Flotsam and Jetsam of My Life

Here are a few trivial thoughts on what I've been doing this week:

--I've had three cans of beef sitting on my shelf for about a month but had no idea what to do with it. As we all know, I am not the most accomplished or intuitive cook. When I was making room on my canned goods shelf, I took a look at the labeling and it said that it could be used in spaghetti sauce. I gave it a try this evening and it worked better than I thought. The consistency is halfway between ground beef and minced beef. It would probably work pretty well in a soup, too. I'm just glad that I have a use for the other two cans.

--For once, ABM and I are almost on the same page when it comes to the house. Even though I am still not doing as much housework as HE thinks I should be doing, we are both in the mood to simplify our surroundings. While I've been purging and paring down our possessions, ABM has been renovating our bedroom. He replaced the computer desk and entertainment tower in our bedroom with more compact versions and mounted the TV on the wall. The bookshelf hutches on our bedside tables were separate pieces; he widened them, attached them permanently, and painted them black. He replaced 95% of the carpet in the house with laminate wood flooring. He even built a tall cabinet for the corner near my ensuite bathroom to house my purse and my knitting projects. There is work like this going on throughout the house.

All these changes make me feel as though I will be able to stay on top of housecleaning, even with the added challenge of fatigue. I've gotten rid of stuff that I don't need, the new furniture gives me specific spots for what I am keeping, and the smaller size of the desks gives me less space for junk to pile up. The floors in particular are a major improvement. No matter how careful we are, this family kills vacuum cleaners. We got to the point where we were slow to replace a dead vacuum cleaner because we knew that the next one was only going to last for a month. Now, I can grab a broom and sweep the whole house in no time.

--I got over my fear of spending money long enough to add a few new pieces to my wardrobe. ABM is not crazy with the amount of money I am spending on individual pieces because he focuses on quantity over quality when he buys clothes. To his credit, he is trying to adjust to the fact that I would rather buy pieces I love even if it means I have to wait a while between purchases. I think he is just sick of how shabby my wardrobe has gotten! Since I haven't bought much clothing over the past five years, I feel like I am rebuilding my closet from scratch. I've purchased bras, underwear, a pair of jeans, a pair of brown linen pants, a basic white button-down shirt, and a few t-shirts. Add those to the new sweats that ABM bought me for Christmas, and I'm feeling better about my appearance than I've felt for a while.