getting started | the many facets of donna

“What we call the beginning is often the end. And to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from.” – T.S. Eliot

Today was interesting. I have been fighting this stomach thing and I couldn’t get to sleep all night. My neighbors had a grand time with the fireworks and around 1 am I was wishing they would stick the next batch in their ears before lighting them. They must have read my mind because they quit soon after. I have powers like that.

Well, I tossed and turned, went to the bathroom, tossed and turned and went to the bathroom…. repeat that about 20 times and by 4 am I was exhausted. I finally fell asleep but I have no idea when. I slept most of the day but now I feel a lot better! I’m so glad too. Since then I’ve been working on my journal and getting started on my New Smash journal I got from Michael’s Arts and Crafts. I’m thrilled about that by the way. I’ll be taking a picture to add here later.

I went back to my “To-Do List” for 2012 and my Goal List which I made with Google Drive (well it was called Google docs then). Google Drive is really awesome by the way and it’s free. If you are not familiar with it you should check it out. It is a great word processor program that runs completely on the net. All of my files are all saved on their servers so it doesn’t take up room on my pitiful little laptop computer. You actually don’t even have to save because it is automatic. Of course, I can save the files to my computer if I want to though and I can choose what type of file to save it as… html, open document, docx (microsoft word), pdf, Rich Text, plain text etc. You can also email it as an attachment which is handy. It is very easy to use and I just noticed I can add/change fonts! There are a ton of cool fonts available to choose from. There is also a handy app for iphone and android which makes me very happy. I tend to save patterns for when I’m crocheting or knitting something and then if I’m not at home I can just open the file on my phone. Nifty!

So I updated my lists and printed them up so I can add them to my Smash journal and I’m about ready to start working on that.

I’ve decided to participate in Home Storage Solutions 101’s Declutter Challenge where they have a daily task and you de-clutter every day for 15 minutes. I learned about this last year but I was already doing my own thing and I hate joining something half way though. I have some OCD traits I guess and my kids tell me I’m like “Monk“. I love Monk. What is so wrong or funny about being like Monk anyway? I don’t get it. Anyway, last year this site was just doing their 52 week challenge and I just can’t not start at the beginning of something and with “Week 1” dated as the 2nd week in January I decided to skip it. I can’t read book series out of order either even if it doesn’t matter. So this year they are also doing a Monthly calendar thing which will be posted on the last day of the previous month. There is a small task to complete for each day for 15 minutes. the whole idea for this system is you can do a lot in just 15 minutes. You can download this calendar as a pdf file but after downloading that file I just hit Control + Print Screen and then pasted and saved it as a .jpg file using my cheesy little Paint program that came on my laptop. Then I saved it as my desktop and now I don’t have to worry about losing it or spilling something on it. Pret-ty han-dy!

Here is the link for the January Calendar and you can download the calendar as a PDF file there. You can click below and save the .jpg version if you’d like.

I just read that the small 15 minute missions on the calendar and made to correspond with the weekly (52 week) challenge so it can be beneficial to do them together. Of course I don’t always follow rules so I’m going to just do my own thing today. The “mission” for today was to create a spot to put donations and such. I already have that so I’m going to clear off my little table by where I sit on the couch. I have a bunch of little stuff in containers that I like to keep handy there – like a little flower pot I have full of various colored pens, adhesive and other stuff I use when I work in my journals. I’m going to be watching some young kids starting next week I don’t want anything little or pointy in reach.

Well, since I’m feeling so much better I think I am going to get busy. It is almost midnight but I don’t feel like sleeping. I hope everyone had a great 1st day of 2013 and if not, a good 2nd, 3rd or 4th…. etc

I have always loved fish. When I was younger my school had a huge fish tank full of some very colorful fish. It was so neat to watch. My dad usually had a fish tank but he liked to try to breed the fish so had a tank full of these plain white fish. When my youngest son showed an interest in fish I got him a fish tank but it wasn’t long before I realized I enjoyed watching the fish more than he did. Riley’s fish didn’t last long and soon the tank was in a garage sale. After a while I decided I wanted my own fish tank and bought a kit at Walmart that was a little bigger than Riley’s tank. I loved it. I bought 6 tiger barbs a plecostomus and a cory and loved watching them swim together. They each had such neat character and it wasn’t long before they each had names. One day one my my barbs died and I was so depressed. I had to have my oldest son remove it from the tank for me. Not even a week later another barb died and then I was angry. I wanted to know why they died. I started reading and learning as much as I could about keeping fish.

Now I have a nice 55 Gallon tank and 22 fish that are very healthy. I know how important it is to maintain my tank on a weekly basis and now I have it down to a science. However, I also learned that it is important to start off right in order to have a healthy tank. You wont lose as many fish if you learn a thing or two before you get started. It took me quite a while to do the research and learn what I know now so I decide to write a simple beginners guide to setting up a freshwater fish tank. It hope it can help someone get started without the trouble I had in the beginning.