Yes I can!

Image from www.yesicanproject.org

I feel like a failure… Again.

I’m full of goals, ideas, resolutions.. I’m brimming with hope for the thought of what is going to be…

But what am I doing for it now?

Nothing.

Nothing at all.

January is almost gone and I have not made it to the gym even once.  I have not figured out a way to make extra money or to pay down more debt.  I have not organized the house.  I have not avoided junk food like the plague.  I have not blogged more.

I have failed.

And it is beginning to depress me.

But, I can’t let it do that.  I need to change my attitude.  To leave the past in the past and to look forward from today.  To say “Yes I can!” 

I can become healthier.

I can lose weight and have the body I want.

I can pay down debt.

I can write more.

I can reach my goals.

Because, the thing is, if I don’t think “Yes I can” I definitely won’t.

This post inspired by Writing Workshop at Sleep is for the Weak.

Devil’s Food Chocolate Cake

I love Devil’s Food Chocolate Cake.  What’s not to love about it?  After all, it is chocolate!

Usually, when the craving hits me, I pull out a Betty Crocker’s Devil’s Food Chocolate Cake, beat in eggs and water, and 30-40 minutes later, I have a cake.

But, in my desire to practice baking & cooking skills, yesterday I decided to make the cake from scratch.

I used a recipe from a cookbook I received at my wedding shower, The American Test Kitchen. 

It came out pretty good, my only complaint being that I found it left a cocoa aftertaste.  The boys said the cake was delicious, and although they could taste the cocoa, it wasn’t a bad thing, so we’ll see.  Maybe next time I’ll tweak it to use a little less cocoa powder? 

At least I tried.. :)

Here’s the recipe I used:

Devil’s Food Cake:
1 1/2 cup – all-purpose flour
1 tsp – baking soda
1/2 tsp – baking powder
1/4 tsp – salt
1 1/4 cup – boiling water
4 oz – unsweetened chocolate, chopped
1/2 cup – Dutch processed Cocoa powder
10 tablespoons – butter, softened
1 1/2 cup – lightly packed brown sugar
3 large eggs
1/2 cup – sour cream
1 tsp – vanilla extract

1. Grease three 8-inch cake pans (or in my case two 9-inch pans) and line the bottoms with parchment paper.  Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

2. Whisk flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt in a large bowl and set aside.  In a separate bowl, whisk boiling water, chocolate, and cocoa powder until smooth.

3. In an electric mixer, beat on medium speed butter and sugar together until light and fluffy, 3 to 6 minutes.  Beat in the eggs, one at a time, until incorporated, scraping the bowl and beaters as needed.  Beat in sour cream and vanilla.

4. On low, beat in 1/3 of the flour mixture.  Beat in half of the chocolate mixture.  Repeat with half of the remaining flour mixture, then the remaining chocolate mixture, and finally the last third of the flour mixture.

5. Give the batter one final stir using a rubber spatula.  Divide batter evenly between cake pans.  Bake 15 to 20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted comes out clean except for a few crumbs.

6. Let cakes cool in the pans for 10 minutes on a wire rack.  Flip onto wire rack, remove parchment paper, and flip cakes upright.  Let cool completely before frosting, 1 to 2 hours.

read read read

It’s July, and I’m more than halfway done my A-Z Reading Challenge.  I only have 12 1/4 letters to go.  Once I finish reading The Lovely Bones tonight, I’ll be down to 12.  I knew it wouldn’t be hard – after all I devour books.  At least I say that now.. Wait till December when I’m still looking for a book that starts with the letter Z that I actually wouldn’t mind reading.. But I digress, so  let’s get to the summaries/critiques/nothingness:

In the past few weeks, I’ve finished 4 books…

First I started with A Book of A Thousand Days.. Not so interesting.  Actually most of the time the book annoyed me.
Then I read, The Queen of Babble Gets Hitched, and am sad I read it out of order, and will have to go searching for the rest of the series.
And then there was Everyone Worth Knowing.  It was good. Not spectacular, but good.
Finally, I had to throw in a Pride & Prejudice related book with Mr. Darcy Takes A Wife… Steamier, as in there is actually kissing scenes.. well more than that, but I’ll let you read it.  Have I mentioned yet how much I adore P&P and Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth?!?

And, now I’m almost at the end of The Lovely Bones.  I tried to put off reading it, since I wanted to see the movie first… After all, we know how I feel about movie adaptations.. But I can’t not read so…  Actually I’m going to get back to that… It’s the best escape… Now if I can only make the grumpy brother-in-law disappear for a while, I’ll be in heaven!!

30

This post is inspired by prompt #4 at Mama Kat’s Writing Workshop.  I may have tweaked it a little from it’s original title, ’30 Things I Vow to Do This Summer’ to ‘ 30 Things I Want to Happen This Summer.’  I’m surprised I managed to come up with so many.. I’ll have to come back at the end of summer and see how many (if any!) are accomplished.. They are in no particular order except for no. 1 – which is the most important to me right now! lol.

1.       Most importantly: have the basement finished, and have life return to wonderful normalcy and just the two of us

2.       Finish my hour quota!

3.       Take two weeks off just to relax

4.       Complete all the remaining letters in the 2010 A-Z Reading Challenge

5.       Organize the closet – Set up the shelves and have it look beautiful

6.       Work on and finish the wedding photo-book

7.       Write story to go along with photo-book

8.       Lose the remaining 14 lbs I want to lose

9.       Spend time with my niece once she gets back from Australia

10.    Waste whole days sitting at the beach reading

11.    Decorate!!  Put up pictures, paintings, clocks, drapes

12.    Grow basil – and have it live for more than a week

13.    Stain front porch

14.    Start a new routine of waking up at 6:30 every morning

15.    Go to the gym 4x a week or more

16.    Drink lots of water and eat fresh fruits and vegetables

17.    Write more – it seems like it gets put on the back burner more often than not

18.    Spend more time with my family as a couple

19.    Start entertaining

20.    Begin thinking about and organizing AMP’s Grad Party

21.    Keep in touch with family overseas

22.    Have a cleaning routine where I spend 20 minutes a day cleaning and no more than that!  No major clean-up days all summer!

23.    Do outdoor sports

24.    Learn outdoor sports

25.    Start planning next spring’s garden

26.    Water my hanging baskets so they don’t die before July

27.    De-clutter before September

28.    Go camping with AMP’s family

29.    Make one new ‘close’ friend

30.    Spend time with the friends I never get to see

Less & More

Yes, I’m like everyone else.  I’m low on time.  And unlike most of the blogs I follow, I’m not a mother of one, never mind 2 or 3 or more.  You would think that I’d have more time.  But I do not.  I am continuously struggling to balance my life, to make time for me, for my goals and pursuits.

This month I am succeeding.  I started my Get Fit Challenge.  I’ve been making time for myself to eat healthy. I’ve been making time to go to the gym at least 4x a week.  I’m making time to accomplish my goal – 19 lbs and 12 inches to lose.  Two weeks in and I’m already down 5 lbs and 2 inches – only 14 and 10 to go.

It made it easier that my parents were away for a few days.  I love them dearly and visit them at least 3x a week, which while lovely, takes hours out of my day.  Often, I go with the intention of staying half-an-hour and then making my way to the gym or home to clean or run errands.  But usually nothing else gets done and I’m there till A will be home from work, so I have to rush around.   And then there are other relatives who I really should go visit on a regular basis – but my time is limited and there’s only one of me to go around. 

But, along the theme of more and less, I can think of a few more:

Less debt, more savings

Less gossipers, more friends

Less tears, more smiles

Less writer’s block, more blogging 

Less waiting, more living!

I think that last one is really important.  I feel like I’m always waiting for something.  I waited for A to propose, I waited for the wedding, I waited till we were ready to buy a house.  Now I’m waiting for A to be ready to have kids – if that ever happens.  But, maybe, instead of waiting I should spend more time just living.  Instead of waiting to have a child, spend more time enjoying just being a couple without any pressure to procreate.

There’s always a list of things we want more of or less of.  If I find more time to myself to get things done, maybe I’ll be more relaxed and less rushed, less of a chicken running around with my head cut off.
 

This post inspired Sleep is For the Weak’s Writing Workshop prompt # 5 – What do you need to do more of?  What do you need to do less of?

Emotionally Emotional

I scoured in vain.  Overwhelmed is not an actual emotion.  I think that isn’t fair.  After all, I am feeling overwhelmed.  That is my emotional state. 

I want to be poetic – I want to be the type of writer that people will want to read – but how do I beautify stress?  I see some do it – and it reiterates an important fact – I am not a writer.  I could never survive in the world of writing.  I can write passively well – but that is all.  It saddens me that I have no outstanding talents – I can do many things well or well enough, but there is nothing I can do amazingly.

But, I digress.  This overwhelming-ness is consuming me.  There are so many goals I wanted to reach this year and as of yet, have accomplished none.  I am no better of a cook or housekeeper.  I am no more organized.  I am no more healthier or in better shape than I was 4 months ago.

I am overwhelmed by my failure.

I want to state a new goal – but I do not want any more goals to fail at.  Instead I will take pleasure in small accomplishments, the small accomplishments of today.  Optimism after all is better for my state of mind.

And perhaps, by the end of this year, some of the goals will be reached and this silly thing called life will not be so overwhelming.

 

Inspired by prompt no. 5 – Pick an emotion that best describes your state of mind right now.

Success, of sorts…

This morning, I stepped onto the evil scale and weighed myself.  Two days before I leave for our anniversary weekend getaway, and I’m down to 139 lbs.  :)  At least we’re making progress now!

I’m still 5 pounds away from what was my goal weight for the end of February – but maybe I need to readjust my goal.. SO, here goes the new plan:

March 1st – 139 lbs
April 1st – 136 lbs
May 1st – 133 lbs
June 1st – 130 lbs
July 1st – 127 lbs
August 1st – 125 lbs

Let’s see if this works…

mrs. failure

Two months ago, I had made a goal. It wasn’t vague. It was specific and clear, as you can see here. 

According to that, I should now be 137 lbs. 

That means I have lost 0 lbs in the past 2 months.  I guess I should be happy that I haven’t gained any weight, but couldn’t I have at least gotten under 140 lbs?  It’s depressing.  I’ve been attempting the gym, but it’s impossible.  Now, with the latest disaster of my grandfather being in an hospital an hour away, it’s slipping further and further away.  I wanted to be down to 134 by the end of this month, before our anniversary weekend.

I weighed myself this morning and I am 142 lbs.

Instead, I’ll still be the same weight.  Maybe if I eliminate all junk food, I can make it down to 140 by the end of this month.  And I can push myself to go to the gym 5x a week for the next 4 weeks.  Maybe!  I’ll have to give up my sleeping in till 8 to make it work, but I can sleep once I’ve reached my goal! 

Hopefully…

the undomestic housewife