Pantry Labels

As you know one of my goals for this week is to finish off my pantry.

One of the things holding me back are my chalk labels. If you look at catalog pictures in magazines the labels are written in fonts. They look so neat and clean. Like in this picture:

I'm afraid if I write them they'll look like this. Of course there is nothing really wrong with this one it just looks like a child wrote it and its not professional (again this is one of my faults):

So I think I have made the decision to try and write them myself today. If I can't live with them then I will ask the person I wanted to ask to write them at my teacher's meeting this afternoon.

Hopefully I will have before and after pictures posted by Thursday of my new and improved pantry!

Brain Purge

Throughout my day I get ideas, thoughts, etc. that I NEED to deal with or tell someone about it IMMEDIATELY for fear that if it doesnt get verbalized the idea will get lost in the space the is called my mind and will be lost forever.

I would like to call this action a

"Brain Purge"

I just got off the phone with my therapist. She was "assigned" to me by my lawyer since I was in a car accident 3 weeks ago (the second car accident I have had in the past 15 months).

My need to be perfect, to not give over responsibility to others is based possibly on a sensory disorder.


Sorry, I know there is a lot of history necessary to explain a lot of what I just said, hopefully it will be explained in future posts.

My First Step on the Journey

I've put some thought into what action or habit I would like to work on for each version of myself.

In my previous post I described myself as 9 things: A wife, mother, homemaker, daughter, sibling, friend, teacher, community member and, person

I will write my ideas (in random order):

Homemaker:
Finish the pantry organization project I began last week. That means I need to return any unused items, finalize the pantry, ask someone to write my labels for me, and snap the after pictures.

Wife:
Have good menu habits.
That needs some explanation.....I don't always have the right ingredients at home for my husband to take lunch to work, and I don't make his lunch. I dont always have dinner ready on time, and I usually bother my husband by asking him what he wants for dinner. I want to stop doing that and make lunches and dinners for him happen "magically".

(as a side note: In the future I want to explore my need to make sure everyone is happy with their breakfast/lunch/dinner choices instead of just making food and plopping it on the table or in their lunch bags and having them eat what is in front of them.)

Community Member:
Try and convince my husband to take the school president position because I know he can do it and be great at the job even if it makes him stretched a little thinner.

Teacher:
End of the year strongly. Catch up on my grading over this weekend, have strong lessons for the last two weeks. Continue teaching as though it is in the middle of the year despite the students thinking it's summer break already.

Mother:
From 4:30-7:30 deposite my phone in a basket and only pick up calls from David (my husband), my father, and Shani (my sister). I have a special ring for these 3 people (Margot, my best friend, also has a special ring but she can wait until after 7:30). I gave them that ring so I can make an informed decision to answer their call without having to look at the phone to see who is calling.

Daughter:
Continue what I am doing. I try an not allow more than 1 days to pass without touching base with my father. I also like to arrange dinners so I know he sees at least all of my kids within a months time.
As a daughter in law I want to Skype my in laws once a week with my baby so they see her an extra time during the week. I used to do this with my other daughter but I was not working at the time so it was easier. However, just because it's hard doesn't mean it shouldn't be done.

Sibling:
Continue staying in contact, have the kids interact more with their cousins.

Friend:
Complement 5 people a day, even if they aren't my best friend. It can be anything as simple as "I like your top."

Person:
1 hour of Non-Electronic and Non-Food oriented personal time.

The Road Begins

I have been listening to podcasts by "A Slob Comes Clean" and she said that you don't plan how to start a blog, you just start it.

So I'm starting it.

Almost 4 weeks ago my paternal grandmother died. She was the last of my 4 grandparents to die. On the plane ride home from her funeral I wrote a letter to my father and in that letter I wrote, "I know from both sides of my genetics I'm made from women of strong stuff. I have always known that I'm made of strong stuff and I've known where it comes from." From my father's side the woman is my grandmother and from my mother's side the woman is my mother. My mother died a little over 12 years ago. To this day people come over to me to tell me how much they miss her and what a loss they feel. Of course I think she was great she was my mother. But when you hear other people telling you that they were impacted by her and feel her loss 12 years later, you realize she was great because she was herself.

I am not saying this to boast or make myself sound great, however, I believe that in order to reach your potential you need to know where you are headed. I need to know how high I can reach.

I reach for perfection.
I believe that perfection is unreachable.
However, I still reach for it because I know that will help me get as close as possible to it.

I feel like I can improve as:
A wife
A mother
A homemaker
A daughter
A sibling
A friend
A teacher
A community member
A person

Everyone journey started out with one step.

I will begin my journey with a step in the right direction for all 9 versions of me.

Now I know professionals will say that I'm trying too much at once, and I may prove them right. However, I can't separate these 9 parts of me. I am all of them and when one is lacking it pulls down the others.

So here is to my journey. Please sit back and hopefully enjoy the road to my potential.