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Thrift Haul: January 2018

I spent $97.58 at thrift stores in January. Here’s what I found!

First . . . something I didn’t buy, but totally would have when I was twelve. And entire row of Sweet Dreams romance books. They were the precursor to Sweet Valley High, and I ate these things up in the 80s. I resisted them now, though.

Okay, on to what I did actually buy. I actually bought a ton this month. There were half-off sales for Martin Luther King’s birthday,  and I was looking for one thing in particular, a paper cutter, so I went into shops three times.

I’m on a mission to revamp my wardrobe. I spent a lot of years wearing an outlier clothing size. I basically would buy ANYTHING, if it fit on my body. Since I’ve lost weight, I have far more choices, but I’ve found that I’ve struggled to change my mindset about clothes. I’m working on it.

Specifically, I’m working on replacing clothes that I have but don’t wear, or that I wear but don’t love, or are cheap and not what I really want, with clothes that are A) high quality, B) just exactly what I want to wear, and C) fit me perfectly.

First, I found several sweaters.

I don’t usually wear white well. It washes me out. But this sweater lets enough of the color of whatever I wear under it show through that it actually works. I love the oversize fit, too, and the open weave, which gives it a kind of retro look. It’s from Old Navy, made of cotton, and cost $3.

I have a love affair going on with cashmere. Most of the time, I find cashmere sweaters in the men’s department and they’re like the ultimate boyfriend sweater. And that’s fine. I’m tall and I like the look of mens wear sometimes. But sometimes? Sometimes I want something girlie. I rarely, rarely find a cashmere sweater designed for women in my size, so I was super excited to find this pretty robin’s egg blue cardigan from Talbots. It’s super fine, light as a feather, super soft, in perfect condition. And it cost $5. (Cashmere sweaters run $150 to $190 on Talbot’s website.  This is why I love thrift shopping!)

And here’s an example of a men’s cashmere sweater. I was excited to find one in navy, which is one of my favorite colors to wear. I have a theory that men receive beautiful sweaters as gifts, never wear then, then eventually donate them.  This one cost me $7.

And one more men’s sweater. This one is a kelly green cotton v-neck Polo pullover with an orange logo. I love the colors and the preppy boyfriend fit. It cost $4. (Similar sweaters sell for between $45 and $70)

And a cardigan. This one is a silky soft wool cardigan in a kind of unusual bright olive (as opposed to drab olive, which isn’t a color that suits me very well.) It’s made by Pure Jill, which is a J. Jill label. It cost $4.

I also found this Anne Taylor blouse. It’s a creamy color with navy blue horses all over. Again, white isn’t my color, but the navy off-sets it enough to let me wear it. It’s a tiny bit too small. I don’t normally buy clothes for ten-pounds-from-now or whatever, but it only cost $1 (a similar blouse sells for $69) and I can tell from how it does fit that it will fit perfectly eventually and I love the pattern. So, I went for it.

This is a pretty wool scarf–it’ll be nice during spring soccer games when I feel like I might freeze to death. It cost $3.

And I found a couple of t-shirts. Both are cotton. Both are just comfy, fit me well, and each one cost $1.50.

I also hit some kind of bonanza on office supplies. Starting with a vintage Lisa Frank pencil box. Cute! It cost 40 cents (!!!) These sell on Etsy for about $30.

And one more pencil case. I swear I don’t seek these things out! But this one cost 50 cents. I’m a sucker for this kind of a container with all kinds of little pockets and compartments. This exact case sells for $7.49 on Amazon.

This is a pretty pink faux-leather Rolodex notebook cover. It actually came with a notebook inside, which had someone’s meeting notes. The notes kind of cracked me up, because they started nice and neat and got progressively more incoherent until at the end they’re just scribbles. But I bought it because it fits my Erin Condren Monthly Planner perfectly. It cost $1.50. Amazon has the exact cover, only in letter size (instead of this A5 size) for $20.

I also found a couple of notebooks to replace cheapies I had been using. One is a A6 sized (so quarter sheet) 6-ring binder. I’d been using just a plastic one that’s probably 30 years old and falling apart. This one is nicer–faux leather with a pen holder and pockets and a button snap and everything. I’ll get rid of the planner pages, but I can reuse the tabs. It cost $2.19

And a full-size 8.5X11 three-ring made by Cambridge. It’s an oldie–the calendar it came with is 15 years old . But it’s in beautiful condition. It’s faux-leather. It cost $2.19 as well (Goodwill has such weird pricing.)

I’m a little obsessed lately with using business card holders as an organization tool for my writing. When I saw this little 24-card holder for 49 cents, even though it’s nothing special and just has a plastic cover, I couldn’t resist.

I’ve been working on building a Commonplace Book (like Ryan Holliday’s) and I was so excited when I found this neat vintage metal card box. It had a ton of cards and 50 tabs in the back, all labeled with the names of the US states. I wish I knew what project the previous owner was working on.  It cost $3.

Then, on the last day of the month I found a matching 5X8 index box at Goodwill for 49 cents! I rather like the industrial feel of both of them.

I actually haggled for this orangey-red leather tote bag. It’s leather, made by Buxton–the style is a Kelly Computer Bag. I work away from home sometimes and this will be nice for carrying my office with me. It was marked $10 and I talked it down to $8, because it’s going to need a little cleaning up. (It never hurts to ask!) Plus I had a 30 percent off coupon, so it was something like $5.75 total!

I’ve been looking for a notebook cover forever. I’d finally given up and actually had a new one in my cart on Amazon when I found this beauty. It’s an orange leather Franklin Covey classic-sized cover. It’s designed to hold their planners, but I’m using it as my everyday, carry-with-me notebook holder. (Plus, it matches my new tote bag!) Maybe I’ll do a walk-through of my notebook system later. This cover cost $3–similar ones retail for about $65!

I also came across this pretty Canvaslife laptop case that’s just the right size for my MacBook Pro. They aren’t expensive on Amazon, but it’s well-made and I love the look of it, and I got it for $3 instead of $11!

And I found a paper cutter, which was what I went in looking for all three times I shopped this month. I’ve been working on an A5-sized binder system and wanted one. This is a nice one by Fiskars–Amazon has a very similar one listed at $58. I picked it up for 30 percent off $6 or about $4.20!

I usually draw the line at buying water bottles at thrift stores. But I saw  these two pretty glass ones and I had to have them. They’re small, which I love, and so, so lovely. They cost $1.19 each. Similar double-walled glass water bottles sell on Amazon for about $15.

This was something I (obviously) don’t need–but I couldn’t resist it. It’s an art deco vanity dish from the 1930s, made by a company called Hickok. It has a heavy glass base and a brass lid. It was about $3.50 and it’s so pretty. The brass lid has a really nice patina. I love thinking about some 1930s lady keeping her hair pins in it, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do, too.

I found a couple of other vintage goodies. Including this 1960s overnight suitcase. It cost $5.99. These fabric suitcases are so fun–but the covers are often pretty messed up. this one is nice and clean. And yellow is my happy color!

And this cute set of mid-century yellow (happy color!) melamine coffee mugs in a wire rack. I love the  yellow and spring green color combo. These cost $2.

A little set of 1950s brass seagulls for $6.

And a cute 1960s Timex alarm clock. I love how small it is. It cost $3.

And I picked up a pile of vintage books with cool covers. I have a project in mind for  them. They cost $2 a piece or $8 total.

Lastly, I got a pile of books.

I have to read 50 books in the next five months for school. Trust me, that’s a lot of books. I have a couple of . . . I call them reading missions. I want to read every Newberry winner (there are 95 so far, one for every year from 1922 to 2017.) I want to read every Printz winner and honor book (there are significantly fewer, since the award started in 2000.) And I want to read books by authors I love, but have only read one or two of their most popular books. I found several books that fit into those goals.

These books cost between 25 cents and one dollar. I spent  roughly $10 on them.

Summer Crossing is by Truman Capote (I’ve read and loved his two most famous books: In Cold Blood and Breakfast at Tiffany’s.)

Jacob Have I Loved is by Katherine Paterson and won the 1981 Newberry medal.

These Happy Golden Years is by Laura Ingalls Wilder. It was a 1945 Newberry honor book, not the winner. Also it was the only book in the series I don’t own.

Freak the Mighty is by Rodman Philbrick. It doesn’t fit into any of my missions, but I loved the movie and I’m looking forward to reading it this semester anyway.

The Littles is by John Peterson. Again, it doesn’t fit into any of my missions, but it was a favorite when I was a little girl and I’m looking forward to reading it this semester.

Madeline in London is by Ludwig Bemelmans and was bought for pure love of Madeline.

The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle is by Hugh Lofting. It was the 1923 winner of the Newberry medal (the second ever.)

The Voyage of the Arctic Tern is by Hugh Montgomery. It doesn’t really fit into any of my missions–but it has an interesting publishing history (it was self-published, then picked up by a publisher after it was successful) and is a book in verse which is interesting to me. Plus when I was looking at it, the kid who worked at Savers stopped to tell me that it was a really good book.

Puck of Pook’s Hill is by Rudyard Kipling. I’ve read and loved The Jungle Book and Just So Stories, Kipling’s two most well-known works.

Paris in the Twentieth Century is by Jules Verne. I’ve only read 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and Around the World in 80 days by Verne.

Lavinia is by Ursula K. Le Guin. I’ve only read her Earthsea series.

Hatchet is by Gary Paulsen. It doesn’t fit into any of my missions, exactly, but it was a Newberry honor book in 1987 and one I somehow missed when I was a kid. I’m always interested in children’s book that stands the test of time. Ruby and her friends love this book, so it’s in my TBR pile for this semester.

I also picked up this book of poetry and short stories that I’ve seen a million times, but never really looked at. It’s a sort of celebration and exploration of aging women. I didn’t think it would fit into my MFA reading–but when I started reading, I realized that a lot of the poems and stories are about young women (sometimes teenagers) considering their grandmothers or thinking about their own old age. I was sucked into it.

And this book about making books, just for fun.

Also a couple of picture books. One is Moses the Kitten by James Herriot and the other I might have actually squealed when I saw: The Tasha Tudor Book of Fairy Tales. The art in that one is spectacular.

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Thrift Haul: December 2017

I thought I’d share with you guys the cool stuff I picked up at thrift stores in December. I spent a total of about $83.

First, I think my favorite find of this whole year. I had one of those moments where I actually squealed out loud, and while I was shopping with these babies in my cart, three different people stopped me to comment.

I guarded my cart.

These are a 7.5 quart dutch oven and a large sauce pan–both from Le Creuset. Amazon sells a brand new dutch oven this size for $369 and a sauce pan for $275. They’re enameled cast iron, absolutely gorgeous bright blue, and nothing I’d ever spend the full price on because…that’s more than $600 for two pots and THAT’S nuts.

It’s even more crazy that I found them for $8 each.

They don’t have lids, but that’s okay.

I also found this little vintage grinder thingie that I pretty much only bought because it cost $1 and it reminded me so much of my grandma. My sister Jill and I used to sit at our grandma’s kitchen table and grind up saltine crackers in hers–which was just like this one.

Don’t ask me why we ground up our saltines. I guess because we could? We’d eat them by licking a finger and dipping it into the salty crumbs.

I’ve actually come across these before, but the grindy teeth inside are almost always rusty. This one has a little surface rust on the arm, but the teeth are in perfect condition, straight from the 1970s.

One more little thing for the kitchen: an electric coffee grinder. It’ll need some cleaning, since it came complete with the remains of the last beans that were ground in it, but it works perfectly and is kind of cute. It reminds me of a little alien space ship. Plus, it cost $3, so a little elbow grease is okay.

This is just a metal pencil box–kinda lunchbox shaped–with a picture of 3D sharks. I saw these at Staples in late summer (you know, school supply time) and couldn’t make myself spend $12 on one.

The one I really, really wanted had an astronaut on it. But this shark one was only $2. I’ll probably take it to school with me next week and then pass it on to Ruby.

Rwar!

I actually went out thrifting this month specifically looking for something like this. I live with a LOT of people and I work from home. Which means I work in my bedroom a lot. It’s the only place where I can have at least some privacy some of the time.

I decided that I couldn’t keep giving most of my nightstand over to a lamp. So I wanted something either wall mounted or hanging–that just plugs in. We’re renters and I don’t want to mess with wiring.

Voila.  For $5, totally worth the search. I like the cut glass shade. I’m pretty sure it’ll make pretty patterns on the wall when it’s up and lit. It works fine, but the switch is sticky and also on the wrong side for my side of the bed, so I ordered a wireless remote plug.

Technology, man. You just plug that thing into the wall, plug the lamp into it, and a wireless remote will connect. The Clapper of the 21st century. Overall, with the plug, this lamp will wind up costing me $17.

This next doodad is pretty utilitarian. It’s just an over-the-shower-head thingie. It’s big, which is why I bought it. And has hooks at the bottom. And  it cost $3.

Here’s another thing I got super excited about when I saw it. It’s a pretty green cashmere sweater. Suuuper soft and it fits me perfectly. SOMEONE stuck it in the wrong place, probably hoping to come back to find it later.

But it’s mine! For $5. Amazon has a similar sweater, the same brand (Charter Club), for $129.

And when I’m at Lake Tahoe next week at school in the freezing cold…it will come in handy.

I also found this kind of amazing leather jacket. It has a vintage-y feel to me, although I don’t think it’s very old. Maybe 1990s? It fits me like a glove and I love the length–just to my hips. And it cost $10.

Something else that’s making the trip to school with me  to help make sure I don’t freeze to death.

I almost never find shoes that fit me and are in like-new condition at a thrift store. For one thing–I wear a size 11 or 12.

Actually that’s the only thing. There are always tons of cute shoes in smaller sizes.

So I was super excited to find these little soft-gold flats for $5. I’m pretty sure they’re just from Payless, but they fit me just right and are adorable with a little bit of sparkle that you can’t really see in the picture.

As many purses as there are in thrift stores, I don’t usually find any that I like well enough to bring home. I loved this one though. It’s a nice medium-sized leather bag that hits me just at the hip, which is perfect. I love the rich toffee color and the  leather is butter soft.

There’s no brand name anywhere, but it feels very well made. The kind of purse that gets better as you use it. It cost $10.

I found this pretty awesome, very vintage copy of The Courtship of Miles Standish and Other Poems by Wadsworth. It was published in 1900. And it cost me $2.  I couldn’t resist. The cover is quilted and gorgeous–and I know that at the turn of the LAST century, someone really cherished this beautiful volume.

My local SPCA thrift store has a  loft that they have set up as an ‘art gallery.’ I love taking a look up there. I found a  bunch of pieces this month.

Let’s start with this print by a French painter named Jean Crotti. It’s  a print of a drawing called The Infinite Staircase. It cost $2.

I absolutely could not resist these three little guys. Seriously. Those mustaches.  I love the graphic feeling of them. And the green frames. Everything about this trio makes me so happy. Including that they cost $5 each.

They’re designed by an artist named Nicole Thompson. The prints sell for about $27 each, unframed.

They’re big–24 inches by 18 inches. I’m 99 percent sure I’m going to  hang them over our bed.

Lastly, I saw this ship picture. Something about it made me pick it up and  take a closer look.  I probably wouldn’t have bought it. It’s just a print and not really my style.

But then I turned it over. And on the OTHER side, for  some reason, there was a paint-by-numbers horse. And that is definitely my style. I have  a small collection of mid-century paint-by-number pieces. There’s just something about them that appeals to me so much.

This little guy was  mine for $2.

 

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Italian Beef Sandwiches

December is a CRAZY month in my house.

Not only do we have the regular old holiday stuff–we have FOUR birthdays.  Two kids on the 8th and 12th, my husband Kevin on the 23rd, and then, bringing up the hind end, a family friend on the 28th.

I always make Albert a cake and a special dinner on December 28th.

This year, it’s Italian Beef Sandwiches.

I got a great deal on a tri-tip roast when I was buying our Christmas prime rib. I made some broth with the prime rib–um, ribs. And I bought some killer ale rolls from a local brewery/restaurant.

These sandwiches are  EPIC. The roast is cooked rare and then brined all day. You might be a little worried about soaking perfectly good roast beef in pickled pepper juice for six hours, but the flavor–O.M.G.

Just trust me.

So first things first–I braised the roast until it was 140 degrees in the center.

To do that, I seasoned the meat well with garlic powder, salt, and pepper, then put it in a big pot and covered it to about 3/4 with that homemade beef broth. (If you don’t have prime rib ribs laying around, that’s okay. Used boxed beef broth.)

I roasted the whole thing uncovered at 400 degrees. I started checking the temperature at 45 minutes. It took an hour and fifteen minutes for my five pound roast to reach 140 degrees.

You can either do this pre-roasting the night before or the morning of your sammy dinner. I did it the morning of–mostly because I forgot to take my roast out of the freezer in time to roast it the night before.

After your roast is at the 140 mark, take it out of the oven and put it on a cutting board. Cover it lightly–I used a clean bar cloth. You don’t want it to steam, so don’t cover tightly with anything that will hold in the heat.

Let it sit for an hour. Meanwhile, pour the left over broth in the pot through a fine mesh sieve into a bowl. Get rid of the solids in the sieve and save the broth.

Then take out your sharpest knife and slice it as thin as you can manage on the bias. Put the slices in a big lidded container. (This particular roast, being a tri-tip, was thick in the middle and pretty narrow on the ends. I wish I’d left it at 130, instead of going to 140. The middle was perfect, but the ends are a overdone. You want rare or medium rare here.)

Now–open three bottles of these babies.

Pour them in. Peppers, juice, and all.  Add the reserved broth. Your meat should be completely submerged. If it’s not, add more broth.

Then mix in about a cup of dry, Italian bread crumbs.

Give it a little mix, cover the container, and let it all sit and soak for at least six hours. The beef will finish cooking in the pickle-y broth. So good.

Pour the whole thing into a big pot and let it simmer over medium heat for 30 minutes.

There are two traditional toppings for an Italian Beef sandwich. One is grilled sweet peppers. The other is spicy pickled vegetables called giardiniera.

To grill the peppers, just cut them into pieces, toss with a little oil and salt and pepper, and add to a hot pan. I used a grill pan, but a large frying pan would work just as well. Cut into slices.

Now just put the sandwich together.

You want a sturdy roll. Slice it most of the way through, pile on the beef and top with peppers and pickled veggies. And, if you’re feeling adventurous, hold the sandwich with tongs and dip the entire thing into the broth in your pot.

I told you that you’ll want a sturdy roll!

Unfortunately, I got excited and took my picture before adding the pickled veggies. But still…look at this sandwich. So. Yum. Serve the little pickled peppers on the side.

And french fries. (Make frozen fries taste better by tossing them in one tablespoon of olive oil per 4 ounces of fries and spicing them up–I used garlic powder, salt, and pepper–before baking as directed.)

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2018 Goal #7: Be Financially Stable

In 2017, we were able to pay a bunch of it off. Ruby’s braces. A loan we took out in a moment of desperation three years ago. Some credit cards.

We’ve still got a few more of those cards that need attention. And a car loan.

But, I feel like this goal needs to be bigger than just paying off debt. It needs to be about becoming something I’ve NEVER been: financially stable.

Here’s what financially stable means to me:

  1. We STAY debt-free.
  2. We have a solid savings.
  3. We are planning for our retirement.
  4. We understand where our money is coming from and where it’s going.
  5. We aren’t dependent on each pay check to support our family.

Paying off debt is going to be the easiest part of this. Because I sold a book this summer, we have a chunk of money set aside for this purpose. It’s happening, except for the car loan, in January.

Harder is the goal of STAYING debt-free. So a big resolution for 2018 is to not go into more debt. No credit card usage. Period.

Most financial-guru type people suggest a savings of at least three months income. That sounds good to me. I’m a little embarrassed to admit (okay, a bunch embarrassed) that I don’t really know what that number is. But we’re going to figure it out.

Kevin’s parents are in their mid-70s. They live in our basement apartment. While it’s nice to have them here and I think it’s especially good for Ruby to have her grandparents here everyday, they aren’t here by choice. They can’t afford to live on their own because they did nothing to save for their retirement years.

I strongly STRONGLY don’t want that to happen to me in 30 years. In fact, if I had to pick one life goal it would be to not have to live in one of my kid’s basements because I can’t afford an apartment when I’m old.

So, while I don’t have the exact plan of action in my head yet, we’ll put some energy into figuring out a retirement plan in 2018.

Some energy in January will also go into figuring out just exactly what we spend every month. And also how much we have coming in, which can be chaotic because we have a bunch of income streams–and almost none of them are stable weekly or biweekly paychecks.

But for now, I’m going to say that at goal of saving $10,000 and paying off our car loan sounds solid. And doable, but not easy. Which is what a resolution should be, right?

We’re not going to become financially independent in one year. But, I think we can make big strides in stepping back from that edge where we’re one pay check or wrong step away from financial disaster.

Whew. That’s a lot. This is a big fat MAJOR resolution.

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2018 Goal #6: Make a Mandala Blanket

This year I decided that instead of starting and stopping a hundred projects that I never finish, I want to work on one big, spectacular crafty thing all year.

After a bunch of research, the winner is: a mandala blanket.

My Nana taught me to crochet when I was 10 years old.

I was feeling sad for some reason. My memory (after 35-ish years) is that I was feeling sorry for myself because my parents went out and didn’t take me with them. Nana, my great-grandma, was babysitting.

She taught me to make a crochet chain. I spent all night working on it and by the time my parents got home, I’d turned an entire ball of wool (or, probably, acrylic) into a ginormous chain that would have wrapped around my whole bedroom. Twice.

A mandala blanket is crocheted in the round…just around and around and around until it’s the right size. I love them when they’re a riot of colors and fancy stitches.

I found this crochet-a-long that is long over, but looks like it still attracts lots of crocheters–and the whole pattern is available for free online. It’s gorgeous. GORGEOUS.

And a huge commitment. Not only of time, but money as well. This thing is massive. Big enough to cover a big bed. Which means a LOT of yarn. And if I’m going to put this much work into it, I probably don’t want to use the cheapest cheapy yarn.

There are a ton of bloggers who have blogged their way through crocheting this exact blanket. Here’s a finished one from itsallinanutshell.com:

Told you. Gorgeous.

I love that the project is broken down into 18 parts. Supposed to be 18 weeks, but I’m giving myself a whole year, so if it takes 2 or 3 weeks for each section, that’s okay.

Step one: head over to Michael’s before school starts and get the first skeins I’ll need. Eight days at school, twelve hours of work a day–I figure crocheting might be a good way to unwind at the end of the day.

Maybe.

Maybe I’ll just need to sleep.

We’ll see!

 

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2018 Goal #5: Curate My Life

Please, please tell me I’m not the only one like this.

I crave order and minimalism and pretty spaces–but my life doesn’t reflect that AT ALL.

In fact, I think it’s a safe bet that the gap between what I want my my home to be and how it actually looks is the widest of any in my life. (Except maybe my desire to run an Ironman and my current lack of athleticism.)

My home reflects a lot of what’s going on inside it. It’s chaotic. My husband and I are squarely part of the sandwich generation. We live with our 13-year-old daughter, our 24-year-old son who has autism, AND Kevin’s parents who both have dementia.

Plus I work from home.

We have too much stuff. Clutter is drowning us. The idea of moving is daunting because . . . yeah, we’re talking a LOT of stuff. A whole lot.

My daughter, Adrienne, is an art history major at Boise State University and, as a result, I’ve been fascinated for a while by the idea of curation.

I have things that I love. Really, truly love.

Vintage things. Clothes that make my heart sing. Art. A whole collection of thrifted Le Creuset pots and pans. Things that I really, truly love.

And they’re totally overshadowed by things that need to GO.

My biggest project for this entire year is going to be that curation. Not just my house. My whole life. Hacking away at the junk to get to just the sweetest, best parts. The stuff I really wanted and need and crave and love.

It starts with a deep, deep decluttering.  I don’t want anything that I don’t adore. (And even utilitarian things can be things I adore, I’m convinced.)

I actually have a plan for this. I’ll be writing more about it soon.

Meantime, I have a mini pre-goal of getting my own personal spaces (my work area, my closet, my bathroom) gutted and cleaned and pretty. And decluttered.

Curated.

Stay tuned!

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2018 Goal #4: Treat Myself Like the Athlete I Want to be.

This goal is the hardest for me to write about. It started out as an old stand-by New Year’s Resolution. One that I’ve had, at some level, every year since I was 13 years old.

Lose weight.

True story, I’ve been stalled here for most of a week. Because weight is a touchy issue for me. And I have a hard, hard time making a goal that involves weight loss.

So, let’s start with a little history:

Two years ago I weighed 368 pounds and I was pretty miserable. I had undiagnosed arthritis in my hips that was causing so much pain, I’d started to honestly worry about my mobility. I needed a C-PAP machine to breathe in my sleep.

Then my mother-in-law was hospitalized and in nursing homes for most of a year due to an illness that was caused by her life-long habit of heavy smoking. As I was sitting with her one day, I thought to myself that if she’d only quit smoking when she was my age (in her 40s), she’d be healthy in her 70s.

And I had a serious light-bulb moment. If I wanted to be healthy and mobile and alive in my 70s, I needed to do something big. Now.

So, I had weight  loss surgery in July 2015.

That was a hard decision. Because I believed (and still believe) in body acceptance and health at every size. But I made it and in about six months I lost 120 pounds. I stopped losing weight and I’ve maintained that loss for 18 months.

So, that’s where I am now. The pain from my arthritis has dramatically decreased. I don’t have sleep apnea anymore. I feel better. And I’m not losing anymore weight as a direct result of my surgery.

And I have  this Big Fat Goal of finishing an Iron Man when I’m 48 (that’s two to three years.)

It’s so tempting to make ‘lose weight’ a goal for this year.  I mean, it feels comfortable. Like I said, I’ve had it as a New Year’s Resolution since I was in junior high school.

Even when I was deep into the body acceptance movement and would never have SAID out loud or even written down that my goal was to lose weight, the desire was there.

Even when I never would have pronounced that goal out loud or written it on any list.

It was always there.

But the truth is that my REAL goal is to treat my body in a way that supports my athletic goal. Athletes exercise regularly. They train their bodies. Athletes eat clean and healthy.

My goal for 2018 is to give my body the support it needs. To treat myself like the athlete I want to be.

Instead of having some big number in mind, I’m just  going to focus on reminding myself that being an athlete starts now. Eat clean. Exercise. Hydrate. And, as always, just see what happens.

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2018 Goal #3: Run a 5K

Wait. Wait.

Let me show you the whole, unfiltered, unadulterated picture I made that header pic from:

That’s me, age roughly 40. That’s the last time I really tried to run.

I got it  in my head that I could do this big, fat, juicy race they run every year in the Reno/Tahoe area. It’s called the Reno Tahoe  Odyssey and it’s a ginormous relay race. It starts in Reno, goes AROUND Lake Tahoe, and back to Reno.

Something like 52 million miles.

Or so.

Anyway. I had a friend organizing a team and she invited me and I was so excited to be invited to something athletic that I was like. . .YES!

Didn’t work.

But I did try to run for a while. Eventually the pain was too much and I realized I wasn’t going to be able to do the race. Quitting was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.

That was about five years ago.

I’ve lost 120 pounds since then.

I’ve been diagnosed with arthritis in my hips. (Which is why trying to run that far at that weight hurt THAT much.)

I haven’t run again, though. At. All.

I have this crazy-ass goal, you know. My mom died when she was 48 (of breast cancer.) I just turned 46 at the  end of October. My BFG (that’s Big Fat Goal) is to  finish an Iron Man when I’m 48.

It’s a 5 year plan. The first half was dedicated to getting healthy enough to start training. I’m there now. It’s time.

It’s time for me to start training for an Ironman.

Uh huh.

Forget Couch to Ironman. This is . . . i don’t even know. It’s 368 pounds, arthritic, miserable, nearly immobile to Ironman.

So, with a BFG that Big and Fat, the only thing to do is break it down. Not worry about the end, just do the next thing. Because if I think about training to finish an Ironman, I’ll panic and decide I just can’t do it.

I  just need to take it one step at a time.

I’m a good swimmer. I’m not ready to even think about riding a bike.

So, step one is running.

My goal for 2018 is simple: I want to be able to run a  5K.

By run I mean: not walk. I’m not looking to be an Olympian here. I just want to be able to finish a 5K without limping in last–after they’re already cleaning up the course.

(That’s happened to me. It sucked.)

My action plan is  simple,  too.

I’m just going  to start on day one of this Conservative Couch to 5K program after I get back from my residency on January 10 and follow it step-by-step for all seven months. 

I belong to a gym with a beautiful indoor track, so the cold is no excuse. I even get to go in the hot tub after.

That’ll take me  through to August 2018  or  so. After that, I’ll start building up  to a 10K, I  guess. Then a half marathon. Then a marathon. But before I get ahead of myself,  I’ll also start participating in 5Ks.

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2018 Goal #2: Sell Another Book

I’ve tweaked this a little from the original post.

In July 2017 I sold a book to MacMillan. (That MacMillan — the big old amazing publisher (!!!) You’ll be hearing more about this, I’m sure.) Not only did they buy the book I tried to sell them, they bought ANOTHER book, too, which I haven’t written yet.

So my original 2018 goal was to write that second book. Because A) I’ve already been paid for it and B) it’s contractually due in January 2019.

But as I started to write THIS post, I realized–meh.

I’m going to hit that goal, no matter what. I don’t need a boost. I’ve got a lot of outside support for finishing that book. Like I said, I’ve been paid for it. My career depends on it. I have an editor and an agent expecting it from me.

But I have this really big, over-arching life goal: I want to have a writing career, not just one or two books.

So my goal for 2018 is to sell another book. One I’m not already contracted for.

This isn’t my favorite type of goal, actually. Because I don’t have control over whether or not a publisher buys any of my work. My real goal should be to write a book I’m not contracted for.

And if I do that, I’ll consider my goal met.

But I also want to let the universe know that I’d really like to sell that book.

(Please and thank you.)

I’m not 100 percent sure what that book will be. I have a couple of projects at various levels of doneness that I might finish up and run past my agents. Or maybe I’ll be struck with a shiny new idea.

Here are my action steps for this goal for 2018:

  1. Write for 10 minutes everyday. This has been my daily goal for, oh, most of my adult life. It works really well for me. But, with a contracted book and enough income from writing THAT book that I don’t need a day job right now, I’m obviously writing way more than 10 minutes a day. So I’m going to add this as 10 minutes a day of writing toward this goal.
  2. Figure out what I’ve already got done. I have a few projects that are at different states of doneness, like I said. I need to get organized with those and evaluate them.
  3. Look at my new ideas. I have a whole notebook full of ideas for books I haven’t done any work on. I need to take a look at those and see if one of them is right for this goal.
  4. Start A Novel Idea on this new project. A Novel Idea is my method of writing. It works spectacularly well for me. I used it to write the book that I sold last summer. I know how to write a book. The key is to not try to skip steps.

 

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2018 Goal #1: Finish My MFA

 

Let me tell you about my education.

I didn’t go to kindergarten. I started first grade when I was almost six years old. I’ve been in school almost without stop for the forty years since.

I have roughly eleven million undergraduate credits. (Okay, maybe that’s an exaggeration. But not by much!)

See, I used to live in this teeny tiny rural Nevada town. The teeny tiny rural community college there partnered with the University of Nevada to offer  two undergraduate degrees. One in education and one in social work.

I got about 3/4 of  the way through both of them.

Here’s what happens at the 3/4 mark: you have to do an internship.

Here’s what happened to me, twice: I panicked.

I didn’t want to be a classroom teacher OR a social worker.

I wanted to be a writer. So I found a low residency Bachelor of Fine Arts in Writing at Goddard College and did two semesters of that.

Then we moved to Reno and I suddenly had access to a big fat state university. So I switched and started working toward a BA in English. Only some of my credits didn’t transfer over, so I had to take MORE courses.

So, I have a LOT of credits. Lots and lots and lots.

And no degree. For reasons.

A big reason is purely psychological. For my whole life being a school teacher has been my Plan B. If I can’t hack it as a writer, I’ll teach.

And if I have a degree? Well, I start to run out of reasons not to engage Plan B if Plan A isn’t feeding my kidlets.  So, I just keep writing, and I don’t put myself in  a situation where teaching in a classroom is a real option.

So I got within 9 credits of graduating and kind of stalled.

And then, about 18 months ago, I was offered something kind of special.

I was accepted into a Master of Fine Arts program. The school was starting a new concentration (Writing for Children and Young Adults) and I was a good fit–even without my undergraduate papers.

So, in January I’ll go to school for 8 days and start my fourth and final semester. As long as I get the work done, I’ll finish up and graduate with an MFA in August.

You know, as long as I don’t find a way to stall out at the finish line again.

I’ll write more about this some time soon, but I sold a book at the start of the last semester. So I don’t actually need my Plan B. That takes some of the self-impossed pressure off.

So, goal #1 for 2018 is to stay out of my own way and actually graduate.

So here are some action steps for meeting this goal:

  1. Show up to my residencies. (One in January to start my last semester, and the last one in August, where I’ll graduate.)
  2. Stay on top of my work. That means not waiting until the end of each month to get my packet work done. I’ll use my planner to help organize my time.
  3. Reach out to school friends when I’m feeling overwhelmed. (My instant response to school overwhelm is always: why am I doing this? I should drop out.)
  4. I have packets of work due once a month for the five months of the semester. I’ll work this week on coming up with some ideas for rewarding myself when I’ve turned them in.

P.S. Maybe when I’m done, I’ll see about those 9 credits and get my BA, too.  Who knows.