As Long As It Has a Time Limit

Tonight I needed to mop the floor and do other various cleany things around my house. I'll admit, I'm a staller. If I can find a reasonable reason not to clean, I'll probably do it. (Reasonable reasons include "I don't have enough time to clean what I REALLY want to clean so I might as well not do anything", "we're taking the dogs up to the mountains and they'll get the house dirty so we might as well wait until we get back", "I'll do it on Saturday when I have all day", "I'm tired", and "I don't feel like it".)
But tonight I couldn't think of anything else to do. I really needed to give my floor another smell other than it's current smell of "I have two dogs". I didn't want to clean. I wanted to be lazy. So I had to resort to the method my mature self uses to get my lazy, immature self to do anything: I gave myself a time limit. I said, "I'll just clean everything I can for 20 minutes and then I can stop." When I do this I usually end up cleaning for at least an hour. I know this fact when I give myself the time limit. I just need a jump start. I need an out in case after 20 minutes I'm still not in the mood to clean.

Tonight worked like most other nights. I ended up cleaning until I HAD to stop and go to a family thing (Family night where my favorite quote of the night was: Dad: "And who gives us the gift of the Holy Ghost?" Answer from the almost two-year old: "ME!")

Why do I need a time limit? I think it has something to do with the bad thing having an end. As I was cleaning, I started thinking about other things I "endure" because I know there's a time limit. Being alone. Pulling weeds. Parent/Teacher Conferences. Uncomfortable parties where I don't know anyone. Missing family members. Cars broken down on the freeway (I honestly tell myself "This will be over a week from now. Somehow this will have all been taken care of a week from now...")

Come to think of it, a lot of my happiness is based on the hope that all bad things will eventually go away. And that has it's base in faith and trust- good companions when you're going through a tough time. Somehow they can even help us feel happiness in the midst of the unhappiness.

I Don't Pay Well

This being the second day of summer vacation, in the year two-thousand and seven, I being 29 years of age and having nothing better to do with my time, decided to go forth and organize my closet. My hall closet. The one at the end of my hall. The only closet I have besides my bedroom closet and my coat closet. I know. I need more closets. Closet is really starting to look like a strange word right now.

Anyway, this morning and for the past 200 or so mornings my closet looked like this:

There are other shelves, but they don't need any make-overs. They're full of stuff I don't use that often so they never get out of place. (extra sheets, blankets, ...cleaning supplies)

Since I was in the "organizing mode" (I was not in any mode. I didn't want to organize anything. I wanted to be lazy today. I was tiiired.) I decided to organize the bathroom drawers, too. They looked like this:

And this (respectively):

I couldn't wait to get started (I didn't want to start at all. But I had nothing else to do. Well, there was a ton I could have done, but I didn't want to do any of it. This seemed like the easiest of my options.) I went over to the local Tarjay and bought some bins. Bins I love. Bins I love because they are way cheap ($1.39!!!) and because they are sturdy and because they were the right size.

I got home and worked my magic (I took almost 2 hours to pull the contents of 2 small drawers and 2 shelves and put them into bins. I even brought a chair in from the other room so I wouldn't have to stand. I'm that lazy.)

Behold what I have done!

I feel good now. I've done something productive today. And to top it all off, I found a cool $1.28 AND a 2 pound coin from England. (You know what that means, ladies! We need to go to London!)

I don't pay myself so well.

It's a snack revoLUTION!

Thanks to some people we know, who shall remain anonymous, Zack and I ended up with THIS last night:

Actually, this is not all of it. The plate used to be full. We ate some (a lot) for lunch.

Thanks to the people at Village Inn, we also ended up with this the other night:

This plate used to be full, too.
Why did they have to have one pie left? Why? This is, as Zack would say, THE best pie in the world. I'm not sure what's in it exactly. Dark chocolate cookies, dark chocolate mousse, chocolate whipped cream, a layer of chocolatey goodness that shall be unnamed, and chocolate sprinkles. It's called the European Truffle pie and is thankfully only around once a year.

What I'm getting at is that we eat treats. We like treats. We buy them or make them often. We are addicted to treats. Mostly chocolate ones. And cookie ones. And doughnut ones. And cake ones. And, in Zack's case, ice creamy ones.

So last night Zack suggested we do something about it. He said we should put healthy snacks in little 'snack sized' baggies that are easily accessible for to eat. So today, on my FIRST day of summer break, I bought LOADS of healthy snacks and put them in little baggies. We will now have snacks to last A LIFETIME!! MWAAAA HAAHA HA HA!!!

But really, we have a ton of snacks.

We have these:

First of all, I know what you're thinking. That my chicken basket is awesome. It's a chicken AND it's a basket! A chicken-basket! But focus. Inside the brilliant chicken basket are healthy snacks! Apples, oranges, dried fruit, nuts, trail mixes of all kinds, pretzels, and even sunflower seeds. And they're all in little snack-sized pouches. And inside the pantry there's a box full of those same snacks so we can replenish the healthy chicken. There's also a note mentioning the snacks that are hiding in the fridge:

Carrots, peppers, yogurt and string cheese.

Honestly, it's so healthy in there I'm starting to feel sick. When Zack came home and found the snacks he was very excited. His words were "This stuff looks so good to me! And it's good FOR me! ...most of it. We are so going to skinny-up!" He's never used the term "skinny-up" before. I think what he means is "we will be more healthy now".

But honestly, after making all those snack bags, all I really want are some potato chips and cottage cheese (don't knock it 'til you've tried it) and the rest of those peanut butter fingers. (Keep 'em coming anonymous family that lives in grandma's old house! We love them! We'll eat all your leftover goodness!)

What Happened to my Time?

About a month ago, due to what I believe to be heavenly promptings, we decided to take our T.V. to the D.I. (D.I.= Mormon Thrift Store) We still have a T.V. in our room, a T.V. downstairs in the "exercise room" and our beloved HD T.V.. We use that one for special occasions such as Jazz Playoff Games (when they're NOT on cable), and movies (NeverEnding Stoooorryyyyy..... Atraaaaayooooooo!) We basically got rid of the main T.V. The one we always turn on when we're bored. The one I turn on when I'm home alone and need some background noise. The one I watch when I get home from work. The one we'd turn on at 9:00 at night to watch King of Queens and Scrubs. Well, we got rid of it. And I think it has been one of the best decisions we've ever made.
I don't miss T.V. .
The less I watch it the less I am in touch with the "Hollywood Wacko World". The less I have to hear about people I don't care about doing things I'd really rather not know. The less I have to watch scantilly clad girls flashed on the screen for a commercial for soap, or books, or lotion, or whatever.

You'd think that I'd have a lot more spare time now that I've cut an hour or 2 of T.V. watching out of my day. Not so. In fact, I think my time has shrunk. How in the world did I manage to watch T.V. and get ANYTHING done? I go to bed after 11:00 almost every night and I still didn't get it all done.

Here's what "it all" is that I want to get done every day:
Exercise
Read my scriptures
Work in the yard (20 minutes of weed control)
Work in the house (20 minutes of clutter and dirt control)
Read scriptures with Zack

That's it. Even eating is optional. Doing all that, plus teaching school, takes up my entire day. I do have to admit that once I'm outside working in the yard 20 minutes sometimes doubles...or triples.... but STILL.

How do you Domestic Heros do it?