Take The Fall With Us

A NEW SEASON, A FRESH START, WHAT’S ON YOUR TO DO LIST?

Anyone who knows even the slightest thing about me, knows Fall is my season!  In jeans and sweaters, taking salty walks on the beach and visiting cities where the smell of changing leaves is in the air.  In our home, the nesting and prep for hibernation begins with a few things on our To Do List.

Fall Is For Slowing Down

As the days get shorter, it’s the time to slow down a bit after the long summer days.  To be drawn into our kitchens with memorable aromas of soups and stews, and reintroduce our homes with candlelight and fragrance.

Fall weather is perfect.  In most parts of the country, the blast of heat is over, the bitter cold is still months off and it’s not as wet as springtime.  Indoor and outdoor projects are almost fun to do!  Time to organize and regroup before the holidays arrive.

Happy Motivational Monday!

THE FALL BUCKET LIST

Yes, we know that Hollywood promotes a bucket list as things to do before we die.  The actual definition says, “a number of experiences or achievements that a person hopes to have or accomplish during their lifetime” which I much prefer.  In the blog world, it’s just a catchy title about a list of things to do.  So here is mine.

• Trim Down Our Luggage and Travel Totes
•  Reduce Landscape For View and Maintenance
• Weekly Meal Plan On Sundays
• Play Music Vs. TV More Often
• Create Minimalistic Bathrooms

Before we start to explore in more detail, let me be fair and say that I am a list person.  But I cheat.  I deliberately place things on the list I know I can accomplish without much effort.  I have also added an item that has been randomly accomplished to the list and immediately cross it off pretending it was on the list all along.   I place things on my list that I know Mr. LBD will have to do.  However, there is seldom a list that does not get addressed so I will stick with my system for now.

Luggage

We travel often and have several trips planned this fall.  The storage of our luggage is better than it was, with nesting of cases, but it can still be improved.  UAt times we have the luxury of being able to carry on our luggage.  Other times, when gone for several weeks, we need to check luggage.  Like almost everyone else today, we also have phones, iPads, a computer and sometimes a camera with all their chargers.  Remember this Post?

In the past I have tried to have the electronics in a single carry on tote.  It simply got too heavy for me and my shoulders ended up screaming by midday.  Mr. LBD has always carried a single backpack and arrives fresh for happy hours.  Recently I have used a light weight Tumi Halle backpack and only use it for electronics.  Since all airlines let each of us have two carry ons, it is no problem to add this pack and let me now arrive happier and organized.

For checked luggage, we buy our wheelies from TJ Max and always in black (shows less of the abuse the airlines cause) with colored secure name tags.  Currently we have fabric suitcases but my bother in law who’s a pest control guy, just told me bed bugs cannot get in the hard body cases.  Another reason why reviewing our travel gear is on my bucket list.

One of the pieces we are looking at is this carry on that has a built in usb charger and a tsa approved lock.  Finding once piece that could carry the electronics and the items we don’t check might be nice.

Caroline at un-fancy.com does a great job trying to teach me how to pack light.  See her tips here.  Learning to pack with less means less luggage to store.  Even tho I am the queen of nesting when it comes to luggage…. I’m in.

Landscape

Yep, we live in Florida and have a water view.  Not this one, but I am making a point to the developers of all the neighborhoods popping up everywhere.  Buyers pay extra for a water view, even if our water is a retention pond, and we’d like very much to be able to see this water.

Our “pond” view is soothing.  It was hidden by too many plantings that had been let go by the developer for too long.  Mr. LBD took care of this the other day.  It was technically after the first day of fall so I am putting it on the list.  See, I told you I do this.  Nothing motivates like having something already done on the list.  To me, there is nothing like enjoying an outdoor space cuddled up with a blanket.

Meal Planning

Planning what to have for dinner is a two step process for me.  It’s fairly easy to save recipes that I know we will love and combine them with our tried and true meals we can make quickly.  Having the ingredients in the house and prepped for the week is where I get frustrated and defeated.  When our kids were home, I’d plan, shop and cook ahead on Sundays.   We love to eat and like to cook.  There is no reason to not reinstate this habit.  I’ll start off easy tho…3-4 meals planned per week.  This summer I met two young gals who are food bloggers.  Their recipes are always inspiring.  Just look at these photos with links to their sites below.  Not too shabby on the photos either!  Pretty sure a stroll through their blogs will have you starting your grocery list too.

Creamy Spinach Lasagna

KJandCompany

Lemon Sun Dried Tomato Linguine

goodie godmother

Music Vs TV

Here is the item I put on the list because we can do this easily.  Our music skills are zero, nada, zip.  However, we are pros at making playlists on Pandora.  We have a wonderful Sonos system in the house that even has portable speakers.  Music makes life better.  Next time you go to a movie, take note at how many scenes have music in the background.  This is how we get such great soundtracks from our favorite flicks.  The only thing I need to do is to remember to turn it on.  Check.

Minimalistic Bathrooms

 Baths all function the same.  We all need to bathe, primp and that other thing we don’t broadcast.  The space we have to do this in is often the smallest room in our homes.  Our baths are important to us.  They have to handle a lot of tasks for our families.  Clean baths are both appealing and attainable.  Here’s a room we can all do the less is more thing.  We will have a post coming up that talks about bath renovations, updates and also look at some beauties.

In the mean time, I am planning a fall freshen up of our baths.  It is very easy to let cabinets get too full of miracle products that only work for the infomercial people, to let drawers get hairy and sticky and for towels to look sad.  When we I am honest about what we truly use on a regular basis, our bath can be the poster child for minimalism.

No, this is not our bath.  Way too many towels for two of us, but it is a good example that less can be more.

I’m so excited to work on this Bucket List and really enjoy the fall!

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“A home is not a shelter. It’s your soulmate.” –laurel bledsoe