Monday Message

Me in the apron my dear friend Liza made for me.

"As we have been continuously counseled for more than 60 years, let us have some food set aside that would sustain us for a time in case of need. But let us not panic nor go to extremes. Let us be prudent in every respect. And, above all, my brothers and sisters, let us move forward with faith in the Living God and His Beloved Son" (Gordon B. Hinckley, in Conference Report, Oct. 2001, 89; or Ensign, Nov. 2001, 73).

This message comes out after Christmas hoping that you were able to have quality family time and that you got to have time to reflect on Jesus.

In a few days it will be a new year. Have you taken a few minutes to think about what you want to accomplish this year??

If not, grab a pen and paper and sit down with me. Get a cup of hot cocoa and go through this Monday Message.

 Make a list of your skills…

See, you have lots you don’t think about! Pat yourself on the back, you are doing great!

I am not one who makes an impossible to-do list without a plan B. My plan B is that what I don’t get done just remains on my list. I think life has stress enough without my causing impossibly tight deadlines then feel rotten about myself for not getting it done.

So set goals work towards them but don’t beat yourself with them!

I have been asked to sew a pretty white dress for my granddaughter’s baptism… this will be in March. Up to this point I have collected the items together to accomplish this.

I have Fibromyalgia which is very painful and causes much fatigue as well. Before I got this I was energetic, could do things in one hour with what now takes me three days. How I explain this to those who just get this diagnoses is… you have a bowl with ten marbles in it, you cannot save the ten marbles. When your ten marbles are gone your done, you cannot borrow from tomorrow's ten marbles. The marbles represent your energy - so getting up, showered and dressed, fixing breakfast, takes three marbles. Now you have seven left. Think about a regular day of laundry, cleaning, cooking, doctor appointments, errands, etc. You have seven marbles to ration for the rest of the day…how do you do that?? 

Break down the tasks into steps. Someone without fibro will say, "I have to run and get groceries"… and they might even want to have them done by a certain time. A fibro person has to think of the marbles… I have to get in the car -ouch- I have to drive to store -ouch- get out of car -ouch- walk through the really big store -ouch- then there are heavy things like a bag of flour or sugar or gallon of milk or laundry soap. If you are wise you went to a store that unloads from the cart then bags and carries and puts them in your car. Then drive again but this time you are huge ouch, get out of car -ouch worse- then carry in groceries, even with help it hurts, then to put things away. By this time all my marbles are gone but I press on and fix supper.

How do you do this? For me, if I can I try to plan and only go once a month, I plan an easy supper and usually easy meals the next day since I will pay with pain for the overdoing or big projects. I used to do things fast and many things I can hardly remember but I helped build the addition. I know more than I wanted to about construction. I helped shingles. I remember going to sleep at night and waking up ready to go get big projects done… Now part of this is not sleeping all night and waking more tired than when I went to bed. Big projects like helping clean the church is four days of big pain. I have to plan for these events, rest before and have meals ready for those days. Planting a garden is way worse... we are talking weeks.

I am only telling this to you so that you think about when you write down your goals, break them into steps. Nothing is that huge when you break it down into steps, it is more likely to get accomplished.

I was a busy lady for sure before getting this, overdoing did not play a part. I was healthy, was walking miles every day. Things just happen and we can fight and be angry or just adapt so you can live with it but do so with joy.

So look over your list.

On my ongoing list I have that I want to learn more on weaving, so I have to be realistic. I cannot learn in a month, in fact, not a year…so I break it down.
  
Classes cost too much and not in my budget, if that was not an issue the fibro would be, sooooo my plan is…

Read all I can in my books and on the internet.

Break it down. I would need to refresh how to warp a jack floor loom, I will need to refresh using warping board. I need to learn how to set up for different weaves. Suffice it there is a long list. But I think you see what I am saying.

A huge deal is to be FLEXIBLE. Life is happening always, we get sick, our kids get sick, things come up, service is needed to help others, new family additions, job loss,... things get in the way of our goals, we need to accept that and not let our goals stress us out.

Mind you probably no one reading this has weaving as a goal but whatever your goal is, break it down.

Back to the white dress, everything is gathered. Step two, cut it out. Step three, is sew when I can. I have allowed a couple months so if I get sick I can accomplish this. So with fibro my immune system is bad so when I get sick it is awhile to climb out.

So write your goal then break it into steps just like I told you I have to do to get groceries. Don’t make this a race, make it fun.

Budgets are this way as well. Set your goals for your budget and steps you will take to stay in it.

I remember long ago I read how a family planned on getting out of debt. They made a dark cloud out of paper and wrote a debt like car or master card on the cloud. Then they made a cloud for each debt. They cut out a house and put this house up to represent them and put the clouds above the house each time they got rid of a debt they threw out the cloud this was a helpful tool. I like to think now there are no clouds over that house.

Things we can do to help stay within our budgets…

Eat in and not out. This is easy for me. I have gotten food poisoning twice from eating out so I would much rather eat in where I am in charge of my own safety, but I do understand being tired. But when you're trying to cut bills this can add up fast.

If your food budget is not very much look for ways to stretch your food dollars. Go through your recipe file and get out your most frugal recipes. If they are in your file you probably like them.

A huge $ stretcher is cooking from scratch. Yes, it is easier to buy ready made but with prices as high as they are cooking from scratch should be everyone's goal.

Here again, break it down. I find mixing the dry ingredients together when doing supper clean up helps me. In the morning just add wet ingredients and bake like muffins. If you buy a muffin mix you still have to add wet ingredients and by breaking it down helps. Okay, finding your muffin recipe might be challenging. I have to break down things so I have my breakfast recipes like muffins, pancakes, scones and such on recipe cards and hooked together with book rings. You could use yarn if you don’t have the rings. I have them on a nail by the stove. I have another with one-pot meals like homemade hamburger helper all done in one pot. I also have my go-to binder which has my favorite English muffin bread, my favorite hot cocoa mix, recipe for white sauce... things I do all the time. So break it down, even setting those up to help me I broke them down.

A great place to get from scratch recipes is our Relief Society cookbook - http://www.dickshook.com/Cookbook/Recipe%20book%202015.pdf

I know you are thinking well she has to break it down and yes, I do, but slow and steady wins the race, right? Just think how better you could do it without fibro…lucky you are.

They don’t have to be pinterest award winning if you don’t have the time but better than a snicker bar for saving time and money.

Okay, I would still like the snicker bar as well... :p

These are just a few things and ideas to get you started. I know you can do it.

Probably more than you wanted to know about me but now you know how to break things down.

Food storage is the same, break it down. You might not be able to do a lot but what you can do adds up fast.

For us, I noticed that we will need to make a purchase in January for powdered milk from the storehouse. For us it has to be a planned purchase of fifty lbs or as close to that as we can get, and will have to plan on going to Omaha to pick up.

We use powdered milk for everything, so you see this is a big purchase and has to be planned.

So break down and get as you can.

This is a different blog just us vising over a hot cocoa. :)

The picture on top is me in the Christmas apron my friend liza made me.

Lets plan for a great new year!