February 2017 - Page 2 of 3 - Luggage and Literature

I wrote a New Year’s Resolutions post at the beginning of January 2017 and was so thankful for the positive response that I received from everyone. I plan to come back every month with a goal check-in, so that I have even more incentive/accountability to continue working on my goals.

Goal #1: Publish at least one blog post per week on Luggage and Literature.

In January I met this goal! Woot woot! I think the key was writing posts ahead and scheduling them, so that the hustle and bustle of life didn’t take a toll on my blog.

Goal #2: Complete the Modern Mrs. Darcy Reading Challenges.

You can check out my previous post outlining my 2017 reading plans here. So far, I’m a little bit ahead of schedule for completing both the Reading for Fun and Reading for Growth challenges. My What I Read January 2017 lists the categories that I fulfilled this month.

Goal #3: Play cello at least twice (preferably more) per month.

I met this goal.

Goal #4: Pay down debt.

Mike and I are both lawyers. This means that we both have student loans. And we have a mortgage and vehicle payments. Debt makes me anxious. We were previously much more diligent in our efforts to pay down debt than I feel like we were in 2016. I’d like to get back on track with that so that we don’t live our entire lives in debt. In sum, we continued making progress toward this goal. I bumped my debt payments up slightly in January.

Action Steps:

Prepare lunches on the weekend. Met this goal!
Pack lunch or eat at home every weekday for lunch, unless meeting colleagues. I ate out 2 times for lunch, so I wasn’t 100% on this goal. But I did try to pick less expensive and healthier options.
Eat dinner at home five nights per week. I’d say that we met this about 80% of the time. So that’s progress probably from before, and realistic considering that life does get in the way.
Prepare/freeze dessert items (I have a major sweet tooth, and if we don’t have dessert items in the house at all, I’m much more likely to go get ice cream or run to the store and purchase snack items). I met this goal (of course!). But seriously, it does help to have a few sweets in the house.
Curb spending on books by utilizing the library. I haven’t gone to the library. BUT, I did find a new resource, Prime Reading, that will allow me to read a whole bunch of books from my Wish List for free. So I’m counting that as a win. And I need to figure out how to set up Overdrive on my Kindle Fire. So if you know how to do that, please help!
Curb spending on clothing and accessories, especially by utilizing Pinterest for remixing my existing wardrobe. Met! I didn’t buy any clothing or accessories this month, but didn’t feel sick of my wardrobe. I did buy one pair of black heels this month, but they were $10 from a Buy, Sell, Trade site in a brand that I find very comfortable. So it was more of a stockpile type of item for me, because I will wear them out.
Use up back stock of MaryKay and hair products before purchasing more. Met this goal! I didn’t purchase any hair or makeup products this month. And I was visiting with a friend who sells Lipsense, and she’s going to swap out a tube that I have that is clumpy for some reason. So that’ll be cool too.
Clean out refrigerator/freezers/pantry and use up existing food rather than just purchasing more. Met! We really only purchased some perishable items in January. And my friend Destinee gave us 5 pounds of ground pork (thanks Destinee!!) We did make some progress on using up stuff in our freezers, pantry, and fridge.
Curb unnecessary trips to Kearney (this is about half an hour from our town, so the gas can get pricey when we run there for no reason other than we’re bored/want to go shopping/etc.). We sort of met this goal. I can think of one trip to Kearney because we were bored. But we went to a free museum, and we spent Christmas gift cards on the trip. So, besides the price of the gas, it was a pretty inexpensive day out.
Take on additional cases and work more hours to increase income. In progress. I’m in the process of taking over several new cases from an attorney who is moving away. So I didn’t ramp up marketing efforts because I knew this would be coming.

Goal #5: Be healthier.

I don’t want a ‘lose X number of pounds by a certain date’ or an unrealistic ‘exercise everyday’ type of goal. Instead, I want to make realistic changes in my life so that I’m healthier. I want to feel comfortable rather than cramped when flying. I want my frequent headaches and neck pain to go away. I want all of the clothing in my closet to fit better. I want to feel comfortable in a swimming suit or a wetsuit for the first time in my life. I just want to feel better and more energized in my day-to-day life. I’m down 3.3 pounds since the beginning of 2017.

Action Steps:

Drink no more than 3 pops per day, preferably no more than 2 (but I’m realistic about my job). I met this goal probably 95% of the time. I can think of a couple of days that I went over. But I did a much better job of limiting my pop intake.
Drink at least 8 cups of water per day. Met. I was much more diligent about this in January.
Eat/drink at least 2 servings of dairy per day (when I did Weight Watchers, the studies showed that this contributed to weight loss, plus I know that it makes for healthier bones and teeth). Met probably 95% of the month.
Eat at least one fruit or vegetable per day, preferably more. Met probably 75% of the time, and yes I realize how ridiculous it is that I struggle to eat even 1 fruit or vegetable per day. To my credit, Mike’s refusal to eat vegetables or fresh fruits makes this more difficult. I hope to continue working in the right direction on this goal.
Drink 1 cup of water before each meal. Met 50% of the time probably. I hope to do better with this goal going forward.
Take my water bottle with me during the day. Met 50% of the time. And I definitely think that doing this more consistently will help cut down on afternoon snacking because I won’t have to stop and purchase a beverage (which for me often leads to buying a snack too).
Pack lunches or eat lunch at home during the week. Met with the exception of two days.
Eat dinner at home five nights per week. I’d say that we met this about 80% of the time. So that’s progress probably from before, and realistic considering that life does get in the way.
Do 10 sit-ups and 10 push-ups 3 times per week (in law school, I had a professor who expected all students to do 10 push-ups at the start of each of his classes, and was surprised how doing this 3 times per week actually made me feel stronger by the end of the semester). Met 20% of time. I pretty much failed at this one. And I will do better in February.
Exercise (walk/swim/yoga/YMCA class) 3 times per week. I think I exercised 1 time per week in January. But that’s better than 0 times per week in December. So hopefully in February I can get 2-3 times per week.
Walk at least 6,000 steps per day, preferably more. Met probably 75% of the time.
Sleep 8 hours per night. Met.
Continue taking a daily multivitamin. Met.
Track food daily in My Fitness Pal. Met.
Continue utilizing my Fit Bit to monitor activity, steps, food, sleep. Met.

Goal #6: Take one trip or visit one local area attraction per month.

I get stir crazy if I stay home for too long. To combat that, I think that this goal will help. Although monthly travels to exotic locations aren’t realistic in my stage of life and with my career, a monthly trip somewhere is realistic. So it can be international, domestic, or just a local area attraction, just some reason to leave my house and my town. Plus there are several museums in my area that I’ve been meaning to visit, but just haven’t gotten around to. So I’m actually really looking forward to this goal. This goal is in progress.

Action Steps:

January: The Museum of Nebraska Art (MONA), and The Great Platte River Road Archway, Kearney, NE (I’ve wanted to visit the archway since we moved to the area, but haven’t gotten around to it yet…probably because Mike is absolutely not excited about visiting it). We visited MONA in January. After looking at the admission price for the Archway, we opted to skip it for now.
February: Roatan!
March: Scuba diving at Bonne Terre again, perhaps
April: Black Hills for Easter with family, I hope
May: ??
June: Stuhr Museum, Grand Island, NE
July: Michigan again and Canada, perhaps
August: Total Solar Eclipse on August 21 right in my area
September: Pioneer Village, Minden, NE
October: ??
November: Florida perhaps (Mike wants to get his full cave diving certification, and I’d like to go back to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal)
December: ??
I also need to plan a get together with my dear friend Tara. She and I have talked about several different options, but need to nail down the date and location of our visit.
In 2016, I also had a super fun girls weekend with some of my closest friends from college. We talked about making it an annual occurrence, so I need to check in with those gals as well, then nail down the date and location of girls weekend 2017!

Mike and I recently returned from Guadeloupe. In Part 1, I covered general information about the island, transportation, getting there, and our accommodations. In Part 2, I covered some of the many fun things to do on the island. In Part 3, I went through a breakdown of the cost of our trip. And in Part 4, I’ll talk about the scuba diving, and the dive operator that we used. So without further ado, the final entry in the series on Guadeloupe scuba diving!

Jacques Cousteau Guadeloupe — Hanging out with my buddy Jacques Cousteau.

We dove with Les Heures Saines, a dive shop located on Basse Terre. Mike and I are both SDI trained divers, so we asked for a recommendation for a dive shop on Guadeloupe. The French SDI rep recommended Les Heures Saines, and we were happy with our experience with them. They ensured that we had English dive briefings on all of our dives. And after they monitored our diving closely on the first couple of dives, they gave us a briefing and let us dive essentially on our own, which was appreciated. Most of the other divers were French, and I have to say that the French have different diving habits from the Americans (at least the Americans that we dive with). For example, many of them had gear dangling from them, rather than attached firmly to their gear. And most used full foot fins, rather than separate fins and boots. And they have a policy that you cannot surface without a surface marker, no matter if you are right near your boat and no matter how low your air supply. But despite the differences in diving style and gear configuration, we still enjoyed out diving with Les Heures Saines.

With the exception of one dive on the wreck The Franjack, our other dives were all around Pigeon Island, in the Jacques Cousteau Underwater Reserve. The reef was very healthy, with lots of colorful corals and sponges. The barrel sponges in particular were the largest that we’d ever seen. And the fish were plentiful. We were pleased with the diving, and that we even saw a sea turtle (although it happened to be on one of the two days that I dove without a camera).

Anyway, here are pictures from Pigeon Island.