Ongoing Projects At Hand

These will continue to be researched and added to, started or gathered together in order to start...some personal, some family

1. Begin attending a local place of worship. We've put this off for different reasons in the past, but now it's time to find a shul.

2. Stepping up inroads to land finalization and relocation.

3. Determining on paper the ACTUAL savings/costs, advantages/disadvantages of my returning to the job I had. Will weigh financial realities and compare money saved by more careful managing from home (all meals from scratch, really stretching our money, no gasoline expenses, pack all lunches/cook all meals for other family members, etc) VS. the cash. Will also weigh the health impact of working nights, and the reality of how much I can get done in a day here at home, etc.

4. Researching greens and crops that would last the winter here. Must get them in the ground. Plan to do floating row covers or something along that line if necessary during colder weeks.

5. We MUST start substituting grocery store items with our own homegrown/homeproduced. The only of these we're actually using on a daily basis are the fresh and dried herbs and the homemade kombucha. Oh yes, and the diabetes plant/gynura. It's a start, but it's not enough. Greens are top on the list for the immediate, also leaf lettuces and radishes.

6. More experimentation with unfamiliar but available plants, such as cooking young papaya leaves, clover, and others.

7. Need to weekly eliminate ANY storebought breads, with exception of maybe flour tortillas now and then, with my own homemade. Same thing with any sweet treats, occasional desserts. Do NOT plan on making these in large quantities, though, because we're trying to cut back, find our balance. We've lost a little weight just cutting back on them a bit and substituting other things.

8. Find tried and true soup recipes...ones I get asked to make again. Ones I have ingredients for without having to include half a dozen difficult ones. ( I really appreciate Lemongrass's recent recommendations...thank you, I look forward to trying them out!!)

9. Take the time to shop a few places for specific things. I can find real deals out there on specific items, but they're places I seldom shop for much of anything and don't think to go on my weekly grocery shopping. I'll be divvying up the food budget to make stops for these things since they're close by and it would save me maybe 1/4 of my weekly budget. Need to find somewhere with better prices for meat, even though we've cut back on meat quantity by about half.

10. Ultimately, to achieve reducing weekly grocery bill by half within a year's time. I am now spending half of what I spent last year weekly.

11. Increase my physical activity daily. I've lost some weight now, not much, but without trying, simply by getting more rest and eating better, eating more homemade...and, I think, by drinking such copious amounts of the longer-fermented Kombucha (not as sugary as the younger kombucha) I think it's something my body's been needing, and now I FEEL like doing more...yay!!

12. Begin planning the spring garden beds and order seeds.

13. Expand useful recipe base for things to make all meals last.

14. Find the many ways to use the pumpkins and winter squashes since the prices of these right now are really reasonable.

15. Don't know if I can achieve this one, but if so, great :) Can we find a small freezer by late November?? If so, I'd like to watch the sales on turkeys and get some. For now, it would feed us for a long time...till the day we can have our own (praying praying praying...) The prices are so stupid these days, it's maybe my onlyhope to find affordable meat in quantity.

16. Write the thank you notes I have procrastinated.

17. Declutter my desk area, my closet, the back porch. Keep floors mopped regularly (we have allllllll tile floors) Keep laundry folded right after washing. Empty a couple of piles in the garage to free up two more laundry baskets for that purpose. Oh yeah, and those dishes that keep replenishing themselves in the sink even after I've just gotten things back in order (grrrr...) :)

18. Keep saving our loose change for the Kiva.org/Doing Not Thinking Challenge.

19. Plan simple things for Hannukah. I have no idea what we'll do.

20. Make EVERY shabbat a special celebration in our week. Have the music, meals, clothing ready no later than Thursday, since it allllwayyyyyssss seems to get put off till Friday afternoon and then either gets rushed or otherwise goofed. I want it to be a relaxing time, a planned time, an oasis.

21. Every week study the Torah portion ahead of time, and read my Bible every day. I'll be concentrating on the version by Friedman...love his literal translation and brief yet historical insights in his Torah translation with commentary.

22. Do something with that neglected front flowerbed. (Update: Just started that today, whacking the bushes back with the HEAVY limb cutter since we don't have a hedge trimmer. My forearms are obviously out of shape. I got half of them done and my arms feel like they weigh forty pounds and feel like I imagine Popeye's do, ahoy!)

23. I ordered yarn...this, and this...for The First Time In My Life!!!!! (so excited) I'm SO NOT a thready sewing crocheting knitting person. But my daughter has a neglected Knifty Knitter set, and inspired by Warren's success making things with his KK, initially inspired by Angie's KK success here being modeled by the cutest pictures of her kids, I thought of the time I could be sitting beside my sweetie as we watch movies and in an hour or two I could have a real, homeknitted hat or scarf, or (as I get better) a longer project such as a throw blanket. So this project is underway.

24. I sketched some chicken pictures for possible red-on-white embroidering, or maybe applique? to make some squares throughout the winter for later assembling a quilt or other project...(y'know, when I learn how to sew??? lol)

25. We have honed hand-sketched house plans down to a few basic designs. Now I'm concentrating on trying to imagine what specific things we'll need to incorporate for ongoing real life activities...shelf space for fermenting, storage, kitchen arranged in best way for canning and food prep and large quantities of things needing to be cleaned and chopped, etc. Windows situated for best through-the-house airflow, some sort of passive design that encourages temperate interior during exterior extremes. Siting gardens and animals in relation to the house and our need to access them quickly yet not be too close. And so on and so on...

26. Will I Can??? I have a dozen quarts, new in the box, sitting there. I have a soup pot that could act as a hot water canner. This is where I got stuck with the kombucha, before taking the leap. I could start with something easy, like lemon curd. Or pumpkin pickles a' la Throwback at Trapper Creek, or Pumpkin Butter a' la Kathie. And yet I circle the project slowly and with trepidation. Hmmm...

27. Make my own laundry liquid/powder. Yep, another procrastinated project. I think cleaning out the cluttered corners of the laundry room would inspire me to get that underway.

28. Correcting my typos before posting on the blog. Yeah....right (lolol)

That's it for now...just needed to put this to keyboard so as to have the list handy! :)