Hope your first week into the New Year was great! Mine was hard to get back into work and the daily routine after the 11 days of staycation over the holidays. I had so many lofty ideas of how my new 2024 routine was going to go and all the things I would get accomplished each day this week.

I don’t know why I do that. I am starting this 2024 back to basics since Wednesday. I really feel like I need to get the basics down each day and in my routine before I can add to it. I just want to get things done a little at a time and keep working towards finishing the tasks in 10 to 15 min increments.

What am I doing that is back to basics? Fly lady we are working on shining our sinks and getting a little done each day. I want to long arm so I spent some time loading a quilt and it was really physically tiring. I am in a beginners sew along and I want to make each block accurately with preserved points and I succeeded in the first block! The cross stitch along part is also little quilt blocks and I am experimenting with using up stash floss and my hand dyed aida cloth.

Exercise is basics. A workout or two in the gym and the rest are doing senior exercises with youtubers Yes2next. I have the PT exercises that I can do also.

I am also tidying up the sewing room and following Karen Brown’s prompts for the sewing room declutter. Has been easy this year because I was so brutal in diving deep on the neglected space last year.

Back to basics also means keeping it simple. I don’t need to be making things super complicated to get through the week. I am building in some rest, journaling and meditation.

Because I want to try to get a few more things done vs. what I have been able to do over the past year, I am looking at what I need to give up. I am scaling back on social media. I unfollowed most accounts that are selling me something. I am growing weary of it in general and creating content isn’t fun anymore. I remember why I even signed up for social media and that was to keep in touch with people. Not have it all be ads and selling me stuff. I am going to keep my accounts, but I am not going to create as much content… maybe weekly instead of daily. I am going to keep blogging here weekly and doing the podcast. I want to do less ”doom scrolling” on the internet also.

One thing I want to add to do instead of doom scrolling on the phone is listen to more podcasts. Listen to audiobooks. I decided I want to read/listen to books that are on the recommended 100 books to read before you die list on Google. I am going to read a book from the list that I have never read this year. I checked out Pride and Prejudice from the library. I listened to the intro so far.

That said I was very tired this week with work, exercise and chores. I got things done and then was exhausted by Thursday. I am going to be home and resting up this weekend to recover! Cleaning up. Quilting. Stitching. Tidying up and watching a football game on Sunday and the College Nation championship game on Monday. Sound boring? You bet but it is back to basics and get it down before the busyness of the spring and summer month.

The new year is young and I want to grow it with a good solid foundation.

How was your start to the year?

Vicki