Check! It! Out!

Goal 31 - Get all papers filed.


BEFORE

AFTER
Well, okay, they're not really all filed unless you count moving all the extraneous boxes of mother-in-law documents into public storage at great expense, as well as the six boxes of old stuff I moved into the closet last year, and then throwing everything that's not glued down into other boxes and stacking them in the newly cleared space in the closet. But hey, it seems to work, at least for me. Now I guess I have to take the boxes out of the closet one at a time and deal with the contents.

So this goal is not actually accomplished yet. But hey, it sure looks better!

They say the best way to get your house in order is to throw a big party, which is what we did. I co-hosted a baby shower for my daughter, along with her mother-in-law. Since her mother-in-law lives out of town, we had to have it at my place, and I seized the opportunities afforded by this crisis, like Rahm Emmanuel says to.

Along with boxes of documents, I took all non-essential furniture to storage as well, and gave some of it away to our progeny who showed up for the baby shower. Yay for opportunities! Then we hired a cleaning company to come in and clean. Nothing like throwing money around in a situation like this. Fortunately I had a little bit to spare at the time, and I think it was money well spent. The place looks so great!!!

Bonus picture:



Happy Expectant Family (in clean apartment!)

Flora and Fauna

My friends The Bag Lady and Mary Anne from Kentucky are always posting nice pictures of plants and animals and sunrises, etc. I thought I'd see what I could do....

I pass these pansies on my way to/from the bus stop. They really are electric purple.



The wisteria is right smack in the middle of beautiful downtown Fort Lee. The house used to be a nice little florist's shop, but now it's a hair salon. It's not so electric purple, but it's my favorite. I adore wisteria!

















And this is the view from my balcony! If I were taking the picture to the south (to the right in the picture), you'd see Manhattan and the Empire State Building and all that. (Well technically that is Upper Manhattan just beyond the high rises, and the hills beyond that are Queens.) But I was taking this because of the rainbow over to the east.

And aren't ScottieDog's window boxes nice! He says the tree tops out there are our "lawn."

The fauna specimen in the far distance is my neighbor. He's Russian! Not a cute little newborn calf or anything, but still.

And the Winner of the FatBet Is.....!!!

Nobody.

None of us lost ten pounds, but two of us lost significantly, so we feel great about that. We're currently considering donating our $100 to something worthy instead of taking it back. After all we did lose the bet.

But hey, since I drew the picture of me on the scale, back last August, I have lost 10.6 pounds! Not bad for an elderly lady. Let's see now, that's just over a pound a month.

I'm only slightly more than five pounds away from my goal weight!

And I have to say I feel great. I feel so much lighter and I even walk differently. I guess I must have been waddling slightly or something. AND, I have worn a tucked in shirt with a belt several times in the last few weeks. It's been at least four years since I've had the nerve to do that.

I don't think I'll ever diet alone again. This was the most motivating experience!

My plan now is to try to maintain my current weight and concentrate more on exercising. And after another month or so, two of us are going to have another go at a FatBet.