It’s been a busy year–so busy, in fact, that a lot of my goals have been put on the back burner while I work to keep up with my regular everyday chores (you can see my daily schedule here). I’ll be picking and processing fruit from the garden this month, organizing, and sewing every chance I get. As the heat sets in, I try to do my gardening in the early morning hours before breakfast (and in the late evenings after dinner) and do my sewing, organizing, and food processing in the afternoons when it’s over 100º. We’ll continue to homeschool throughout this month.
Garden:
1. Weed and tidy garden
2. Pick blackberries as they ripen
3. Pick figs as they ripen
4. Pick apples as they ripen
5. Cut flowers for arrangements indoors
6. Plant seeds for more flowers and food
7. Fix a few water lines
8. Trim hedges
9. Stake trees and tomato cages to strengthen them against the wind
10. Plant the last of the bushes in the front walk
Sewing:
1. Continue to embroider the piece I’m currently working on (pictured above)
2. Finish two dresses I started last year
3. Finish hot pads
Food preservation:
1. Freeze blackberries and figs
2. Make and can applesauce if we don’t eat all of the apples fresh
3. Can fig jam
Organization:
1. Go through more outgrown clothing and donate it to the thrift store
2. Go through a box of papers
3. Organize garden seeds
What are your goals for this month?
My goal list is a bit shorter than yours. :-). I posted it yesterday. Like you – I’ve got some lingering projects I am trying to finish up. I love the piece you are embroidering.
We don’t have a space for a vegetable garden, but I am hoping to start some canning with items from the Farmer’s Market.
Continue to mulch and weed the flower gardens. We have gotten a late start due to the cold rainy weather
Clean windows.
Clean mini blinds.
Prepare for Bible School Crafts and be a blessing to our Pastor’s wife during that week wherever I can be.
Strive to do better at keeping the house straightened even during deep cleaning. I tend to tare apart and make an alful mess and I cringe if someone comes ugh!!! My hubby is patient but I am striving to keep things tidy! My corners are clean but the clutter is there:)
My main goal is to stay on track with the budget as we are paying off the mortgage next month!!!
Maintain my existing roses and flowers. No new plants are in the budget this month.
Walk everyday
Core strength exercise 3x per week
Continue to downsize wardrobe & sell on eBay
Continue to declutter house
Finish downstairs remodel
Create the budget for the kitchen remodel next year
Goal setting is so motivating! Thanks for sharing your goals Brandy.
Physical:
Run 20-25 miles total
Focus on developing strong arms and core with weightlifting
Creative:
Knit my second pair of socks
Finish quilting a baby quilt, apply binding as well
Organization:
Take advantage of under bed storage provided by the purchase of a new bed frame
Take extra pillows and linens to the local animal shelter
Work my way thru the freezer to reduce the half full containers of odds and ends
And for my spiritual enjoyment:
Sit in the sun daily
Leave windows open to wake up to birds chirping
Spend time focusing on all the blessings God has placed in my life
Happy June all!
It’s time for me to pressure can more if my dried beans so that they are on the pantry shelf ready to open and use in a recipe without any delays for soaking, etc! I have the jars, lids, beans and space and I’m down to my last 5 jars! I like to keep 12 jars of each variety on the shelves all the time and when I pressure can them, I can do 16 pint jars at a time and I can have a variety of beans all processing at the same time so this speeds things up!
I want to declutter more around the house- selling some things, donating others. My goal is decluttering at least 5 things a week!
I want to finish putting in my new brick walkway in the next 2 weeks. I am over 1/2 done already!
We are going to quadruple our chicken coop area in the next 3 weeks and so I have a list of what we need to accomplish each week so that we will reach that goal.
Will continue to use up the stacks of materials ( bricks, rocks, lumber, etc) to beautify our yard so that our yard doesn’t look like Ma and Pa Kettle live here! No sense in having free/recycled materials unless we use them up!
Congratulations on paying off your mortgage! I can’t imagine how wonderful that must feel.
Do you have any tips to share? 🙂
June Goal Setting~
Finish planting veggie starters for garden , as well as seeds
Pick new roses that are blooming now for home~ we have 4 rose color bushes, 1 peach, 1 white, 1 red
Pressure wash front driveway and walk way.
Trim all bushes
Pick up one more fruit tree from nursery this weekend. We only have 1 apple tree so far.
Sew pillow cases for grandchildren ( for presents ) and make napkins from fabric that I brought back from Kauai
Clean all windows in home
Purge unwanted items and organize garage ( Big project) Will be installing a ceiling storage shelf to get containers off the floor.
Babysitting overnight our 3 year old grandson 🙂 so his parents can have an evening away.
A weekend Hike 2 more times this month. After surgery, I was able to hike 1 mile last weekend.
Have a wonderful June~ Yay summer is here for the Pacific NW 🙂
Blessings~ Patty
Ditto. 😉
1. Walk 50 minutes a day. Specifically, to spend more time walking in the abundant natural parks we have around here.
2. Pay $100 extra on the mortgage every month IF I decide I am going to stay in this house upon retirement. If not, I need to put that extra amount in savings every month.
3. Put at least $300 in savings every month.
5. Lose 2 lbs a month for the next six months.
6. Develop a three year, five year, eight year, possibly, retirement plan with contingencies. Also decide exactly where I wish to retire to, if in fact, I wish to retire where I am currently living. I also need to find out exactly what my retirement pay will be, depending on when I retire.
7. Develop a plan to do a church mission out of my home. Realistically, I cannot leave my sick grown child. So, I need to perhaps explore the possibility of doing a church service mission from my home, when I retire.
My goals for this week are to get all outside yard work and trimming done, clean the exhaust fans in the kitchen and the bathroom, wash the baseboards and finish my meal plan for June. We have a very limited grocery budget but as long as I meal the plan for dinners, the breakfasts and lunches kind of take care of themselves.
My goal for the first week of June is to visit family and friends in Florida…on a budget, of course! To save money on food, we will do a combination of bringing food from home to cook, grocery shopping, and taking advantage of free/discounted meals from restaurants that offer them during my birthday week. My parents are taking us out for a nice meal to celebrate my actual birthday. Upon returning home, I need to continue working on decluttering our house. Last week I donated several large bags of clothes to our local thrift store. Next up is attacking household items.
Double ditto!!! Lana, that’s wonderful!!!
Brandy, I’m so glad you’re posting your monthly goals again. I think I get more done when you do it! Motivation!!
*I’m in the middle of painting our big entertainment center. I had some indoor house paint leftover in a neutral cream so I’m using that. It was barn red color and I really wanted to lighten it up. I love the way it’s turning out.
*Go the Y 4 days per week to run the lazy river. I love being in the outdoor pool and want to enjoy it as much as possible.
*Sew 2 pillows for the guest room.
*Start making C’mas cards and use what I have.
*Fine tune our new budget.
*Continue working to finish my mom’s embroidered quilt squares (50 states)
*Finish embroidering 2 more flour sack towels for gifts.
*Finish embroidering the last of the 12 quilt squares so my church group can assemble & quilt them for our Quilt Bingo.
I am having my house totally re-wired. It is an expensive undertaking that I had to do (my bedroom electricity quit one day and they saw I had the original electricity in my 100 year old house…lots of bare wires). My goals for June revolve around the re-wiring process. The electrician is a “friend” that is willing to work with me. I’ve paid $3,000.00 and he has done the front third of the house. He finished with that yesterday and has gone to other work while I (Jake not me physically) have holes in the walls and ceilings patched. When that is finished my goals for this month are to repaint these rooms, replace 2 windows and change anything that I don’t like or no longer works for my life now (I am in a wheelchair). I will be going through everything I own to “keep, sell, donate” (not all of it this month *laughing*) to simplify my life. Put new carpet in my bedroom. Make curtains for my room and two front windows. I will put my bedroom furniture in the new configuration. Hanging some of my art work in my bedroom and I will be looking at July.
Easily stated:
get the weeds out of the garden and the seeds in! Too much rain here so we’re starting out way behind.
If I finish that, there is decluttering and washing curtains and washing floors, baseboards, and the outsides of cabinets!
Out goals for the month include cutting two cords of firewood, making homemade cards to fill in the gaps in my collection, pressure washing the decks, garage and rugs, washing windows inside and out, and quilting the table runner I sewed over the winter. We have a camping trip and a short trip to celebrate my husband’s birthday planned, and I’m having a friend over for the day mid-month. It’s good to have fun things to look forward to in between the work.
Anne, I love your spiritual goals. We have been sitting in ournsunroom at night with the windows open and enjoying the sunset. It’s the little things that can be so peaceful.
Sounds like a busy month for everyone!
I celebrate a birthday this month, as well as hosting a father’s day get-together for my family, in addition to my usual work, blogging, and a bunch of medical appointments.
FUN
– do something fun to celebrate milestone birthday, working around others schedules as well as my own yet-to-be-scheduled medical appointments
BLOG
– update my About Me page on my blog significantly, and include an email funnel
– book and attend an appointment to use the photoshoot Groupon that I bought. I may or may not end up posting the resultant picture on my blog, but it will likely be part of a longer term blog redesign project
GARDEN
– buy the last of the items I need for my balcony garden: borage seeds (if I can find them), two more bags of dirt, 4 more small containers, some herb starts, and possibly some strawberry starts
– put up the wire trellis that my parents gave me as a Christmas gift. I plan to grow my peas on this, and the peas are already sprouting; I need to check that applying the wire trellis to the wall doesn’t flout any condo rules though.
GARAGE SALE/SELL/DONATE
– continue to go through my home and set aside things that I no longer use, either to sell in a garage sale (if I know of one happening soon), or to donate
– list some furniture on kijiji or bunz if I don’t put it out in a garage sale
There are a few things that I want to get done this year (revamp closet, clean carpets, get in electrician to fix lighting fixtures) but they don’t have to be done this month. However, if I find time, why not!
Hello Brandy and all from Australia 🙂 .
Our goals for this month include –
Household –
– Knock down nails on the front and back veranda.
– Cook all meals and bread from scratch.
– Deep clean room by room to get ready for our rental inspection in July.
– Go out and cut some more firewood for winter as we are getting low, we have heaps of green wood seasoning for next year but not a lot to use now.
Financial –
– Keep within or under all allotted budget categories.
– Save as much as we can for our buying our home with cash by being frugal.
– Pay new household and garden equipment purchases off our credit card, none are incurring interest.
– Put $100 into our bulk grocery home cash stash out of our grocery budget.
– Deposit $250 into our emergency bank account.
Garden –
– Finish mulching the rest of the vegetable garden beds and mulch them with composted grass clippings.
– Pick any ripe berries and vegetables from the gardens and blanch, freeze or preserve them.
– Plant carrot and turnip seeds.
– Put together garden tip wagon carts when they arrive to use them.
– Have a tyre fixed on our other garden trolley.
Craft sewing and hobby internet business –
– Take more photos of unlisted handmade items and list them.
I love to buy seeds from Bountiful Gardens…they should have borage seeds and, when purchasing from them, we support the important work they do in Africa. All they sell are open pollinated non-profit GMO seeds.
As an aside, they have a carrot that is especially high in vitamin A, and my favorite cut-and-come-again lettuce…Bronze Arrow.
Hello all from the mountains of West Virginia.
Goals for June:
Well, after 20 years of teaching, I didn’t start until my mid-forties, I retired on May 31. Boy do I have lots of goals for the summer now that I have time at home!
In June, I want to declutter my workroom and sun room that are filled with boxes of “stuff” brought from my classroom and from a loft in my husband’s woodworking shop. I want go through it all carefully and thoughtfully so I never need to do it again.
Due to too much rain, the big garden just got tilled 3 days ago so we are just beginning to plant our tomatoes, onions and winter squash. We do have a few raised beds up near the house that require on going maintenance but are very easy to work in. I also need to clean-up my rose garden and transplant black-eyed Susan that have spread too much and taken over.
My DH and I hope to take a few short weekday trips now that I am retired.
Plans for June
Continue to go thru things as I pack for our move. Anything not going with us if school can use, I’ll donate it to there.
Also, cleaning out both refrigerators and freezers.
Since our new home should be done in a few weeks. We plan to move what we can and then over a weekend have help for big things.
Shopping… I’m trying not to but have had the kick of wants so working on ignoring my wants and holding off until after the move.
Ooh, good to know! Thanks, PJGT! I want to grow borage to make my own organic fertilizer solution, but haven’t been able to find it in brick and mortar stores. I’ll Google Bountiful Gardens — thanks!
I’ve bought borage seeds from Burpee, Outside Pride, and Territorial Seed. All reseed READILY. I had to pull out self-seeded borage that was growing too close to the grass this week.
Congratulations, Lana!! You’ll feel AMAZING once your mortgage is gone. We paid our home off just before this past Christmas (a 30 yr mortgage paid off in 7.5 years) and I spent that day telling my counters and walls that I owned them!
I also lift weights (heavy) and love it. It’s completely changed my body composition. I’m so strong now and considering I turn 41 later this year, I also appreciate the fact that I’m reducing my risk of osteoporosis and loss of bone density. Plus, it’s pretty awesome that my husband (a retired Marine) is duly impressed. I can even do one-handed push-ups!!
1. Read devotional daily.
2. Walk 2 min. every weekday.
3. Eat in except for when we are out of town.
4. Find a house to buy.
5. Go thru guest closet and purge unneeded items and bring them to Goodwill.
6. Put $800 in savings.
Thanks, Brandy! I’ll check out those companies and see whose shipping costs are cheaper. Glad to hear that reseed so easily; I’m balcony gardening so hopefully they reseed themselves in their pot/trough and I will be able to leave them alone except for watering.
Whoo hoo! How exciting!
June marks my very last month of graduate school. I have two pieces of homework due by Saturday, and then I will only have two more weeks of classes this month. My main goal is to wrap this master’s in nursing up on a high note. I want to work on the afghan I am crocheting a bit, finally sew the Daisy Girl Scout patches on to my daughter’s uniform vest, roll over an old 401K that has always gotten crummy returns, do a nursing CEU my state requires for licensure renewal, set up our home command center to prepare for next school year, and hit a few summer bucket list items with the kids.
That should say walk 20 minutes every weekday!
My boards are at the beginning of July so my biggest goal is to be ready for them.
Otherwise:
– continue to work out 4-5 days per week at home
– make most meals at home. I’m giving myself a little grace this month because between work, the kids, and studying we may end up making frozen pizzas or eating out occasionally
– continue to cloth diaper and breast feed. 4.5 months and the baby has only had a few bottles of formula! Not that there’s anything wrong with formula- my son had a lot it- but it decreases the cost if I can pump enough!
– have at least one date with my husband
– figure out frugal gifts for Father’s Day
– manage a way of continuing at daycare without a nanny. Not only is it less expensive but I love our daycare and I think learning to share has been really good for my son
– figure out a way to wear more of my wardrobe in stylish ways. I think I’m in a fashion rut
– get a few more seeds planted (chamomile, beans, zinnias) asap
Lana, yes, congratulations on the end of the mortgage payments!
I had always froze the cooked beans as I have always been afraid of the pressure canner. My husband even bought me a brand new one a few years ago..still afraid 🙁
Then my oldest girl moved back in the area a few years ago and she is fearless. So working with her and my husband’s sister I have become much better at it. Since I can and freeze for the year it is nice to pressure can the items like green and wax beans, corn, legumes, meats that I normally would have frozen. Saves more room for the things I prefer to freeze like peas and berries and fish.
Cindy, that work at home mission plan sounds interesting. I hope you can figure something out. Our church ladies make all kinds of kits for missions using sewing…hygiene kits, comforters, infants kits, relief kits etc.
We use Jung seeds as they are a local company. They have borage seeds in their catalog and there is an online coupon to use.
Brandy, what will your stichery project be? Did you draw it freehand?
Thanks! That sounds like something that is very beneficial, especially the hygiene kits.
My goals for June include:
-finish painting wardrobe, then organize sewing supplies in it
-sew pillows for day bed
-begin stripping porch posts
-walk at least 2 miles daily
-clean dog nose art off storm doors
-plant another round of lettuce
-list some things on ebay
-keep eating down the freezer
-weed in the garden
My goals for the month of June are to wash my garage windows, mulch a flower bed in my front yard, Pick my rhubarb and freeze or bake a strawberry rhubarb pie, pick and dry parsley.
For fun I will help plan a family reunion picnic, try to fit in a day at the beach and play with my grandson as much as possible. He isn’t at his best these days. His parents are super busy working and taking classes to secure their income. He is 4 years old and I think he can feel the stress his parents are under. He doesn’t like changes to his schedule and there have been many. I will try to provide some stability and consistency to his days.
I am also going to try to fit in more exercise and better nutrition so that I can better keep up with my grandson.
I hope we all work hard towards our goals but also enjoy ourselves.
That’s wonderful that you want to find a way to serve from your home while caring for your adult child. I’m sure He will present a way for you to contribute to your church while being a wonderful mother.
I have used pressure canners for years and never had a problem at all. In fact, I’m on my second one, not counting the pressure canner. There are only two rules, really—turn the heat down to med low to med once the pressure is up where you want it, and don’t OVERFILL the pressure cooker–2/3 is FULL. Mine has a rubber ring which has to be replaced about every year or two–you’ll know when the cooker doesn’t seem to hold pressure –steam will come out around the edges because the ring stretches and doesn’t get a good seal any more. We have an old time hardware store in town that carries parts, but you can look them up online and get them too. It’s really quite easy and I would like to see more people use them. You can make a soup in a hour or hour and a half that tastes like it’s cooked all day. Results are wonderful.