The Weekly Ramble 10/14/23

The days have been long and a bit scattered, but the sunrises have been amazing.

Our old house had a postage stamp-size backyard that was mostly hill, so when we looked out the back door it was a wall of ground cover and fence that we saw.

The new house has a much better view, from all angles, but especially from my bedroom window and balcony. Every morning I take a picture and share this view with the world.

It’s my reminder that God’s mercies are new every morning and that the new day offers a clean slate.

Thankfully, everything in-house is good. The kids and Bryan are healthy and happy in their endeavors. Life is good in our new digs.

Behind on all the things

But I feel behind on all the things. I have been living very “hand-to-mouth” for the last month and was just able to keep most plates spinning. Just.

This last week, the plates have started to wobble. I’m behind in many areas of my life (work, home, bookkeeping), something that I can live with but don’t really like.

I work best when I do one of two things:

• have ample time to dig myself out/catch up

• get in a rhythm or routine

Things have felt so scattered in the wake of our move, I haven’t really been able to do either.

Earlier this week I followed my own advice and wrote a Master To-Do List. Writing it was freeing to get things out of my head and see them written down. As a result, I carved out time on Friday and Saturday to tackle some things on the list, allowing myself time to focus and get things done.

To take us from “survive” to “thrive”.

In the process, I realized that I am spending a lot of time prepping meals every day, in part because I have a good audiobook I want to listen to and also because I want something yummy.

When fall arrives, my tastebuds start craving all the comfort foods, like roast chicken and pot pies, shepherd’s pie and casseroles. These things take a little bit longer to prep than the meals I had on repeat this summer. While I’ve made some of these this month, I’ve also spent a lot of time.

TIME I could spend on other things for TASKS that other people could do.

The solution? If I want those comfort foods I either need to delegate them (to a child or Costco to prepare) OR do some freezer meal prep to set me up better.

That idea got me really excited. We’ve got freezer space, and I have fond memories of the early years with kids when I had a variety of foods to choose from in the freezer, all prepped and ready to go.

I dug through my meal plan PDFs and thanked my past self that much of the work is already done for me! I’m looking forward to building a freezer stash, even though it will take a little bit of a time investment upfront.

There are some good grocery sales this week so I’m taking advantage of those and consulting A Month of Freezer Friendly Meals for doubling or tripling dinners here and there throughout the next few weeks.

Bonus: I can listen to all the audio books I like!

So, that’s the gist of the week.