Per my arbitrary declaration, it’s time for the spring bucket list!

On to the goals. I have a little notebook that is mostly always with me (currently its orange with gold circles from Target; highly recommend). The front part is my to do list and the back is random lists, plans, tracking sheets, etc. Usually once I post a bucket list for a season, I start a new list in my notebook for the next season. This way I can capture things throughout the months that I’d like to work on, rather than sitting down and coming up with ten random goals at one time.

I noticed a flaw in my system when I looked through what I had for spring. It was several hefty craft/house projects and some fitness goals. They are all fun and I’d love to spend my time doing them, but they don’t really reflect my priorities right now and through the next ten weeks. I decided to take another approach and first recognize what my priorities are, then make goals against those. Here’s what I came up with for priorities:

1. Family Time
2. Eating Real Food
3. Sleep
4. Work
5. Schoolwork
6. Exercise
7. Crafting/house

Having an actual list for how I want/need to spend my time was really helpful for coming up with a bucket list that will be realistic and not add stress. The point is to be intentional with my time and have fun, so adding goals that add stress is just silly.

The dirt, weeds, and stone should be grass by summer.

1. Start on fixing up the backyard. This might sound like it falls under priority seven, crafting/house, but it’s actually a project that Greg and I will work on together through nice weekends this spring. We’re both really excited about it and looking forward to doing it. It will definitely be good quality time together. There’s more we want to do to the backyard eventually, but for spring we hope to: plant grass on half the yard, clean up the plants around the sitting area, spruce up our small table and chairs, create veggie boxes for the unused planter, and lay down a ground cover (small white rocks?) around the veggie boxes.

2. Deal with Alfred’s doorbell and stranger barking. This may not be the most fun way to spend family time but it’s seriously going to increase all of our quality of life.

3. Plan and have a fun Memorial Day weekend with my parents and the girls. We are loving all the visitors we have this year and my parents will be in town for Memorial Day weekend. Since we don’t typically have a five and three year old with us, I want to plan a few things that will be fun for everyone.

4. Render pork fat into lard. A new cooking challenge, a new item to use for cooking when it’s done, and creating freezer space! Win, win, win.

5. Buy amber glasses and regular alarm clocks. Sleep improvements! Since I’m usually on my computer until 9 and Greg sometimes later, we’re getting amber tinted glasses. (Yes, I’m aware I get weirder every day.) These glasses help block the blue light that comes from electronics, which throw off your body’s natural cycle of producing melatonin in the evening. Yes, getting off electronics in the evening would be better but right now that’s not going to happen. I’m also looking for some alarm clocks to use in our room instead of our phones.

6. Keep on top of NTP work. I’ve been both on top of my school work and a little behind (post Phoenix) and life is much less stressful during the on top if it phases. So I hope to keep it that way.

7. Get started on my community outreach project. It’s not due until October, but I don’t want to spend September scrambling to finish. My goal for spring is to outline the project.

We did our first walk on Monday evening and got in 2.3 miles. I love you, day light savings time.

8. Walk 50 miles with the doodle. I had so much fun doing this last summer and I don’t have any other form of exercise going on right now, so why not go for it a second time. This will get us both outside and checking out new parks while we rack up the miles.

9. Script class. I signed up for this class, bought the supplies, then promptly started my NTP class. Haven’t done much else but the class is available to me still as it’s online so I hope to get to it soon.

10. Finish the office and craft closet. After careful consideration, the craft closet is going to remain a closet and not a room. It’s been reorganized partially and already that’s made a huge difference. With our new desk I have plenty of room to craft. With the cleaned out closet, I have a place to neatly store everything. It’s working. Virtually no progress has been made on the office since I shared our update, so I need to complete the finishing touches and also clean out the last few shelves in the closet. Totally doable.

Next week I’ll recap my winter bucket list. Which turned out to be not quite as big of a miss as I thought it might be.