A Better Year Project

OMG. It's already FEBRUARY.

Like, woah.

So far A Better Year Project has been full of not fun things (though The A Team Juice Detox was pretty cool), but now that it's February already, this project should pick up on the enrichment side and slow down (or at least not focus) on the boring organizing and cleaning house side! 

February's theme is Getting Through the Dark Days: strategies to brighten the most dreaded month in the North East.

That said, it's a bit hard to take the theme seriously since today, the first day of February, IS GORGEOUS AND WARM. It's 59 degrees F right now! Crazy.

February Week 5 Task: Throw an island themed 50th birthday party for my uncle. Spend time with friends and family over the weekend and appreciate them.

Perceived Fun Level: 8 (once everything is set and I'm able to relax, I'm sure the fun level will skyrocket, but planning a party always has a bit of a not fun element to it)

I have wanted to track an entire year for as long as I can remember. And when I say track a year, I don't even mean anything incredibly high maintenance. A couple sentences a day describing what happened that day. Enough to trigger memories in my brain. 

But alas, I have never been able to accomplish this task. I start off okay, the drop off for months, then pick it up, then fall off the wagon again. I have a collection of partially filled in notebooks and journals. Pathetic. 

So this year, I bought a new calendar and hope to use it to track my year. Then again, it came a couple weeks into January, and I haven't started using it because I'm still trying to figure out what my system will be. What symbols I'll use to mean what since the space for each day is small (a blessing and a curse). 

January Week 4 Task: Create a system for tracking an entire year. Use the system on my new calendar and back fill in January. 

Perceived Fun Level: 6

Sounds like the juice detox went well for Alix. . . Et toi, Andrew? Very brave of y'all, and also brave to throw down the sibling rivalry gauntlet. Interestingly enough, Ryan and I did Week 3 together as well! As you know, Sean got into Cornell. For January Week 3, Ryan and I helped him move out of his apartment and split his stuff between the family house and his dorm room at Cornell. 

The apartment Sean was in was his first apartment ever. Soooo, as you can imagine, he had NO IDEA of the pain and work involved in moving out. And since he's been out of the house for awhile, his old room became a guest room, and the guest room became an office. 

Yah. 

So we 1) moved, transformed, cleaned and organized rooms at the family house, 2) moved Sean out of his apartment and back into the family house, 3) scrubbed the apartment and got rid of a lot of stuff, and 4) helped him figure out what would go to Cornell. We worked all weekend long but it was fun due to the quality hang out time and knowing we were sending Sean to Cornell while helping the family with what we've deemed important this month.

January Week 3: Send our little brother off to school. 

Perceived Fun Level: 5 - cleaning and organizing sucks.

Actual Fun Level: 7 - definitely better than expected, but let's be honest, still cleaning and organizing. (pride and quality hang out level: 10)

Filed Under: Great family time. Our college boy is off!

Juice Detox Update~

Day one= i feel good, this is great

Evening one= i need soup

Day two= back on the wagon, i feel energized, slept well, gonna be good

Evening two= why am I doing this again? it's stupid. 

Day Three= just add juicing and water to current daily routine for goodness sake, I don't   eat all that bad anyway!

Dear A Better Year Project (and the Willards), 

We in Western New York are stepping up our game.  Week three of January will be a sibling-juice-detox diet.  We will be juicing and consuming only fresh fruits and vegetables for the next five days in an attempt at looking and feeling our best as we begin this new and better year.  

Alix and Andrew

Week 3:  Juice Detox Diet

Perceived Level of Fun: 5 (Fun shopping, fun making, delicious, but actual enjoyment of week yet to be determined)

Tagged:  detox, beautiful, fruits, vegetables, fresh, fresh-faced, skinny, healthy, awesome.

What you got Willards?

Love, 

I am going through stacks of papers and reorganizing things to make open space in my shoebox of an apartment. I'm at the point where everything seems messier than it was when I started, though I know it's somewhat better. I have to push through and finish, but I'm boooooored.

I can't wait until you are a FUN project and not full of tasks that will make my life better but SUCK.

Love,

Sigh. So with the reality of getting back to the swing of things and attending events I already committed to, my January Week 1 Task has yet to be completed. But I am hitting it hard later today and will roll in my January Week 2 task as well. . . 

January Week 2: Scrub my apartment down and reorganize my bathroom so the various things I've hoarded actually get used. And I stop purchasing things I ALREADY HAVE.

Perceived Fun Level: 5

January Week 2-

I am going to attempt to tackle the mounds of paperwork, taxes, and business papers this week as well as keep an eye out for a cleansing diet for week 3 that Andrew and I think we would like to do together. I have a pile of crap at the studios and boxes and baskets of crap at home that I need to deal with.

Perceived Fun Level: 0

Filed under: why bother it will just pile back up.

And I forgot to share....

My overview for month of January and a snippet of my hopes for the year-

Plot my year: trips, shows, gallery openings, kids camps & sports, etc.

Home front~

Finish upstairs study; paint, clean, organize bookshelves 

(photograph progress as well)

Organize heaps paperwork;

stored and incoming

Actually use my new gym membership

Art/ work world~

Organize 2011 business receipts and books

Start new year with streamlined business plan. 

Clean out studios and gallery of artists deserted studio crap 

(before and  after photos to follow)

Order canvas stretching supplies and get ready for next series of work

Year long goals~

Keep inspired and creating.

Laugh a lot with my family.

Pray daily.

Edit life.

January Week 2:  

Bills, bills, bills, bills, bills, bills, bills, bills, ugggh. I don't want to, but I need to face the music. My goal is to go through all my upcoming, current, and, yes, past due bills.  I will create a calendar/budget which addresses these bills by priority (which ones will affect my credit).  

Perceived Fun Level: -500

Week 1 Goal: Accomplished

One of my year long goals is to get back to a balanced, moderation-based diet and a schedule that includes working out most days of the week. I have successfully lived like this before so it's possible. I do know that I am someone who needs an aggressive kick start in the diet department, so currently I am on Day 5 of no carb eating. A five day stretch was my goal (yay meeting a goal!) because I generally do NOT do well on no carbs, but I think I'm going to take it a bit further.

Fortunately (or unfortunately?), I think my body was desperate for some regulation, so Days 1-4 weren't incredibly difficult. That said, I am now sick of ham and low fat cheese omelets. THOUGH I could be okay with them again if they were served with a pile of toasted everything bagels and lots of ketchup. 

Just sayin'.

Personal organization is quite possibly my biggest challenge in life. I consider myself terrible at it but strive to to do better.

My first and most important task is my bedroom. I had been keeping it organized and clean, but fell off the wagon over the holidays. If I can keep my room consistently clean and organized, it will undoubtedly lead to A Better Year. 

January Week 1: Clean and organize my room. Utilize my filing cabinet, finally. 

Perceived Fun Level: ZEROZEROZEROZEROZERO