Daily Photo: The Difference a Day Makes

After posting the pictures of my piles here yesterday, I cleaned.  There's nothing quite like posting my messes on my blog to get my attention.  Here's what everything looks like today.

Once I finish homeschool study planning, this area will get completely cleaned up.

Lot's of sewing going on here lately.  The books are for Dancer's studies.
This won't be cleaned up until I'm tired of sewing.  I have lots of stuff planned,
so it might be awhile.
I wish I had a sewing room!

You can see my table!

Better.  The backdoor can be fully opened now.

All nice and cleaned up.  This is what my bed usually looks like.

Daily Photo: Sometimes Things Pile Up

Yesterday, a few online friends posted some of the worst areas of our homes to help another friend feel better about the state of her home.  It really is true that most people don't live in pristine homes, no matter what the outside might look like.  I've helped Dodger with jobs in some of the most amazing houses I've ever stepped inside and they live just like everyone else.

I've gotten a bit behind in the home upkeep.  I tend to float from one project to another.  If something, like cleaning up the yard, is at the front of my brain then other things, like the state of the inside of my house, is put on the back burner.

But it's yucky outside right now, so I think I'll get to work on some of these piles this weekend.  ;)

Pile of books that have been hanging out on the recliner for far too long.

I have the sewing machine out now, working on the pile of denim underneath it.

The pile of stuff around the kitchen table, most of which is going to the thrift shop.

The utility room is usually in some state of chaos.

My bed rarely looks like this but it's the truth of what it looked like yesterday.

Hard Work, Yard Work, Gardening, and Pain

The part that I still needed to do after working on it yesterday is now done.

For lunch today, Dancer and I met my mom and stepdad at Hometown Buffet.  We were there to get together with other very much extended family members for a family reunion.  I really didn't find the long table very conducive for visiting.  Mom suggested that next year, we all get together at her house after lunch to visit.

After lunch, Dancer went with them to shop at Menard's for more garden pavers.  I dropped off a few more PaperBackSwap book requests at the Post Office and then after I got home, I got to work on the rest of the mess in the back yard.

I broke up the rest of the limbs, weed whacked the tall weeds, mowed, cut down some of the randomly growing trees, and chopped off the rogue limbs of some of the plants that are lining the fences.

Then I started to work on the mess behind the garage.  As I suspected there are shingles and wood back there that Dodgers's brothers threw down there when they reroofed the garage last spring.  The neighbor behind us also has a mess of weeds and overgrowth going on in their backyard that's spilling over the fence, so I also worked on cutting down what was spilling over into our space.  I got halfway down the strip by the time I decided to call it quits for the day.

Got half of the space behind the garage cleaned.

I started my outdoor work around 3 pm.  Dancer arrived around 4 or so.  She got to work as soon as she got home and they all unloaded my stepdad's truck.  I went in to shower at 7 pm.  She came in shortly after, as soon as she finished putting all of the new pavers down and planting all of the plants she brought home from my mom.

Dancer put new pavers along the side of the house.

Dancer planting all of the flowers she brought home from her granny's.

All of the pots had plants in them from my mom.
They were ones that she transplanted to share with Dancer.

The Sweet Woodruff is taking over one of Dancer's flower gardens.
She's hoping her great aunt Jodi will want some when she comes up for a visit next weekend.

When Dodger got home from work, he started to work on the last of the shutters he's been painting for a client.  I started to thaw out some burgers for dinner as soon as I got out of the shower and he cooked them up with onion and bacon later after he finished with the shutters, took a shower, and went to the store for milk and orange juice.  I'll need the OJ tomorrow for my vodka and date night with the man.

Now, I'm icing my feet because they hurt worse than they did last night.  Earlier this evening, my pain was at about an 8 on a scale from 1-10.  My ankles and feet felt almost as bad as they used to after a night of work at Kohl's when I worked there.  I couldn't even go to the store for Dodger because they hurt so bad and it was all I could do to just relax and not focus on how much pain I was in.

I've got another episode of Bones streaming on Netflix and I'm going to stick the thumb drive into my laptop and bring up Dancer's Ambleside study schedule.  I'm just going to scan things to see what I already finished 12 weeks ago and what needs to be done before the start of her next term.

Taming the Beast

Before.

After.

The limbs I could break.

The ones I couldn't break and the ones Dodger cut up for me today,
minus the ones I already added to the yard waste bins.

Crazy huge limb.

Still to do.

Today, I was up before 10 am but then let myself get side-tracked playing Castleville for too long and by the time I wanted to start my workout at 1 pm, Dodger got home early.  He thought I was upset that he was home.  I had to make it clear to him that it just surprised me that he was home early and that I was frustrated with myself for not getting to my workouts soon after I got up.

So, I ended up doing a one mile Leslie Sansone walking workout in my bedroom and then decided to go outside and work on the mess of limbs back by the old swing set.  He and his brother cut them down last spring when they reshingled our house and garage.  I worked on them last year but there were still a bunch left before winter hit.  They're all nice and crisp now, too, which makes them a ton easier to break with my hands and feet.  I don't have to use cutters on them now.

It won't take me much longer to finish up with the limbs that are left, then I'll be able to weed whack the weeds and mow.  It's highly possible that there's a mess of old shingles behind the garage that I'll have to clean up, since there's a mess of them on the other side of the garage that I still need to finish cleaning up... and inside the garage that they dumped down in there when replacing old rotted roof boards.

My feet are really on my nerves lately.  Even though I work very hard to keep my workouts low-impact, by the end of the week they are killing me.  For this very reason, if nothing else, I must stick to eating right and eating in a way that is conducive to weight loss.  I can't lose weight with exercise alone and keeping my eating clean will help me to speed up the weight loss and thus take less weight off of my poor, tiny feet.

Dancer had another dance company performance this evening at Hickory Point Christian Village.  Dad came to watch.  I didn't take any pictures or video because the spot they dance in there was just too small and crowded for us to sit in a place that would work well for that.  Then the three of us went to Hometown Buffet for dinner afterwards.

Now that I've got my blogging done, I'm going to ice my feet and watch some more Netflix TV.  I just finished an episode of Bones.  I might watch another or maybe I'll queue up Weeds again.  I'm not sure.  I really should start to dive into the Ambleside schedule and work on my workout schedule for next week, too.