April-ish Goals Update

April marked the start of baseball season.  We only have one child who plays baseball, but it is enough to throw the whole schedule off kilter.  Fortunately, some of the kids' other activities are winding down for the year, so life from 4-9pm is becoming slightly more manageable.

Cooking: Try One New Recipe per Month.  This was a big fail.  Most of April's dinners were about making something that could be eaten by part of the family at 4:30 and again by the rest of the family at 8:45.  It wasn't pretty.  But I am trying harder in May.

 Last weekend I sat down with the latest issues of my magazines, and I pulled out four new recipes to try this week, so I'm feeling all Mission Accomplished for May.

Fitness/Health: Go to the Gym Regularly.  I am having two issues with this goal: not getting to do what I want to when I'm at the gym and just getting there in the first place.

 When the kids were little, I'd drop them in the kiddie care at the gym and go about my business.  Now, the girls have taken the orientation classes and they can use the fitness center (i.e. treadmills, bikes, equipment) with me.  Bobby can't take the orientation until he is ten.  Sometimes, we sign the kids in at the pool and let them swim while Rob and I work out in the fitness center.

These plans don't always go smoothly.  The pool might be closed for lessons, or there's not a class for the younger kids to go to, or (and this one is the worst for me) the fitness center is so full that there's not enough equipment for us all to use.  The last few times I have gone in, all the elliptical machines have been taken.  I am going to have to rethink my workouts.

As for just getting there in the first place, I am resorting to the old trick of scheduling.  I have written it into my calendar.  Going at four o'clock is the perfect time because the kids have had enough time to get home and have a snack, and we're back home with plenty of time to get homework done before dinner.

At Home: Print pictures, put them in albums.  Nothing like a trip to Disney to get me motivated to print pictures!  I even printed pictures from last summer's beach trip.  Now they are all in this photo album.  

I'd like to raise the stakes, though.  Our most recent albums have all been of trips and vacations, which is fantastic, but there aren't any candid, not on vacation pictures in the books.  I'm going to charge the batteries and bring the camera out of hiding this month.