Grits & Gossip: New Year's Diet? Not me!

Don't get me wrong- I believe whole-heartily in setting New Year's resolutions and goals. But for me, it's just not realistic to start a drastically new diet and/or workout routine in January with the rest of the world. That's not to say I don't NEED to loose weight and get to the gym. Just not this month! (But good luck to those of you that are sticking with your New Year's diet! I'll be right there with you soon enough.)

Reason #1- There are too many leftover holiday cookies and treats that I don't want to waste!

Reason #2- My traditional New Year's meal is not the healthiest....and I had enough collards, black-eyed peas, corn bread, pork loin, and macaroni and cheese to eat for the first week of 2011. And did. I should get extra luck in the new year since I ate the meal so many times!

Reason #3- It's too cold and I really like hot chocolate. And pancakes. With Bacon thank-you-very-much.

Reason #4- The post-holiday slump can give me a case of the winter blah's. And I'm not about to give up comfort food in the midst of that!

Reason #5- My birthday is coming up. It makes more since for me to wait until after my birthday on February 1st.

So I chose to use January to concentrate on the other common New Year's resolution- cleaning out and organizing. In the spirit of a fresh start, I thought I would ride the decluttering and organizing train in 2011. I did a fairly decent job of this in the past year since I moved. But it's amazing how quickly things can accumulate. And I held on to some things, not knowing what I would need/use in my new place. Time to get rid of all of that and lighten my load even more. I want to simplify, simplify, and simplify some more.

I was inspired by Young House Love's self challenge last month to get rid of 100 things before they moved. Even though I feel like I probably did get rid of 100 things last spring, and again after I I finally moved into my place in September, I'm positive there are 100 more things that can go.

My first project was cutting down on the amount of Christmas decorations and organizing them better. I started out with 7 mismatched storage containers/boxes. I had some hand-me down decorations that I haven't used in a few years since I started building my own collection. If I didn't use it this year, or didn't absolutely love it....it's being donated.

I managed to empty 4 of the original storage boxes! I did buy a new container that organizes and protect ornaments. I previously held on to the original boxes, which took up too much space. So I went from 7 storage containers down to 4. Not too shabby! I filled the extra boxes with stuff to donate.