Currently 03.2021 & Winter Goals Update

Lovelies, it’s that time again – time for the Currently 03.2021 link up! As always, I am joining my friend Anne at Anne in Residence for this series. For today’s post we are sharing what we are  currently choosing, imagining, making, recommending and wearing.

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Choosing…

what to pack for my trip to DISNEY WORLD next week.  Isn’t that crazy?  Me.  I am going to Disney World.  With Brennyn and her family.  We are going to Disney World together.  What in the world!!??  Not only have I not seen the kids in almost a year – Much.Too.Long. – but I haven’t been to Disney since the year it opened.  Think it’s changed any since 1971?  Have I changed much since 1971?  Nah, not much.

Anyway, suggestions welcomed for what to pack.  From those of you who have been there more recently than 50 years ago!!  FIFTY YEARS.  OMGee.  One thing for sure, I will be packing our custom tees from OnceUponaTee Boutique – gotta love that name!!

Our shirts won’t read “Smith Family Trip” however!!

Imagining…

Cady’s surprise when she finds out her Mimi is going to Disney with her.  Brennyn asked us to go 2-3 months ago but I didn’t even consider it because of…Covid.  But I started saving $$ for the trip anyway.  Just in case.  Then I was able to get my first vaccine.  And my second.  Suddenly, what seemed like an impossibility a few weeks ago became a reality.

We had lead Cady, my 10-year-old granddaughter, to believe that I probably won’t be able to go.  The kids are driving from Ft. Worth to Orlando and will swing by to pick me up at the airport.  I keep imagining the look on Cady’s face when she realizes that they are there to get me!

Sadly, my PC won’t be joining us.  He will have had just one vaccine.  And really doesn’t feel comfortable going with just one inoculation.  Also, he hasn’t been to see his mom since his father died in May.  I understand.  But I will miss doing this with him.  Just hope that in the not-so-distant future, all of us…Brennyn and fam, Lauren and fam and my Prince and I can all go together.

Making…

note cards.  Had so wanted to make Christmas cards.  Then New Year’s cards.  Neither happened.  So I have been making little notes for family and friends with a prayer for a better 2021.  Have used the following verse on the inside of the cards.

Psalm 91:4  New International Version

⁴ He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge;

Recommending…

books.  It has been months and months since I wrote a Title Talk post.  But it is going to happen this week, girls.  No excuses.  And I have so many good books to recommend.  On a similar note, my online book club has just selected our book for March.  The gang voted for The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah.  I downloaded it last night but haven’t started listening yet.  Our second place choice was The Missing Letters of Mrs. Bright by Beth Miller.  It had been recommended to me by one of the book club members and it has not disappointed.  Great narration by Marian Hussey on the Audible version.

   

Wearing…

graphic tees, of course.  They are my uni.  Wore this Women’s/Black history tee to receive my second vaccine on Sunday.  It reads “Ida, Maya, Fannie Lou, Harriet & Sojourner.”  Won’t it be nice when someday we can just have all races and religions and genders equitably represented in our study of history and not have to make the differentiation to ensure minority representation?

My other outfit is what I wore to the zoo with the kids on Saturday.  It reads “Easily Distracted by Goats.”  I could just as well wear one that said “easily distracted”.  As I most certainly am.

Let’s shift gears a bit, now and look at the progress I’ve made on my winter goals.

MY WINTER GOALS UPDATE

• Create and keep to a blogging schedule:  made a list of the posts I want to write and the series I want to link up for and plugged them into my planner.  ✅ Need to update for March…and it’s already the 3rd!!  Yikes.
• Set up planner:  made a huge mess of the first 6 months of my planner because I got off a month as I was filling in blog posts and plans but it’s done. ✅  Need to update this, too.
• Purge clothes:  clothes and jewels purged.  Now if I could part with some shoes. ✅  I think I did purge a few shoes but could definitely say goodbye to a few more pairs.
• Declutter:  have worked on the closet and the kitchen.  Following this decluttering program. This goal is a work in progress. We recently decluttered and organized recipes.  I ordered this recipe binder with page protectors for my print recipes and got them all filed away.  Working on the laundry room (pass-through, hallway?? certainly not a ROOM) this week.  I don’t have a lot to do in there, but want to clean my washer and dryer.  And organize the cabinets above them.

• Consolidate remainder of children’s books:  donated about 3 boxes of books to Lauren, Kindercare and our neighborhood Little Free Library.  Had thrown away all of my lesson plans, too.  Then I got the call to do a long term sub job.  Was kicking myself in the tail.  Could have used all of the books I donated in lessons!!  But I wound up turning down the job after all.  So, all is well that ends well.  While I do have a few more books to part with, until this school year is over, I am going to hang onto them.  Going to go ahead and mark this done.  ✅

Hodgepodge with Joyce

Last but not least on this busy hUmP dAy… hodgepodge with my friend Joyce at From this Side of the Pond.  Have to tell you guys, this week’s questions made me think.  Something I do little of these days!!

• Is March coming in like a lion where you live? Aslan, Simba, Elsa, The Cowardly Lion…your favorite ‘famous’ lion?  No roaring around here yet.  March has been fairly gentle…with the exception of hours spent trying to figure out Mom’s insurance woes.  There might be a little screaming that goes along with that.  I loved the movie “Born Free” as a girl.  I would say our March thus far has been an Elsa.
• In what way do you ‘march to the beat of your own drum’?  Toughie tough tough question.  In earlier years, I would have said that I was a march to the beat of my own drum kind of librarian.  Certainly not ‘shushy’ by any stretch of the imagination.  My libraries were loud and full of energy and hopefully, enthusiasm for learning.  Now days, I am not so sure.  I probably march to the beat of a different drummer in that I am kind of a weirdo.  Shy, awkward, goofy.
• What item that you don’t have already, would you most like to own? Any chance of that happening soon?  Gosh, Joyce, I am really having to think on these questions!!  Brain’s not used to this much exertion.  Let’s see.  There’s definitely not a single thing I need.  So this would have to be a want.  My car is going to be 13 years old this October, so maybe a new car.  Oh, and a little RV?  Or a tiny beach house.  There we go…just had to start dreaming a little.  Don’t need any of those things, though.
• March is National Flour Month…are you a baker? Cookies-cakes-or pies…your favorite sweet treat to bake? What’s the last non-sweet thing you made that called for flour?  I could be a baker if I wasn’t always so danged concerned about my blue jeans getting tighter.  Sure do love to eat baked goods!!  My favorite thing to bake….hmmm.  Probably cakes or pies.  Have been on a pie kick, most recently with this Reese’s pie.  The last non-sweet thing I made that called for flour was probably bread.  But I also used it not long ago to thicken some stock.
• There are 31 days in the month of March…where were you and what were you doing when you were 31? If you haven’t hit that milestone yet, then tell us where you were and what you were doing 31 months ago? (if math is not your thing, that would be August 3, 2018).  Goodness, now I have to count backward…31.  Let’s see, that was 1989 since I was born in 1958, right?  That was a tough year.  I am saying tough a lot in this post, huh?  But 1989 really was difficult.My daughters were 5 and 3.  We had just returned to the U.S. after being stationed in the Panama Canal Zone for 3 years. I was working fulltime as a high school librarian.  Hired in August under an emergency certificate valid for only one year.  Stood to lose my librarian job by the end of the 1989-1990 school year if I couldn’t pass 3 Texas state certification exams.  All because my teaching certificate was from Tennessee.  I filed for divorce from Brennyn and Lauren’s father late in 1989.  He refused to sign the papers for almost a year.  When he did sign them late the summer of 1990, it was only after announcing he was going to kill me, my lawyer and her secretary.  Which took our divorce from being uncontested to contested and raised the price considerably.  And increased my level of stress.   My husband was sent to Desert Storm and signed the divorce papers before shipping out.
• Insert your own random thought here.  I am glad it is no longer 1989 or 1990.

Your Turn

How would your Currently 03.2021 read?  What are you currently choosing, imagining, making, recommending and wearing?  What were you up to at 31 years of age?  And how are you coming on those winter goals?  Won’t you share in a comment below?

Thinking about 1989 made me sad and weary.  Going to go for a walk then hit my incredibly high stack of ironing.  Thank you for joining me.  Be sure to hop in to visit Anne and Joyce and the others linking up with them today.  Consider yourself hugged.

Hugs and kisses,