COMMIT has remained a good word for these unusual times, although the goals for April evolved as the month progressed. This, I'm sure, will be the new normal for the summer ahead. All our plans for travel and special events have now been cancelled through the end of August. I'm still holding out hope for a trip to Wisconsin before summer ends, but we'll have to wait and see what things are like, not only here but in all the states between here and there. If things were normal, we'd be there now to celebrate Mother's Day and my birthday. Thank goodness for FaceTime and Zoom.
Like the pandemic, winter has still not lessened its grip on western New York. Trees have still not leafed out, but the birds are returning. In the last two weeks, we've had rose-breasted grosbeaks, Baltimore Orioles, many yellow finches, and a red-winged blackbird and a cowbird at our feeders. The last two are new are new to our yard.
I finished Sandie's 30 Day Photo Challenge, and managed a photo-a-day--again all on my iPhone.
In the middle, you'll see a couple photos of grandchildren I did not take, but were sent to me by my kids. Twelve of the photos were from our almost-daily walks and hikes. We tallied over 57 miles during April, 24 of them on the Lehigh Valley Trail. There are also three photos of food. I've really enjoy cooking, and there could have been many more photos. I'm trying 2-3 new recipes each week, and doing some baking which is really unusual. The walking seems to be offsetting the increased calories!
So back to goals, on the 7th of April I committed to doing a 100 Day Project--daily coloring in any medium which coincided with Kathy Racoosen's 30 Day Coloring Challenge. It's a good project, challenging me to try some new techniques as well as get out a variety of coloring mediums. Amazingly enough, I've managed to post on Instagram regularly as well. I also signed up for an Online Card Class which I've enjoyed. I completed several projects, and have several more I want to tackle.
Another new goal emerged a week or two later when I received notice that my iCloud storage was about full. After offloading about 90% of my documents to an external hard drive, I started to tackle the incredible numbers of photos in my Photos app that go back to 2006. I'm about halfway through (now working on 2013) and have purged over 11,000 photos. It's been a good trip through memory lane and a reminder to henceforth delete duplicates and blurry photos as you go. (As well as the multiple photos I take solely for my blog.)
I read seven books:
I particularly enjoyed Writers and Lovers, the only romantic novel on the list. I found some of Alice Munro's short stories challenging, but in the end understand why she has received so many accolades. Although I found the first of Nora Gallagher's book slow-going in the beginning, by the end I had marked so many pages, I ordered her second memoir and enjoyed it as well. Five of those are books for my Unread Shelf Project. April's goal was to read five books and complete a BINGO sheet. Done! (See the photo for Day 17; one of the books was finished late in March which met the requirements for the BINGO game.) Now I'm engrossed in two long, but interesting books, so I'm thinking I won't finish seven books in May.
So my goals for May: keep working on the 100DayProject, and begin to assemble cards with all the coloring I've done so far; participate in Spring Card Camp 2 which started Wednesday; read another book from the unread shelves (reorganized by genre during April); complete the purging of photos in the Photos app, and move on to one or more projects I keep pushing ahead month after month. We'll see which ones win the battle! I'm also determined to walk every day in May. This weekend will be the biggest test as snow is predicted Saturday night. Mother's Day (celebrated here on Sunday) is going to be really cold!