I am doing neither of these things, unfortunately.

With both of my son’s birthdays, my nephews birthday, Father’s Day (in Australia) and eight baby gifts to buy, I am definitely not spending less these days.

We have also been rehabbing our mudroom from a utility room to more of a proper mud room/entry area, since this is how we usually enter our house.   Not sure why we never thought of it before.  Will post photos when we are done.

Also have my sister-in-law and her friend coming this weekend from Australia, so have been buying extra food and beer.

So, also not much time to post the items I have to sell on Craiglist either.  Will do all of this in a couple of weeks after the birthday parties are done and the guests have left.

However, I’m having a great time reading about all of you who did a fabulous job during Musing of a Midlife Mom’s Spend Less Month and are doing great during High Class, Low Income’s No Spend Month, and earning more during Money Funk’s September’s Earn More Challenge.

Both the posts and comments from the participants have all sorts of great ideas.  All of which I will have to re-read in a couple of weeks in order to starting making up for lost time…er, money, over the past couple of months!

I have about 30 blog posts that I have started and not finished.  I can’t get any focus.  I am super scattered these days.  Not sure why, really.  Can’t focus on anything in order to follow through and haven’t been sleeping very well.

I have a few things going on, but not any more than usual.  I feel I’m getting a handle (slowly, but surely) on the clutter in my house (took another trip to Goodwill over the weekend, woo hoo!).

I’m pretty sure I need to start walking/running.  When I get really overwhelmed in my head, exercise is the only thing that works to clear it.  I used to be a regular exerciser before I had children…I’m sure you’ve heard (or experienced that one before).

Here are some other things I’ve thought about doing…

1.  Cutting down on caffeine (not sure I can do it!)

2.  Cutting down on alcohol (see above comment…ditto)

3.  Going on a long weekend somewhere to get away (this will have to be after my sis-in-law’s visit…she’s coming from Australia on Friday!)

4.  Putting all my ‘to do’ stuff in the basement and dealing with it later so it’s not staring me in the face all the time since I don’t have time to deal with it right now.

5.  Powering through my ‘to do’ stuff so it’s done…but again, not sure when I would do this?  I mean, I do require some sleep.

What kinds of things work to clear the clutter from your head so you can refocus?

I love to read fiction before I go to bed at night.  It (usually) settles my brain and helps to stop me from thinking about my ‘to do’ list that is always in the back of my mind.

I’ve been going through some books fairly quickly lately and thought I’d share what I’ve been reading.

The Twilight Saga by Stephanie Meyer - I finished these four books in two weeks.  I couldn’t put them down and read whenever I had a chance.  VERY good series.  I have a friend who let her 10 year old read them, which I wholeheartedly disagree with.  Although it’s considered young adult (of which a 10 year old is far from being, I don’t care how advance her reading level is), it has some very adult themes in it in terms of relationships.   No sex, but still relationship stuff that you really don’t get until you’ve been in a few.

The Undomestic Goddess and Can You Keep A Secret by Sophie Kinsella (author of Confessions of a Shopoholic) – both of these were pretty good, if you like chick lit.  The kind that doesn’t require or inspire a lot of thought.  I definitely like those every now and then for a bit of escapism.  I liked The Undomestic Goddess better.

I started reading The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith and frankly just couldn’t get into it.  I got it at the used book store as the owner told me a lot of patrons said it was funny.  I will probably give it another go soon.  Apparently there is an HBO series based on it.  Does anyone watch it?  We don’t have HBO.

I’m currently reading This Charming Man by Marian Keyes.  More chick lit.  And I’ve read a lot of Marian Keyes and have liked her books for the most part.  This one is not really doing it for me though.   I might chug along a little longer, but I might give up on it and go for something else.

I have The Geography of Bliss by Eric Weiner on hold at the library.  It looks to be pretty interesting, but I do like to stick to fiction at night time.  But, I’ve heard this one is pretty good and I break my rules for good documentary type books.

What are you reading these days?  I’m always looking for a new good book!

My blog is a secret.   One of the reasons that I keep it a secret is that none of my friends really read blogs.  I think they will think that’s it’s weird and a waste of time.

One friend of mine made a comment regarding blogs that I’ve been thinking a lot about lately.  It pops into my mind every now and then and I keep turning it over and over in my mind.

“I’m too busy living my life to then go home and write about it”.

Now, she was not saying this to be condescending at all.  She is an extremely active, single person.  One of the busiest I know, in fact.  Busy in the sense that she works a lot, she has a ton of friends, and she is always involved in some project or festival or event or whatever that is going at the moment.

But, her comment got me to thinking.  Thinking about all the projects I want to tackle and the photography class I want to take and how I want to get back into making jewelry and all sorts of other things that have been on my ‘to do’ list for ages (like sewing…it’s been a new year’s resolution going on so many years that I finally dropped it this year).

So, I’ve been thinking…..am I trading doing for writing about what I want to do?

Maybe I spend too much time reading blogs…and why do I do this?  Is my own life not exciting enough?  Why am I not taking enough time to spend with the friends I have in my own backyard?  What is not fulfilling me in my own life that I seek out living vicariously through others through blogs?

We went to cabin with 3 other families this weekend and had the BEST time.  I can honestly say that I didn’t think once about any type of computer, blog, facebook, email or anything.  The interest wasn’t there as I was too busy having fun.

I think I need more of that and less of this.  I’m just not sure how to get there from here.

I wonder if anyone else out there in blogland ever feels the same?  Then, maybe that’s why there are so many abandoned blogs out there.

I’ve been reading (and writing) a lot about this lately.  There are blogs galore of people trying to achieve a simple existence, me included.

I feel like I’ve accumulated more stuff, simply because all those around me have and because it’s something I’m supposed to do as I get older.  I still sometimes feel like my house is less ‘grown up’ compared to others since I prefer to keep ours more basic and sparse.

Even typing that though I feel like a phony when I compare our life now and the amount of stuff we have compared to when we lived in Australia.

We lived in a two bedroom (one was more like a half bedroom since only a single bed would fit in there), one bath, furnished flat.  You want to talk about some ugly furniture!?  But, we didn’t really care.  It came with the flat.  We bought a desk and a computer and a bookshelf.  I think that’s it.  My husband’s family gave us some kitchenware, but nothing fancy by any stretch.  There was one closet in our bedroom for the whole unit.  And we didn’t need anything more either.  We just didn’t have a lot of stuff.

And I really don’t even remember cleaning that place.  I know I did, mind you.  I just think the time it took was so negligible that I don’t remember doing it.

Hence we had a lot of time just to do whatever!  Of course, we didn’t have kids either.  But, that’s a whole other level of stuff that just needs a separate post!

Whether you are de-cluttering or downsizing or cutting out more extra-curricular activities or dumping debt, everybody seems to be wanting “the simple life”.

However, ‘simple life’ means something different to each person.

To some people is means getting back to basics like baking your own own bread and making your own cleaners.  Vinegar and baking soda anyone?

To some people or families it means selling (or at least storing) most everything to live in an RV.  Or to some it means paring down to the bare essentials!

There are those who create household management notebooks, which seem like a fabulous idea if I ever actually did it or followed it.

Some are slowing getting rid of childhood collections or selling nearly everything for a new adventure.

For me, being a stay at home Mom keeps our routine simpler.  Also being debt-free as we have less to worry about.  And finally, our attempt to get rid of extraneous stuff is starting to pay off.  The house is slowly but surely becoming easier to manage and to clean

Sometimes I fantasize about moving back to Australia simply so I will be forced to get rid of stuff and start over.  Weird, I know.

What kinds of things do you do to create a simpler life?