I never used to pay attention to what week during the semester we were in. I knew where each of my classes was in their projects, and I had a feel for whether it was the beginning, middle and end of the semester. But that was it.
Somehow that has all changed, possibly because colleagues seem to keep track and because of how I organize the online supplement to my class (I open an electronic folder with the assignments for the week). Now no matter what I do now, I can’t forget what week it is during the semester.
The same is starting to happen for my summer, and I thought I’d try to use it to my advantage (instead of seeing it as a countdown until the end of summer, at which point, I will be sad). I’d like to give you a weekly update of what I’ve been doing, so here goes . . .
Week 1 was mostly about two things: sleeping, and getting a feel for what the house looks like. I have a ton of projects I want to do around the house this summer, and I knew I’d want to show those to you, so I took take a bunch of “before” pictures.
I call these, “Messy Basement,” “Messy Desk,” “Messy (and blurred) Front Room,” and “Messy Living Room” in that order.
Week 2 was about three things: hubby’s birthday, in-laws visiting, and dogs. I bought presents and baked a cake for my husband’s 40th birthday. He loves getting older and felt immediately wiser on that day. I’m glad he had a good day because that is what matters most to me.
My in-laws were here for a few days before husband’s birthday and since my husband told me they were going to sleep upstairs, I cleaned the upstairs of the house. When they came, my husband was at work, and the in-laws said they wanted to sleep downstairs. I smiled, panicked, and changed sheets on the beds and cleaned the downstairs bathroom. I felt much better afterwords ’cause man, the bathroom was gross.
I took time to take the dogs hiking, which they loved. Despite hitting my head really hard on a broken branch, and being disproportionately pulled from one dog more than the other, which hurt my back, I was glad we went. I enjoyed the dogs’ tiredness so much the day we hiked, I took them to the dog park the next day. Visiting the dog park tired out my larger, older dog much more than the little one. I was astonished that the little one took some time to settle down. She did eventually though.
I call these “Sleepy Coonhound 1,” and “Sleepy Coonhound 2.”
We’re currently in Week 3 of the summer and I am dedicating this week to starting projects, training the dogs, and resting–I always need that reminder to rest. So far I’ve called some roofers, started taking down some wash lines in the back yard, took my bicycle into the shop for a tune-up, and emailed some paperwork I want to revise to work so I can print.
Sounds kind of boring, but so far it’s been a good week. I hope yours has been too! If you choose, let me know about it in the comments.
–-Jaye
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