving her own yarn from sheep’s wool. The colors were amazing (she dyes it herself) and it was so cool to see her working the loom. We got fresh soup and curry to bring home for lunch and my favorite Chico Sourdough.

Overall, I’m excited to have the Spring semester ending. It has been a rough one. Between my daughter spending nine days in the hospital, traveling for a conference, an unusually (for me) long cold that was miserable and just an overall stressful semester with way too many things happening all at once, things did not go as planned in my classes or in my FYE position. But, there were some really good things that happened and the conference was really beneficial. My daughter has been feeling much, much better since getting on meds at her last hospital stay. But, now feels like a brand new year! One in which I will:

• Have a Senior in high school! :0
• Turn the ripe age of 58! :0
• Definitely NOT teach on Fridays (I had two classes on Friday this semester – first and last time for that).
• Only teach two days a week, leaving the other three days a week for focusing on FYE and my family.

and one in which I WANT to:

• Lose 30 pounds. It won’t be easy, but I’m feeling like my body could really use a lighter daily load and I know I will be more healthy if I lose some weight.
• Read more books. The bar is low. I am so bad at choosing reading over my phone or work (that doesn’t need to be done at the time) or TV I’ve seen before. I need to just choose to read whenever I can and I could read a ton.
• Blog at least twice a week. I just need to get it in my schedule and I can do it, but I often just let the days go by without thinking about it. I want to be here more regularly.
• Eat at home at least five days a week. This goes with the first one. We eat out a lot and none of it is really good for us. So, eating at home more and aiming for healthy food will really help. Plus it saves money. And gives us time together.
• Take more photos. I am not very good at taking photos regularly during the week. I need to get much better at remembering to get my phone out and snap some photos each day.
• Do a 5K. I’m not going to say run it, but that would be nice. I just want to be a person who does 5Ks regularly.
• Celebrate – I mean REALLY celebrate – my daughter’s final year of high school and Girl Scouts and turning 18 (in February)!

Okay – that’s it for this week! Hope to see you soon here in the blog – with more photos and more celebrations!