Whoo hoo!!!

I won't tell you how crazy-excited I got just now when I went onto my lanai...but it was pretty sad.

Lily, age 3 days

What'd I tell you? Early bloomer.

In other news, I'm spending my Spring Break working on ME. I'm following up on some New Years' resolutions and taking other steps to declutter my life, both figuratively and literally. Here's what I accomplished during my first 2 days of my vacation:

1) Began cleaning my apartment. And I mean for-real cleaning, with ACTUAL cleaning products and sponges and not just water and a paper towel. I've done the living room, dining room and kitchen so far (to be fair, the first 2 were pretty easy). I'm reserving a whole day each for the bathroom and my bedroom. I've alreay thrown out like 2 bags of garbage. Included in this will be taking a lot of my "winter" clothes from my closet and putting them into storage (ie, a garbage bag behind my couch) for the season--although I hear nighttime temps are going to drop to the 40s this week (which, in Florida in April, is almost unheard of). I'm also clearing out a lot of my paperback books via http://www.paperbackswap.com/, which is my new obsession. However, this doesn't really count as "cleaning," since I receive a new (new-to-me) book for every one I get rid of. But still, it's fun.

2) I went to church. This is helping to unclutter my mind.

3) I've been walking regularly AND I've even been running for parts of it. (Damn, it hurts my boobs, I'm not playin'. Even with sports bras, running is unpleasant. Then again, I was also PMSing.)

4) Taking another attempt at quitting. I HAVE to. Prices went up $2 a pack just in the last month alone. They're still only $4-5 a pack down here (I say "only", because I know Michigan must be seeing some crazy numbers), but come on. It's just STUPID at this point. WHY AM I STILL SMOKING? Not to mention all of the health and beauty issues associated with smoking, it will also help with my next area of self-improvement...

5) Getting my debt under control. I got so behind on bills that, as of November or December, my money-management system has been to throw my bills (and, lately, debt collection notices) into a big pile, never to be opened or looked at again. Why bother? I thought. I can't pay them anyway, and looking at them will just stress me out more. Well, let me share a little somethin' with ya: that shit don't just go away. =-) So, I spent like 3 hours last night going through that pile and actually FACING my debt. And it wasn't as bad as I thought--I mean, it's BAD, but so many of those notices were repeats of each other, so once I got down to the meat of it, I had a list of about 5 (pissed off) creditors. So I went online and filled out one of those credit consolidation apps (as you'll recall, that was one of my resoluations). I'm going to fill out a 2nd one today, just to compare rates/programs/etc (as in, what each will say my total monthly payment will be and what the estimated time frame will be for paying off my debt). And I'll tell you--I slept GOOD last night. This has been hanging over my head somethin' fierce the last few months. I'm still in the hole, of course--but at least I finally took the first few steps to getting my damn self out of it.

So...yeah. Those are the first few steps I've taken to Operation: Get Jen's Life Freakin' Together Since She's 30-Freakin-2-And-It's-About-Damn-Time-She-Got-Her-Shiznit-Straight. (Which we'll just refer to as Operation Shiznit, because that's what I'll be by the time this is all done.) ;)

I'd say it's been a pretty successful 48 hours so far.