To Be a Writer

Well, everyone, I'm back! It's been awhile, but I have decided to bring back my personal blog and start writing again! HOORAY! I know you're excited. Try to contain your joy. ;-)

For those of you who know me, you know one of my life goals is to become a writer. Several people have asked me "Well, Kim, what is it you want to write?" And my answer is complicated - EVERYTHING! I would love to write children's books, fiction, nonfiction, research....I just want to write.

Right now I am getting my Master's in Education with a focus on Language and Literacy. I have taken several courses on teaching writing, but in all of them, there was a great emphasis on the teacher's writing life. In order to teach writing well, we must be writers too. That's not to say every teacher needs to be a published writer! It's just important for teachers to go through the writing process with their students: writing in a writer's notebook, coming up with ideas, collecting entries, drafting, revising, editing, sharing. In two of my courses I had to write several of my own pieces and I absolutely loved it! In one class I wrote about several of my family members, sort of like mini-biographies. When I was done, I bound it together and gave it to my parents as a present. In my most recent course, I wrote a memoir about my time as a swimmer and a short fiction story about a brother-sister relationship.

I'm addicted to writing! And I love it!

I really want to continue working on my own writing and I thought a wonderful way to do that was to get back into the habit of blogging. I hope you all will come along for the ride!

De-Clutter!

OK, Spring is in the air and it's time for some Spring Cleaning. Even though I live in a small, one-bedroom apartment, I am DISGUSTED with the amount of stuff I have. I need to simplify and organize so that's my goal this month. I've planned out what I want to work on each week:

Week 1: Closet/Get rid of clothes

Week 2: Bedroom/Under the bed!

Week 3: Living Room

Week 4: Kitchen

I've gone through most of my closet and have gotten rid of three big bags of clothes! If you know me, I LOOOOOVE shopping for clothes so I have plenty to get rid of.

Wish me luck for the rest of the month...I'm going to need it! :)

SLEEP!

Well, February was an interesting month....although I didn't achieve my goal of completing the Daniel Fast, I feel like I am eating a little better. I have actually given up meat for Lent and I'm really enjoying it. Who knows...maybe I'll stick with it after Easter! HAH! Not likely...but you never know.

I feel very proud of myself in the fitness department. I have continued to work out 3 times a week and after completing the 5K a month ago, I am beginning to like running! Who knew??? I have been running 2 to 3 miles at a time and it's actually do-able for me. I'm training for a 10K at the end of the month...I'm super nervous but excited!

This month is all about sleep. I DESPERATELY need to work on this. I'm in the bad habit of staying up late watching TV instead of getting a good night's rest. My goal this month is to be in bed by 10:30 on school nights. Perhaps it will be easier to get up in the morning! :)

Epic Fail

Well, the Daniel Fast Take 2 was an epic fail. The first week or so I did pretty well, but once Valentine's festivities hit I was a goner! GEEZ! However, this whole experience has shown me that SWEETS is once again, what I will be giving up for Lent. I am also going to try giving up meat because I really enjoyed trying vegetarian dishes this month. I'm going to allow myself to have fish though.

There is some good news in February though! My desire to stay more active has continued from January! I have been running a lot and even ran in a 5K early in February with my best friend, Sarah and my twin, Lesley (twin as in we both have the same BIG in our sorority...not actual twin sister haha...I WISH THOUGH!) I ran (well...jogged actually) the whole thing and I was so proud of myself. I enjoyed it SO MUCH that I went crazy and signed up for a 10K at the end of March. I have NEVER run that far in my life so it should be interesting. However, I ran 2 miles this morning and actually ENJOYED IT....usually I'm dying after 5 minutes of running.

Well, hopefully Lent will go better than Food Month did. I also wanted to add something during Lent this year and I've decided to add schedule, intentional prayer time. I'm going to start with 5-10 minutes a day and hopefully work up to 30-40 minutes. Very excited! :)

Daniel Fast - Take 2

Well, I'm a week into my month of food focus and it's going....alright. I decided to attempt the Daniel Fast again. I won't go into the details since I already blogged about it (you can check that out here if you are interested) but basically it's 3 weeks of eating only vegetables, fruit, brown rice, beans, nuts and only drinking water. Now, I have "pretty much" done this for the past 6 days. I cheated a bit this weekend since I finished the Cupid's Chase 5K in Georgetown and I wanted to celebrate at my favorite breakfast spot, Monument Cafe.

I have cheated a bit with dairy and sweets, but I have not had meat since last Tuesday. It's amazing how hard it is to take things out of your diet, but I'm finding it a little easier than last time. However, I feel like this time it's been a much greater mental battle than I remember. It's amazing how much food overtakes your mind and it's all you can think about. I tried to study in Starbucks yesterday and I had to leave basically because I wanted to knock the girl out next to me who had a tasty looking drink and a bagel with cream cheese. Not cool, Kim.

I'm hoping to learn balance through all of this. I want to be able to eat the things I love, but as my mother loves to say, "not in excess." That's my problem with food; I get something I love (example: a box of oreos) but instead of eating a small portion, I end up eating most of it in one sitting. I'm not even hungry at that point. And I always feel horrible afterwards.

One of my best friends Allison sent me a text the other day with this verse -

"Do not labor for the food that perishes but for the food that endures to eternal life, that the Son of Man will give you." John 6:27

This is what I want my focus to be this month. Actually, my focus for the rest of my life. :)

Fitness Month

Well, I believe I have started the year off right! Fitness month has gone better than I expected. :) I met my goal of exercising at least 4 times a week. The first couple of weeks it was only for 15-20 minutes, but I'm slowly working up to 30-45 minutes. The first few weeks I did exercise programs with an online program called bodyrock. It's really tough, but I have a hard time motivating myself so I felt like I wasn't working very hard. I also did a couple yoga routines with Jillian Michaels. They were hard but fun! I think I will continue to do workouts with her. I need someone telling me what to do...even if they are on the TV. ;-)

I've also been walking and running again. Saturday I am doing a 5K in good 'ol Gtown! I've been running the last few days so hopefully I won't die on Saturday! :) I ran 2.15 miles last Saturday, 2.4 miles today and I'm hoping to run 3 miles on Wednesday. Hopefully the 3.3 miles on Saturday will happen. :)

Of course, my FAVORITE exercise activity was brushing up on my MJ moves. My favorite Christmas present by far was my Wii MJ Experience game. 30 minutes of dancing to this and I was exhausted, but it felt so good. :)

I'm glad to have gotten into the habit of working out and I'm hoping to continue this throughout 2012. The only downside to this month is I have not lost any weight. In fact I have gained 2 pounds. :( BUT February is food month so I'm hoping to turn that around.

Stay tuned for Food February! :)

So long, 2011! Hello 2012!

I can hardly believe it, but 2012 has arrived! 2011 was a very hard year for my family so I'm hoping 2012 will bring a lot of peace and comfort to us. 2011 did show me, once again, how truly amazing my family is and the strength of each person in it. I look forward to growing closer to my amazing family in 2012!

Now, I know some people aren't big fans of New Year's resolutions, but I AM! :) I love getting a chance to start over and look forward to the year ahead. Yes, most of the time I don't "achieve" the goals I set, but I think the process and journey is more important than the actual achievement. This year I wanted to do something different though - kind of a combination of what I did with the Spiritual disciplines (working on one a month) and what Gretchen Rubin did in her book The Happiness Project. I'm going to take 12 resolutions and focus on one each month of the year. My goal is not to "master" each resolution, but focus on it and hopefully create a lifestyle change in myself. Of course, I hope to achieve the lose 25 pounds goal, but we'll see what happens. ;-)

I have three main goals: Get Healthy. Get Creative. Seek God, and not the world. After my best friend got married in August of last year, I moved into an apartment by myself. I absolutely LOVE it, but it was also incredibly difficult. I missed her like crazy and I just missed having someone there when I got home. Plus, it helped me be accountable in my eating habits (I gained about 20 pounds from August until now). I can't rely on someone else to keep myself healthy and happy so I'm really trying to learn better habits this year. I'm excited to get started! Here are my 12 goals:

Jan - Fitness - I want to exercise regularly, at least 4 times a week.

Feb - Food - I want to eat healthy foods and lose 25 pounds in 2012.

Mar - Sleep - I want to have a regular sleep pattern and get 7-8 hours each night.

Apr - De-Clutter - I want to remove all the excess clutter from my apartment.

May - Nature - I want to spend more time outside and GET OFF THE COUCH!

June - Media Fast - I want to take time away from the TV, Computer, iphone and spend more time in books, prayer and with God.

July - Cooking - I want to cook more for myself, at least 3-4 times a week.

Aug - Shopping Fast - I want to stop shopping for things I don't need and use that money more wisely.

Sept - Crafts - I want to explore my creative side and get crafty! (Hello pinterest!)

Oct - Music - I want to get back into playing piano and guitar. (my keyboard is mighty dusty!)

Nov - Writing - I want to journal every day and write a novel for NaNoWriMo.

Dec - Books - I want to read 100 books in 2012 (this will be an on-going goal, not just for Dec.).

I'm looking forward to what 2012 brings! Happy New Year everyone!!