as imagined by Kaleya in a recent 1st grade class project 
In 2012, I started my year with approximately 800 messages in my inbox alone! That is a LOT of email. I would go through spurts throughout the year when I would try and reduce the number, but don’t think I did better than a few hundred.
Well, this year, I’m going to do much better. Thus, I began the process of cleaning up my inbox.
This meant:
- deleting email messages I no longer needed
- archiving email messages that had labels but were still in my inbox
- applying labels to emails + archiving them
- putting my “To Do” label to use and archiving those messages
In less than a month, I was able to reduce my inbox from 800+ messages to around 30. I am pleased to report that for the past two weeks, I’ve been able to maintain around 30 messages in my inbox on average. The ones that are there, are ones that I REALLY need to address and don’t want to lose sight. It also helps that I’ve been using an application called “The Other Inbox” to help move messages out of my inbox and into a separate folder. Now, when I check my email, I check my regular inbox, then I check my “Other” Inbox. It really helps!
Aren’t you proud of me?
Over the next few months, I want to continue decluttering and plan to do the following:
- organize my Google Docs account
- whittle my “To Do” list emails down from 400 (this may take awhile….)
- transition to cleaning up my email address that I use for the NCGenWeb Project – I have about 300 emails in that inbox.
Progress report in a few more months. Meanwhile, this does not help the fact that my gmail account is 94% full!
But not for a medical emergency. :-)
Last night, we attended an event hosted by the Autism Society of Middle Tennessee – their Summer Opportunities Fair. My youngest stepson, Q, is autistic and we are trying to make sure we stay aware of what resources are available for him. Though he does not live with us, we want to be prepared for summertime visits. Let me tell you, this fair was AMAZING! I’ve already known that we have access to a plethora of services for him, but to be able to personally interact with representatives from all the agencies, non-profits, services, etc. that attended last night was so incredibly valuable.
Being that it was at the Children’s Hospital, Kaleya couldn’t pass up the opportunity to play on their outside statues.
Kaleya and a family friend
The grand staircase in the hospital is lovely.
kids on the staircase
Kaleya also loves the Butterfly Garden
Kaleya at the Butterfly Garden
And, then we say a cool Gingerbread Town – a holiday initiative done at the hospital.
GingerTown
Kaleya kept saying she wanted to eat it.
The Fair itself was held in the Theatre Room in the Children’s Hospital and the event was hosted by the Autism Society of Middle Tennessee and the Junior League Family Resource Center of the Children’s Hospital. There were many, many places represented and I couldn’t even begin to list them all. Kalonji and I spoke to all but one of them I think! Among the attendees were representatives from camps, art programs, music therapy agencies, applied behavioral analysis therapies, various recreation activities, and research options. Kalonji collected every business card he could find – he is planning to volunteer with a few, and it is always good for him to have contact information for his work in our community.
not the best pic, but some of the material we picked up
Thank you to the hosts for a great & educational evening!
New year, new look!
Updated the website today to use a new theme. The old one used the theme New Balance of Blue and my header image had pictures of the kids from about 4 years ago.
The new on uses a theme called Picolight and I updated our family images. I added Social Media stream icons for Kalonji and I, along with a graphic for our Family Genealogy and for Kalonji’s store.
I’m quite pleased with the change.
Over the past several weeks I have been experiencing the urge to cross-stitch again. This past weekend, I finally acted on it. Of course I did not choose the logical route and pick back up some of my multitude of Works in Progress — oh now– that’s too boring.
Instead, I decided to go to Barnes & Noble, browse their cross-stitch magazines, and see if anything appealed to me. Leave it up to my favorite stitching magazine, Cross Stitch Gold, to delight. It was the first magazine I picked up and lo and behold, what was on the cover? A geisha!
In case you didn’t know, I love geishas. This design is called Dance of the Butterflies and is created by Lesley Teare. The stitch count is 140w x 166h and the finished design size will be 10 x 12 inches. I was originally going for something smaller, but I could not pass this up. Too much geisha love in my heart.
So.. after working it over the weekend, here is my 1st progress picture.
Instead of black fabric, I elected to do mine on Tea colored fabric. I am not a fan of stitching on black and I wanted something other than white. The Monaco is one of my 2nd-favorite fabric to stitch on (Lugana is first choice) , but it was all Hobby Lobby had in stock.
I’ll try to remember to post another update in a month. The plan is to work on this only for awhile, at least until I feel I am back in the swing of it. Of course, I’ll have to fit it in between my genealogy time, but this is such a great pasttime when watching television. Show of choice this weekend was the BBC Poirot series. I am a fan of the Hercule Poirot stories and have never seen them. Season 1 is free on-demand for Amazon Prime members and I took full advantage of that!
This weekend we’ve had some fun as a family – but not too much. There’s something said about just relaxing and enjoying peace and quiet at home.
On Saturday we went to a friend’s house for her annual holiday party for the families of kids she has kept over the years. She was Kaleya’s care provider for three years until Kaleya started school.
I have to say, she had the most awesome GingerBread House ever – they decorated up their TV cabinet
the most awesome Ginger Bread House
Kaleya & friend inside the Ginger Bread House
Orange candles we made before the party - that was fun!
with all her kiddos!
Then, today, we took a visit to the Frist Center for Visual Arts to see their Egyptian Treasures exhibit. The exhibit was well done too – lots of interesting artifacts from Egypt. There were some features I particularly liked – being able to download the audio tour, short movies throughout the gallery, and more — they helped give it a nice touch. The exhibit will be there until January 8th, so if you’re local to the area you still have time to visit.
outside the Frist
beautiful coffin on display
kiddos out back
Kaleya
Now, unfortunately, it’s time to wind down and prepare for the week. At least it is a short one.
Our Kindle Fire arrived a couple of weeks ago soon after it was released and so far, so good! It is such a cute device!
The Kindle Fire launched to much hype and for us it has very much lived up to it’s reputation. As with all things technological, whether or not you like it really depends on personal preference. But, we like it, use it daily, and I predict at least one more in our near future.
What I really like:
- the size – it’s smaller than an iPad; bigger than my smartphone. I think this is a perfect in-between size. It can be held with one hand or two, and though a little on the heavy side, I got used to the weight quickly.
- access to Amazon digital content – nuff said! We are Amazon Prime members and thus are able to take advantage of the movies and shows provided as part of that membership.
- Kindle — of course you can read the Kindle books. Having another device to read them on is handy. I have been reading Kindle books for a couple of years now so now I have a perfect-sized screen to do it on
- no fear in letting the kids play with it – it’s right up their alley too. Can you say Angry Birds?
And, of course I can access most of the Android apps I am used to – making it easy to keep up with my social media accounts and such.
What I don’t like?
- not having a native app for gmail. But, you know what? I have that on my phone anyway, so I can deal.
We traveled with it over the Thanksgiving holiday and it is great for on-the-go. The Kindle Fire is just too handy to pass up! I’m so glad we have one.
Earlier this summer, I received notification from Verizon that I was eligible for a discount on a phone upgrade. I decided to wait since I was not exactly sure what I wanted. Well, yesterday I went ahead and went in and did the upgrade and life is sweet for I have a Droid again! And not just an “Android” droid, but a Droid droid — I got the brand new Droid Razr.
Sweetness!! There are all kinds of goodies about this phone:
- it is the thinnest smartphone on the market. I kid you not, this thing is thin!
- a camera on the front of the phone (1.3 megapixel) and on the back (8 megapixel & 1080 HD video)
- 4G – so I am finally on the 4G network
- multitasking! i can be on the phone and on the internet at the same time
- 4.3 inch screen – nice and big
- a dual-core 1.2. GHz processor -stuff runs fast on it
- currently runs the Gingerbread OS, but will get upgraded to Ice Cream Sandwich in 2012.
- has an HDMI jack so when we do get a new TV next year, I’ll be able to port my phone to it
My 1st smartphone was the original Droid, which I got in November 2009 on the day it came out. In Sept 2010, I got the hubby and I matching Samsung Fascinates. I am so pleased to have another Droid though — there is just something cool about hearing that “Droid” sound play with new notifications; besides, the kids get a kick out of it too
Today the kids are off trunk-or-treating with a family friend. I am loving their outfits this year. Kaleya continues her Monster High obsession and is dressed up like the character Frankie Stein. Jihad is a Night Stalker and a very scary one at that! Their friend is Mario of Super Mario Brothers.
Today is Kaleya’s 7th birthday and we’ve had an incredible day of it. We are so thankful for our friends that came out today to help us celebrate and I know Kaleya thoroughly enjoyed it. The weather was absolutely beautiful and could not have been more perfect.
Kaleya has been into Monster High recently, so we had a Monster High themed bday party. Monster High is a collection of dolls with characters depicted as the children of famous monsters (e.g. Dracula, Frankenstein, etc.).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monster_High
We let the kids play outside for about an hour before having food and cake. They blew bubbles, played jump rope, chased each other — all the things that kids do.
After playing, the kids came inside for some snacks and then cake & ice cream.
The cake itself was a Monster High cake and Kaleya specifically wanted the piece that had Frankie’s face. (Frankie is the daughter of Frankenstein and Kaleya is going to dress like her for Halloween this year).
We also had a piñata to open. Jihad was nice enough to stand on a chair and hold it while the kids took turn pulling one of the strings to see if they would get the one string that would open it. Kaleya went first, but she didn’t get the right string. Several kids later – it was found and boy did they scramble to get their treats.
Awesome does not even describe how much fun it was to watch them. Shortly after, the kids begin to leave. Thank you all so much for coming to spend the time with us and Kaleya. What a great birthday!
Of course I have even more pictures than what I’ve shared in this post. You can find them here.
