Grace's Goals 1st Quarter Check In

As Shannon mentioned on Monday, we wanted to give a quick recap on the progress with our 2013 Goals. According to my very short google search, most people give up on their resolutions by January 9th (or at least the Brits do). While there are many things I haven't even started yet (like a 2012 Family Yearbook or even taking my sewing machine out of the closet), I don't want to dwell on that stuff. Instead I am going to focus on the stuff I am working on.

As far as keeping myself organized, I am slowly but surely going through our closets and purging and sorting. I am (for the most part) keeping them straightened up as well. To help out with that, I made some chalkboard labels for the coat closet:

I have some more plans for my bedroom closet (I am thinking something like this) and the pantry, but for the most part we are more organized than we were in 2012.

On the blog front, I have been keeping up with my at-least-once-a-week goal. I think I am above average at this point having a couple weeks with double posts. I am also slowly (very slowly) working on some Photoshop skills. This Valentine's Day card took entirely too long to figure out:

but I know its going to take some time. I am on a Photoshop hiatus though since we have started on another goal: working on the office. I came home from a couple hours out with JJ two weekend ago to this:

When Joe says "don't be alarmed when you go upstairs" you know he's working on something. This is what I came home to - I guess we are starting on the office!

The contents of the office (well some of the contents of our office) in the hallway. Joe started on the cabinet transformations kit and we are officially underway!

Lastly, the personal "Be More Active/Take Better Care of Myself" Goal. I feel like this is the one I have been working on the hardest. I am taking a multivitamin (and some additional calcium) everyday and getting salads for lunch instead of a sandwich or soup. I also cut snacks out from my weekdays and eat yogurt with low fat granola for breakfast daily. The hardest part has been working out. I started the P90x program 11 weeks ago. I am getting up at 5am every weekday to do my workout and have added in some extra cardio on a couple times a week as well. I average about 7 works-outs a week and all of the effort has netted a whopping 6 lb weight loss.

I posted this pic on my personal instagram a couple weeks ago so please forgive the quality. Each red mark is a work out in the month of February. Yes I realize its 2013 and no one uses a paper planner anymore, but I like seeing the visual of each workout written down.

6 pounds in 11 weeks. I feel like I could have lost that in the first month alone and I am starting to get a little frustrated. I realize the P90 program involves weight lifting and I am building muscles, but I don't feel that different - its not like I am down 2 pants sizes or anything. I am trying to remind myself that 6 pounds is still 6 pounds. And that losing slowly is better in the long run. And the days that I work out I do have a lot more energy throughout the day and sleep better at night. I am not ready to give up yet - but I might need to come to terms with the fact that I might not be bikini ready by the summer.

So I still have some work to do: try a sewing project, hang some stuff on my walls, take more progress pics, make some sensory boxes, and lose some more weight. But I feel like I am making some good progress and still have 8ish more months to work on it all. How about you guys? Anyone still working on their resolutions? Anyone struggling with losing weight too?

Stay tuned for our next Goals Check In sometime in June!