Goals Update/Keeping Busy

(Here's the post of the original goals)

My health goals have slipped. I've been better this week, but it's still a bit of an uphill climb to get back on track. I seem to do well during the morning/afternoon, but when I get home I lose all sense of restraint and I'm like "EAT ALL THE CARBS". Urf. On the plus side, we have tried to eat out less this week, and next week our schedule is a little more predictable and stable so we should be able to cook at home more.

No pumpkin-carving party this year, so I'm going to start thinking about an optimal time for a gingerbread bash! I haven't made a gingerbread house since I was a little kid, and Xmas is my favorite holiday of the Holiday Trinity, so I'm pretty psyched. Of course, I need some of that pesky thing called spare time before I can plan anything. *sigh*

Volleyball is moving forward in that I've found a local open-gym night on Thursdays (that of course was closed the first week I'm free) and joined a Meet-up group (that of course has no current scheduled games). I think XOSO's next season starts in November, so come hell or highwater I WILL PLAY VOLLEYBALL SOON.

Finally, my crafting by hand has been on semi-technicalities, but I'll  count it because at least it's making me be creative and take a moment to work with my hands. I technically missed the second week (although I did create some very cute bulletin boards for my classroom, even if my T.A.s technically put half of them together), but last weekend I drew my RPG character for the new campaign my friends and I are playing. (Yes, I'm one of those nerds!)

Guevana, a gnome Rogue. If you don't know what that means, you were probably popular in high school

Tonight I prepped my possible costume for Wednesday - IF it's cool to wear costumes at work. I would think it is, and my costume is perfectly acceptable for teaching (I'm dressing as a "citizen of the Capitol" a la The Hunger Games - I couldn't find an Effie Trinket-style wig, so I settled for a platinum bob wig), but I want to double-check first. I didn't really have to make anything specifically for the costume - heck, the only money I spent was for the wig, because the rest is from my closet. I had a feathery-thingie that's been in my crafts cupboards for years, so I attached it to a bow headband I had from my New Year's Eve dinner party costume (I'm also using the same dress, belt, and earrings). Et voila:

It's gonna look AWESOME with my wig. Very Effie, I think.

I wish I had more to do for Halloween - this year our usual crew was busy helping our friends move into their new house today! Whooo! Unfortunately, though, that means we don't have any plans. Might see if my cousin and her partner will let me come over and pass out candy - that way I can still wear my awesome costume if I can't wear it to work, haha.

Other than that, my schedule is still crazy but I think it might be slowing down and I can catch up (famous last words!). This is in reference to work schedule, of course - the next three weekends are booked solid as well. Oy. Don't get me wrong, I'm happy to be so busy, being unemployed drove me NUTS; I think I just like having the right to complain about it. ;D

Accepting My Size: Size 22-24

I am full-on into the "Fat Pride/Fat Acceptance" movement. Healthy is defined by your inner workings (physical and mental), not your outer shape. Lately I've been unhealthy, using food as my stress relief, but I'm ready to start working back to healthy mode - not for weight loss, but because I like how I feel when I'm making my blood pump and when the food I eat makes me feel good.

Also, I have sweet legs, a killer rack, and a nice caboose, yo, and these must be recognized as such.

My outfit is together, but my desk is in shambles. 

Showin' off my nice legs, cute shoes, and BRAND NEW BIRTHDAY PURSE OMG

These were taken Monday, the day after my 31st birthday. I was in a great mood that morning, but to be honest, the rest of the week was... less than. I'm working my way back to happiness, though; this is a temporary setback due to work circumstances. I still really like my job, though, and my career field despite the efforts of a select few to make things more difficult for me; I also have a lot of catching up to do, so once these things work themselves out and I find a balance again, I think there will be a lot of happiness returning to me. Despite feeling very moody and overwhelmed, I still feel life is good and the second full year of my 30's is off to a nice start with me still feeling very fulfilled.

One of those fulfillment areas is accepting who I am, inside and out. I'm a beautiful woman, and I really love myself a lot of the time.

One Year Into My 40th Decade

My 4th bday - I've been partying hard since birth, baby

 The 30's are an interesting set of years; it's the decade we all seem to dread getting to, yet once we're here it's almost a relief to see the previous 3 decades finally start to pay off. (Or at least that's what seems to be happening now, finally.)

This isn't to say my life is exactly where I want it to be, but when I hit the big 3-0 without hitting most of my official "success markers" and making myself miserable while stewing on this fact, I finally ran out of f***s to give. I'm still out. It just got exhausting.

And, of course, when I stopped caring is when stuff started to fall into place. It's still early to feel 100% confident that things are going to work out as I hoped (life has made me cynical), but I'm guarded-hopeful and feeling good.

This weekend marked not only the end of some schedule MADNESS that will make my day job a lot easier, but also a nice upswing from last year's birthday. I'm still shaking off my disappointment in myself and some certain people in how my birthday was treated last year; it really hurt me, deeply, but part of that was my own doing. This year, though, I was so busy I didn't even CARE, and The Hubs actually forced me into picking something to do for my bday. When I finally figured that out, I got excited about the weekend, and that led to an overall fantastic weekend. Happiness in celebrating myself, relief at getting my schedule back to my own choices, and joy in finding out that I am more loved than I believed I was last year (and that I need to get the f*** over myself sometimes).

So far, my 30's have actually been fairly excellent, even when I was unemployed. It's definitely nice to be employed again, that's for dang sure. I'm just saying I'm happy so far with how this decade is going, and that's a nice place to be.

That isn't to say there aren't still things I want to work on; I want to create a beautiful life, and find the balance between work and living life. I still live a little too much for work (and considering I'm a teacher, that kind of comes with the job), but I'm hoping that as I work more and become more confident and secure in my job, and find routines that work for me, that it'll start to balance out. I want to cook fresh, delicious food and break the addiction to processed sugars and junk food. I want to take the time to craft with my hands and read books analog-style, and to break my computer/internet addiction. In a lot of ways, my life is getting close to where I want it to be, but there's still some areas that I can control (see previous) and other areas where I can't change but can work on my side of it (see medical issues).

Despite the self-assessed "need for improvement" areas, though, I still feel fairly happy with where I currently am and the direction The Hubs and I are pursuing together. Life is good, and it's nice to feel that way on my actual birthday. 

Hello, Autumn!

Can I just state for the record that I much prefer the term "Autumn" instead of "Fall", because I think "Fall" the noun is too easily confused with "Fall" the verb? Not to mention "Autumn" is such a lovely word to roll off the tongue.

Sorry, the English teacher took over for a second there, I'll stop.

It only took until early October, but we are officially experiencing Fall (Autumn) weather around these parts! Which is nice, it's actually a little early this year. Usually our area has a far-too-long "Indian Summer", but the last few days have been slightly crisp and gorgeous. What a relief!

There are several things I like about the Autumn season:

• my birthday (I'm very self-centered)
• the colors of the trees as they change
• the cold weather demands warmer foods and drinks
• the smell of the air
• cute Halloween costumes on little kids 
• coming in from the cold and the feeling of your body getting warmer
• sweaters and cute boots
• enjoying Turkey Day, then hosting my extended family for ye olde day of Gobbling (Thanksgiving)

I still want to have a pumpkin-carving day, but I suspect that considering we're having folks over next Saturday for my birthday hootenanny (basically just making a chili bar for sustenance and then hanging out and playing games - hence my hesitation to call it a party) it might be too soon to have another party thingy. But the urge to carve pumpkins is still strong...

Regardless, since I mentioned it, yes it IS my birthday next Sunday! It's also homecoming week at the high school where I work, so it's going to be pretty insane this week *sigh* - at least in a mostly good way. The Hubs is coming out to the Homecoming game Friday night at my request to see my classroom and also support the team. ;D Saturday is a baby shower for friends in the morning, and then my hootenanny that evening, followed by Sunday (actual bday) with my folks coming up to go out to lunch! It'll be a fun week/weekend, but to have to go right back into a work week with no real break is not something I'm looking forward to, to be honest. What can I say, I've become a workaholic now that I'm back in the classroom. It's exhausting and stressful, but I love it (for the most part ;D).

Anyway, yes, it's officially my favorite season and it makes me happy. Cooler weather, my special day, SF Giants are in the playoffs... it's good month/season!

4 simple goals: Week 1

A reminder of what those goals are (Full post here):

• Meds and healthy eating regularly
• host a pumpkin-carving/gingerbread-house-making party
• join a volleyball team or league of some sort
• craft something once a week

Progress:
I had a rough week, so rough that my body finally went, "Ya know what? EFF THIS, you're taking a day off" - and I ended my week with a head cold and took Friday off so I could rest, ugh. When I get stressed, I resort to old habits out of comfort. So my eating was not very healthy. The ironic part of this is that I should be eating healthier when I'm stressed, because it makes me feel physically worse. Fortunately, after a few days of eating like this, it loses its novelty and I crave the good stuff, so I usually find my way back, which is nice. It's a small step back as opposed to several steps. Meds are on the reg, though, which is good.

The party will happen; of course, the next party I'm having will not have pumpkin carving or gingerbread house construction, it's for my birthday! We're keeping it simple this year, because last year was just a clustereff in that it left me emotionally destroyed and set me back in my insecurities for really STUPID reasons. Ugh. Don't get me wrong, my birthday ended up being awesome, but fretting over the guest list and how many people weren't coming or were only coming to the dinner kind of ruined it for me. Still ended up having a good bday weekend, though. This year is simple: Game night at our apartment with food and adult beverages and friends, and the actual day of the birthday has my parents coming here for lunch, which is nice.

I found a volleyball group on MeetUp.com, but it's only bi-weekly. I plan to join the soonest one after my volleyball coaching ends, and I'm on the email list for the XOSO social league so when the next "season" starts I'll hopefully sign up in time.

And crafting! I actually hadn't gotten around to making anything (as Friday and Saturday was mostly resting, although Saturday I did catch up on work and go see "Looper" - really good movie, btw), so this morning I decided to do some art journaling.

"The older I get, the more I like myself "

Granted, I'd previously stamped the background and apparently never did anything with it, so this wasn't terribly difficult. Took about half an hour, but it was nice to just sit there and decorate something to (hopefully) make it pretty. It's not my best work, but it looks nice and gave me some tranquility while I made it. Next weekend I want to make a button monogram in a shadowbox!

One bonus about these simple goals: They're not overwhelming, and it gives me a reason to update. Whooo!