On the Use of Time

I mentioned in my last post that one of the things I wanted to share next was some of the goals I have for how to spend the extra "free time" in my day that I've acquired since we moved. Now that we've had some time to get settled and feel at home, my mind has been exploding with all the possibilities of what I can do!

Of course there are all kinds of things to do apart from home, being this close to DC, having the Town Center right across the street, being 15 minutes or less from a ton of stuff that used to be 35-40 minutes away, etc (think mall, movies, museums, shopping, etc.). Naturally I have all kinds of ideas about things I want to do in that regard - and I've already started. (And I might add, it's SO MUCH FUN!)

Besides that though, I've had ideas about what to do during the evenings at home (which is still the majority of them). Something makes me think that if I blog about these ideas, I'll stay inspired to actually do them. I don't know if that's true, but even if it's not, here we go.

• Read more. I haven't really gotten to this yet, since I've been so busy setting up house and freaking out about how much there is to do outside of the house, but I do plan on getting there. There is just SO much good stuff out there to read, and I feel like in all my life I still haven't scratched the surface!

• Get up early(ish). I've found that I actually feel more rested during the day when I don't get too much sleep or sleep til the last minute. Since I don't have to be to work til 9, and I have a 5 minute commute, I have time to get up and have a somewhat leisurely morning for once. (What is that, right?) So last week I made a goal to get up at 7:00-7:15, which I accomplished with the exception of Friday morning. (And that was for a very good reason that involved getting my friend Molly from the airport the night before. ;-) But every other morning I was all "wake up slow," drinking my coffee, reading my Bible, and getting ready for work at a comfortable pace. Not to mention I felt pretty rested the whole week and even went to bed after 11:00pm sometimes! Now that was a long paragraph, so moving on.

• Cook new foods. I have to say, I was getting so tired of cooking the same rotation of 4 or so dinners over. and over. and over again, especially in the few weeks before we moved. It was depressing, boring, and dull, and I got so frustrated at myself for not being able to come up with the energy to do something new and different. But now those days are over! Last week I made this absolutely delicious pesto cream sauce that I put over pasta and chicken, and I was in heaven. Tonight I was a little down about not having any good ideas, so I googled "recipe ideas for ground beef" (that's usually all it really takes) and found a recipe for the Mediterranean Beef Pitas shown below (photo credit here). But as a side note, don't use the recipe that it provides. Soon I'll share my own spin off of it that I think turned out much better, because I've found Real Simple's recipes to frequently be a little too "Simple" on the flavor side of things.

• Kitchen cleaning. I've learned how much sheer happiness I get from having a clean kitchen. Now that we have a dishwasher, it's been my goal to clean the kitchen after every meal in the evenings, because it's a much easier process. In only 20 minutes or so, the table can be cleared, food put away, dishwasher loaded, pots and pans washed/dried/put away, and the counters wiped. A small kitchen helps, and so does the reward of lighting a fresh smelling candle to flicker against the walls when the lights are turned out. What peace of mind.

• The little things. This is kind of the catch-all for, well, the little things. Like giving myself home manicures. Organizing those daunting corners and crannies that only in your mind take more than 15 minutes to get done. Watching something on tv with Levi, setting up a new piece of decoration, going to the pool for a swim. Blogging!

This was a pretty text-heavy post this time, but I definitely enjoy sharing my inspirations! I'll make it a point to get that pita recipe up soon and to cover some of the other things I mentioned before. For now I'll leave you with a snapshot from my weekend. My good friend Molly is vising from California, though she recently returned from months of European travels - and I haven't seen her since last August! So we girls went out on the town for a movie and then a patio dinner while listening to a live salsa/merengue/Afro-Cuban concert. And here we are in a semi-blurred picture waiting for our table.

Happy Monday-is-over!

Brooke - Erin - Kara - Molly