Update: Summer 2024 Bucket List & Goals

Happy hUmP dAy and welcome, October!! Today I am sharing this update to my summer bucket list and goals.  Remind me…what is that saying about best laid plans??

“The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.” Do those words ring a bell? Originally written by the renowned 18th-century Scottish poet Robert Burns, those words also inspired author John Steinbeck to write his novella Of Mice and Men in 1937. Steinbeck later penned his masterpiece, The Grapes of Wrath.

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Oh, yes.  That’s it.  Well, I need to commit that to memory because despite all of my best laid plans for summer, with carefully considered goals to accomplish inside and outside, both the house and me, many of them went awry.  It had been a year since I had shared a bucket list/goals post.  Now I remember why!!

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Update:  Summer 2024 Goals

 

You might remember that I divide my goals into 2 categories.  Things that are external I categorize under House.  Goals specifically affecting me, my body, my personality I categorize under Home.  And here’s a key to my the emojis I use for determining my status on each one.

Key to my Progress:

• ⏱️ = work on goal underway
• ✔️ = goal met
• ❌ = goal not met

Here’s a look at how I fared on my summer 2024 goals.

House

• figure out what to do to the yard on the west side of the house:  in the spring, this area featured 3 trees, a peach, oleander, and Texas ash, so was shadier than any other part of our yard.  But the peach tree met with an unfortunate demise.  Now all of this area is less shady.  But will it grow Bermuda?  In the meantime, while we wait to see if grass grows, PC has gotten a bee in his bonnet and created a raised vegetable garden bed in the northwest corner of this same side yard.  I haven’t seen it because of this foot but it looks great in the pictures he’s taken.  I would have to say this goal is still a work in progress. ⏱️
• hang the TV on the back porch:  hey, we did do this!!  Yay us!!  We used it about everyday to watch the Cincinnati Reds baseball game while we floated in the pool.  Talk about heaven on earth.  That was so relaxing.  I like the way we can use a remote to raise the TV flat against the patio ceiling when it isn’t in use.  No one would know it was there!! And it is protected from weather. ✔️

• *maybe put in a walkway: as I said above the grass on the westside of the house is very sparse.  Might not be so much so now, with the peach tree gone.  We found a place that sells flagstone for a walk on the side of the house past the pool equipment and out to the gate that leads to the front yard.  Just need to have it delivered.  We are talking about something doing something that looks like the walk below but with much fewer stones.  This is still underway. ⏱️

• touch up baseboards:  a summer 2023 goal.  And now a sometime later in 2024 or early 2025 goal because this did not happen.  ❌
• touch up wall paint inside the house and paint the pullouts on the front porch:  this is another goal carried over from last summer that still hasn’t happened!!  And now I want new carpeting in the bedrooms, too.  That will be a fall or winter 2024-2025 goal that will probably get pushed to spring.  But seems like we should paint the walls first, then replace the carpet, then paint the baseboards.  Right now I am using that collective WE very loosely. ❌
• update our comforter in our room:  this is going to sound crazy, but I purchased a new quilt, pillow shams, and curtains a year ago…and then LIFE.  And now more LIFE.  It is still in the closet.  We had PC’s cancer, his sepsis, and my broken foot that has kept me from wanting to put new linen on the bed.  Bumped to fall.  Or maybe I will just sell it and forget the whole crazy idea.  ❌

Home

• stick to Weight Watchers throughout the summer:  stick??  Hmmm. Stick to Weight Watchers, that would be negatory.  I start tracking almost everyday and then I give up.  Just praying that I won’t gain 25 pounds during this 2 months+ of inactivity.  ❌
• faithfully use Revitalash and Retinol and Musely all summer:  I have been using  RoC Retinol Correxion, deep wrinkle, anti-aging night cream and Musely dark spot treatment for lightning my sunspots and damage.  Was doing pretty well on this and using my Revitalash. But somehow all of that has taken a backseat since September. Going to give myself a checkmark, though, because I need that encouragement to get back at it again.  ✔️
• beach pedicure:  never did go for an official pedicure.  Although the girls gave me a pedicure here at home on a recent visit to our house.  This week, I have purchased more Sally Hansen gel polish from Walmart and it arrives today.  The peach color is Terra Coppa and the wine color is called Dig Fig.  Was thrilled that I had given myself an at-home pedi before our trip to Ohio where I broke my foot.  Had so many compliments on the coral polish I was wearing that night!! ✔️

Bucket Lists

 

We always tend to try more new experiences when I have a seasonal bucket list created.  So I am hoping to put together my fall bucket list before the week is out.  If you are interested in creating a fall bucket list, you might check this out, an online bucket list maker, here.  It’s a place where you can create your bucket list online and find support from other bucket list makers AKA buckaroos.  And folks who accompany or support buckaroos in fulfilling the items on their lists are apparently called buckers

Update:  Summer 2024 Bucket List

 

Thank goodness, some of these activities were underway as I wrote up my list, otherwise this update might just have 1 big red X after another.

Key to my Progress:

• ⏱️ = work on goal underway
• ✔️ = goal met
• ❌ = goal not met

In ABC Order

• beach house collage: signed up to make a beach hut collage with Jennifer Chamberlin at The Maker Beehive. Bought some scrapbook paper for my project and then dropped the ball. Will absolutely get this done before next summer (nothing like giving myself 9 months of leeway). ❌
• birthday celebrations:  the summer is a big birthday season for us with Mustafa’s birthday on 06.11, Cady’s bday on 07.28, Brennyn on 07.30, Lauren on 07.31, and Francisco on 08.15.  We did it.  Didn’t have birthday cake or balloons this year but we were all together at South Padre Island.  And that matters most.  ✔️

• Chihuahuas Triple A baseball game with my Prince Charming:  we did this on 07.03 which was seniors’ night (and I don’t mean 12th graders!!) Seniors (60 years of age and older) received a free hot dog meal.  As always, a patriotic fireworks display followed the game in our beautiful Southwest University stadium.  ✔️

• complete the summer photo scavenger hunt hosted by Ruth at This West London Life, here:  why yes, I did!!  Earned another checkmark.  Shared my first finds in posts here and here.  And my final photo challenge post went live, here, yesterday. ✔️

And There’s More

• family pictures:  so thankful that we did manage to get these photos taken.  This is an activity that has been on every.single.bucket.list. for years!! Now I need to print the photos and get some on display around here. ✔️

• South Padre and San Antonio summer vacation:  PC and I met the girls and their fams at South Padre.  We stayed at Suntide III condos.  Spent the whole vacation snuggling, sunbathing, reading and relaxing,  Then PC and I drove up to San Antonio to spend a few nights alone.  It was a great vacation week.  Wrote a blog post about South Padre, here.  Gimme that checkmark!! ✔️

• trip home:  I no longer feel like I have a ‘back home’ because my parents are gone but, the end of August, we traveled to Tennessee and PC’s home, Ohio.  I had written on my original bucket list post in June that I hoped we would make some memories.  We did!!  ✔️

• try two new restaurants:  we did this but I cannot, for the life of me, remember where we went!!   We enjoyed German food at the Centennial Club on Biggs Air Field for PC’s retirement luncheon.  And we had a delicious meal in San Antonio at The Pearl.  But we also visited 2 new-to-us restaurants here in EP.  I just can’t remember the deets.  Nor can I find photos.  But I promise we earned this checkmark.✔️
• writing weekend:  for their anniversary, our friends Dick and Denise, went on a writing holiday.  I thought that sounded glorious so we tossed around ideas for places where we could enjoy something similar.  One of the possibilities is Blackstone Hotsprings in New Mexico.  But I would prefer to have 2 working feet when we go, so will bump this to fall.  ❌

Your Turn

 

We had so many question marks in our lives this time last summer when I attempted to create a bucket list, that I never gave it a second thought after.  And much the same thing happened mid-summer this year.  But we are 3 months into PC’s retirement and almost 5 weeks into my recovery.  We can see a return to normalcy in the not-so-distant future.