Hello everyone! Today’s post is all about all the fun things I’ve been up to this month!

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I’m so excited to wrap up another successful BirthMay tomorrow. For now, let’s focus on the fun events though!

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Life

My Birthday!

I turned 31 this month! I am so astounded at how much my life has both changed and stayed the same in the last year. The biggest change has been the addition of my little dog, Fox, to my life. The biggest surprise for what has stayed the same is the fact that I still live in Illinois. I honestly think it is insane how differently this year has gone than what I’d hoped, but it’s been better than what I’d hoped overall. Life is just good and I’m so happy that it is!

Home

I did a massive declutter this month! I switched my closet out from my winter clothes to my summer clothes this month and managed to declutter tons of items from both categories! I gave them to my mom to take to the thrift store donations but she’s a hoarder and likes to go through it to keep stuff for herself “just in case” she wants to wear it someday. So they are still technically in the house but they’re not my problem anymore as far as I’m concerned! I also removed stuff from my Poshmark that has not sold in over a year, lowered prices on anything that had a like for the rest, but am about to take them down and add brand new stuff.

I also finally decluttered my old makeup. I had a ton of stuff that is just so old now. I used to wear makeup everyday and even then I had a lot of stuff, and since the pandemic I really don’t wear anything anymore. So I finally put them in my “empties” basket although they aren’t technically empties for my next post.

One last thing I decluttered, my craft supplies! When I go to craft night at the library all the supplies are provided, and I don’t really do crafts on my own. So I decided to finally get rid of all the paints, oil pastels, markers, colored pencils, crayons, and other random stuff I didn’t want anymore. I figured if I ever want to make something then I’ll just buy what I need, but otherwise I don’t want to keep it all. What did I do with it? Well I’ll talk about that next!

Craft Supply Swap

A local library had a craft supply swap recently! I took all the newly decluttered items and went to the library to get rid of it. I am so thrilled I did because I got to witness people actually take the stuff I dropped off! Volunteers running the swap would categorize everything and so I would walk by areas and see people grab the things I had brought. Honestly, it was a huge relief. I didn’t want to think the items were thrown away and wasted. I’m sure some stuff eventually was, as it wasn’t all totally the best quality items or really desirable stuff but I think most of it was snatched up fairly quickly! I didn’t end up grabbing anything but my mom did so glad she found stuff!

Foxy Updates

My pup had a big month too! I already shared how his adventures went recently on his weekend hikes at local beach and forest preserves.

He also has been doing much better at his training class. His therapist suggested I try using cheese in class instead of training treats as he’s too stressed to listen otherwise, but the high value treat of cheese will get him to behave. It worked! He is doing much, much better. His recall is also getting so much better!

One more training update is that he learned Paw! He knows quite a few tricks now, but the most exciting is paw. He hates it when I touch his paw but now that he willingly offers his paw is great! Honestly it’s more like “scratch” because he scratches my hand with his talons, I mean, nails, but it’s still progress! Oh, and he does this super cute thing where he’s confused if I want him to give me his paw or touch my hand with his nose so he tries both at the same time.

Work

Work is going well! I had my 90 day review finally, and I didn’t get fired! Which was great because it’s been almost 9 months since I started LOL. Things got WILD so we couldn’t have it until now. My position also got changed up a bit, so that has been super exciting. I really am enjoying my work and I just scheduled a ton of days off because my boss told me to use my time off already. I told him “okay I’m putting in a ton of requests and I expect you to approve them because you asked for this” and then HE LEFT FOR THE WEEKEND BEFORE APPROVING IT??? I was like, RUDE! So now I have to plan something fun for all these random days.

House Hunting!

The house hunting has officially begun! I went to two open houses this month to start to get an idea of what’s out there. My preferences are a small, 2-3 bedroom house with a small fenced-in yard (I have a Chihuahua who’d rather be inside LOL), attached garage, close to the lakefront to Lake Michigan, and doesn’t have too high property taxes.

The first house was listed at $125k and was a TOTAL fixer upper. My dad went with me because he LOVES looking at homes (multiple people have volunteered as tributes to be my house hunting companions, which I LOVE). It was a 3 bed, 1 bath, close to the train station to the city and close to the lakefront. Literally everything had to be redone. The yard was a mess, the floors and baseboards needed to be replaced, the stairs I think needed to be fixed, and it was not at all move-in ready. We estimated it needed at least another $100k worth of work both inside and outside to make it presentable but I did love the bones of it. It had small, cozy rooms, a windy spiral staircase, and it wasn’t open concept so it actually had a separate kitchen, living room, and dining room. The basement was honestly kinda creepy though. The yard was super overgrown but had room to add tons of garden beds and a sizable patio, and even had a little pond! Honestly, I did really love it, even if it was so beat up and had no garage. But I didn’t love that I’d have to spend so much to make it the little lake house of my dreams.

The second house was in my same town, so I wasn’t really considering it as the property taxes are insane in my town. This one was a 3 bed, 2 bath ranch style home with a 2 car detached garage listed at $220k. It was newly remodeled and it was lovely! The rooms were pretty small and cozy, the bathrooms were really cute, and the paint was a lovely collection of purple hues. I really liked the living room and the kitchen was small, just how I like it (I don’t cook and I joke I’d take out the kitchen of my future home – which I won’t but it’s fun to see the reactions to this). The basement was finished and had a ton of space, a separate laundry/exercise room, and a workshop area. There was also a pool table that the realtor said comes with the house LOL! It was night and day between that house and the previous one as this one was completely move-in read, had a concrete patio, and would just need minimal landscaping to add fruit trees and garden beds. My biggest issue outside was that there was a HUGE pine tree and my dad, being a landscaper, pointed it out would be on my property if I bought the house and if it came down it could very well make my house into a pancake house. I don’t think I could sleep well knowing I could be pancaked! Anyway, it also wasn’t the house for me but it was really a lovely house!

Anyway, neither house is my future home, but it was really cool to see some options and I do want to go to more open houses. I do want a cozy cottage/lake house feel so hopefully I can find something that fits that!

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So that’s my update on how the month has gone! I hope you’ve had a fabulous May!

Thanks for reading!

Pamela

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