Worn Out

Sometimes my friends get "small grouped" and call to tell me about it.
Getting "small grouped" is when a nice lady approaches another nice lady and asks her to join a small group.
Some people LOVE this and some people really do not.
I LOVE it.

For my friends who do not love it, I usually offer to read the book with them and they can call or email me after each small group meeting and we can giggle and be moved and inspired and plan the next book we'll read.
Did I mention I love small groups?

This happened to me with the book The Worn Out Woman. A friend got "small grouped", I joined from a distance and emailed in my thoughts.

I would not have chosen to read this particular book (I'm really just too worn out) but I gleaned some helpful quotes from the text:

"You are controlled by your decisions, not by your circumstances."

"On the days when I take intentional steps away from the past," Ashley says, "I notice a light and happy feeling around my heart."

"Telling your story is a tool, not a full-time occupation. It's not really necessary to explore every question and nail down every tendency. Life is a mystery, after all, and you'll never completely sort out all of your influences and motivations."





"Most worn out women struggle with expectations."





"Disease to please = energy sapping malady."





Dr. David Burns says, "If people can't accept your imperfections, that's their fault."





"Have the humility to stop pretending you have it all together."





Y'all, I don't know why I feel so worn out...




...but I'm glad I read the book.

Lesson My Impact #4: Eat to Feed Your Compost

I have been trying to eat to feed my compost.



If I don't have to take out the tupperware containers under my sink every other day to add my food scraps to the compost bin, then I'm not eating how I need to eat, nor feeding my family anything that at one time was alive.



I've been adding my wet scraps then layering with dry leaves from the yard.
I used to do this in an old trash can, then moved it to an open concept with pallets zip-tied together.
Then I inherited this roly-poly number that is awesome.

I have yet to use the compost yet, or have a thriving garden. Who knows this year could be MY YEAR.

(If you have any composting tips, I'd love to hear/read them!)

In The Closet

I love to clean a closet.

It is such therapy for me.

I have organized my mom's art supply closet at her school, a friend's art/creative room in her house, my own closets, my sister's sewing room/closet with a fridge, and now another friend's!

She called me because after 1.63 years of living in her house, this was the tiny space she just couldn't get to. We all have those places.

It's best to accept them with grace, phone a friend (me) and move on.

Here are the Before pics she sent me:

Srsly, my heart quickens at such a sight.

I ran to Target, looked around.

Went to her house at the arranged time and rolled up my sleeves with Pandora in the background. 

Two hours later, we had the beginnings of a more manageable, creative space.

Here are After pictures:

Enter here...

(all shoes with dust on them go to Goodwill. Period.)

(some pictures are blurry to protect the innocent)

(Handbags on a belt hook hanger!  Scarves on a hanger with shower curtain hooks organizing them!)

(all clutches in a basket! Hooray!)

I wanted to color coordinate the sleeveless section, then the short-sleeved section, then the long-sleeved, then the sweaters...but that felt extreme for the first visit and I ran out of time.

She and I will check in next week and see if the "flow" is working for her and if she is using the items I purchased, or if I should return them.

Chaos to Order, a Beginning and an End - Y'all, this is just plain fun.

Manna Market Co-op!

I finally found Manna Market Co-op and got my first half box!

Their food is so good, y'all.

Did you know that if you buy organic bananas, they won't turn totally yellow when ripe and ready to eat? The pesticides used on some bananas affects how yellow they turn...and my eye is trained to wait until the whole fruit is yellow. I do not enjoy a crunchy banana.
But I peeled a yellow-tinged-green banana from Manna Market and it was dee-lish.

Hooray for organic and trying to stay local!

Lesson My Impact #3: Pouches

Terracycle to the rescue again!

They have a Go-Go Squeeze Brigade!

Can you imagine if nursery schools and preschools and lunch rooms would collect empty pouches and mail them in??

That would be a lot of pouches saved from the land fill.


TBH, the Drink Pouch Brigade is pretty amazing too. Capri Sun and Honest Kids empty drink pouches can be mailed in and recycled into more pouches (through a shredding then melting process they show you on the web site - scroll to the very bottom of this page).

I used to cut off the tops and rinse and dry them, but now you can just mail the whole flattened pouch in with the straw still in and everything!!

Thank you, Terracycle, for trying to make saving the earth as convenient as possible.

The work involved for me (AND YOU) is collecting, bagging, packaging, printing the label, and scheduling a UPS pick up or just dropping it off at UPS.

The only cash costs for you are the packaging supplies, printer ink and driving to UPS. Which means it's basically totally worth it.

If YOU collect, I will ship!! We can be a team! Go team!
Let me know...