Organized

I'm not the kind of girl who stays in committed relationships.  It's always love at first sight, the romance, the not being able to get enough.  But then things get boring, like each day of the week just looks the same.  Needs and wants aren't being met anymore, so the eye gets to wondering.  You start seeing what your other options are, and how nice and fresh they look and smell, like nice clean slates to just start all over.  You dance around the guilt of being tempted to stray, days, weeks, hell...months even.  But there will come that day where you can no longer resist temptation, and you give in.  You can never go back, so you don't look back at what you just gave up, you just move on.  And the cycle continues.

Now, if you thought I was talking about relationships with other people, you should get your head out of the gutter.  I was talking about my relationships with planners and other paper-like products.  I love getting a new planner in my hands to fill out with all of my dates and appointments.  I will say that I have fallen in love with and remained committed to my Erin Condren Life Planner.  This is the first time in my life I have used a planner for the entire year without dumping it for a different model.  There are frustrating things that I have experienced with ordering, but eventually once all the problems are fixed, I'm happy.  Plus, usually when they makes mistakes, that means I get a discount towards my next order, so it all works out in the end.

Now that I have found my perfect planer, I've been trying to find a good way for Mike to be able to see my schedule.  We tried google calendars, but its honestly such a pain in the ass to update.  I gave up earlier this year.  So, in the mean time he's just had to guess where I was and hoped to be right.  So, I found some free printable calendars via Pinterest.  This site Elli.com has so many effing adorable things on their site, some free, some to buy.  Luckily, I just need a simple calendar that had a cute design at the top, and they serve it up for free.  So, now, we have a completely free and adorable calendar to hang on our fridge, and Mike can see everything.  I've written all of our appointments, plans with friends/family, and circled my planned weekends to work for him to see easily if I should be free.  I don't like to put my schedule on the calendar until my boss posts it for the month, just in case I end up needing to switch with someone for whatever reason.  I'm really, really happy with it.  Plus, its just one page, no funky picture at the top like traditional calendars.  I don't like that they take up so much space on the wall.  Maybe I'll feel differently once we have kids, but right now, I'll skip it.

I also keep seeing these really really adorable customized budget templates on Pinterest, but none of them are what I would want.  I do our bills on a weekly basis, and most templates are set up for a monthly basis.  I like to be able to see what's coming in each week, and what's going out, and what we have left over.  To me, it helps keep things in line without ending up with $20 for groceries at the end of the month because you didn't pay much attention to it the rest of the month.  And yes, I've tried Mint.com, and I still use it to keep an eye on all of our accounts, like checkings, savings, 401Ks, etcetera etcetera....I absolutely hate using it to keep track of our budget.  I constantly had to go in, re-label charges with the correct category, or change the date of something so it applied to the right month.  It is just not user friendly to me, and I gave up. 

I'm also just not a fan in general of the whole "$100 for going out, $200 for gas, $40 for coffee, etc." type of budget.  We set money aside for things we need, but going as far as saying, well, you've already met your $40 limit for coffee, so I guess you're just gonna have to be tired!!  Not a fan.  Our bills are paid, we have savings, I'm not gonna micromanage how we divvy up the remainder.

So, no on the Mint.com front.   I've used programs like Microsoft Money, etc, and they are all basically the same.  Too much work, especially given its not what I need.  I just need something to show me what's coming in, what's gotta go out, and what we have left over  So I just made my own, and I'm quite in love with it.  I've made SEVERAL before.  But this is the first pretty one.  Plus instead of keeping it on my computer, and updating everything there, I just decided to print it out and update it in pencil.  This way, we can both see it, I don' have to keep printing new copies every time I change something, and its not easy to avoid.  If we spent too much, we're gonna see it rather than not opening the budget spreadsheet until the next month.  I used a cute font I downloaded months ago, and used cute colors.  I get tickled pink by things like this.

Of course, if I can get more creative making my own budget sheets, I won't hesitate a second to drop my current love. lol 

But I do feel so much more organized right after filling out new calendars and budget planning sheets.  It just makes me feel like an adult who has her shit together, and I certainly never thought I'd LIKE feeling like this when I was younger.  Lordy, when I got my first debit card in high school, I over-drafted all the time.  I was not a saver, or a check-book balance-er, or a plan ahead type person.  It was just, I have $5, what can I get with $5?  And that was life.  Luckily, I wised up quickly during my psychology college days, and I've never over-drafted again.  I was a day late paying a bill here and there during nursing school because I'd be so overwhelmed that I would just completely forget to set up the payment, but otherwise, I always pay early, like the statement isn't ready yet, and I want to pay it.  It's a problem I like having.

It's my weekend to work, and hopefully all goes well.  I hate to say this, because it sounds so awful, but I'm glad I'm not at the bottom of the totem pole anymore.  There are 3 girls who are newer than me now, and while it doesn't completely take the sting out of the two girls picking on me, it has shown me what confidence I do have.  I'm happy to see that I have not taken the same method of being on the attack in correcting my new coworkers as I've gotten the pleasure of experiencing.  Mistakes happen, and I believe I can be softer in my approach because I still make mistakes.  It is also helping me take the mistakes I do make in stride a little better.  How can I tell my new coworkers its ok, mistakes happen, if I beat myself up over each of my own mistakes?

Work is going to go the way it is going to go.  No matter how well I plan, my shift is gonna be what it wants to be.  I just have to remind myself, I always get it done someway somehow, if I have to stay late, I have to stay late.  And I need to slow down my rush when it comes to paperwork, those are the mistakes that come back to bite me in the butt later.  Those are the ones that could cause someone else to make a mistake because I wrote an order wrong.  Anyway, I just have to make sure I'm making good use of my time, and as hard as it is, not spending too much time chatting with my residents, because I just don't have as much time to spend as I would like, and that's just the way it is.

I took this week off (not completely intentionally) of Weight Watchers and exercising.  The weekend was full of good food, then I was busy with work, and then I had this damned craving for BBQ Pulled Pork Nachos, and the scale has certainly expressed all of it.  Luckily, since it is my work weekend, it actually easier to get back on track, because I don't have as much free time to pig out.   I just have to make the rest of the week count since I skipped weigh in.  Reaching 50 lbs is gonna be the death of me, I am having a hard time getting back in gear and sticking to it.  Maybe because I have felt so good about the improvements I've seen already in how I look, that the impetus to keep going is fading?  I dunno, but I gotta cut it out.  I have a timed 5k I need to get ready for, and I will not accept any excuses this time on why I can not run all of it.

And my little sister just started her last year in high school.  It is completely insane that she is a senior.  I remember vividly the day she was born, waiting to get to go to the hospital, getting the button with her foot print on it that I proudly wore to school.  Getting to go eat at Cracker Barrel with just Dad and me and Lena and Zach, something that didn't get to happen very often.  I remember becoming a pro at changing diapers, mixing formula, and my favorite of getting her to fall asleep on my chest.  I was Jr. Mom.  And now that little baby girl is a senior in high school.  And I'm gonna feel REALLY old when the littlest one is a senior in high school, only 6 more years for that!  It is pretty insane when you think of the span of all of our ages, My older sister is 32, I'm 29, my brother is 27, little sis #1 is 17, and little sis #2 is 11.  My poor parents. lol

Well, I gotta get moving, I have some errands I need to run before work, so that's all I got for now. :)