March Goals

The cutest baby pigs at Spring Haven Farm last weekend

Well, February was a month and I'm glad we've finally rounded the corner into March. I'm hopeful for warm weather, great Duke basketball, and a bit more normalcy to my routine. 

On the Calendar This Month

1. My Articles Club - all 12 of us - are headed to our 4th annual Camp Club weekend at Lake Gaston! Our "camp weekend" always ends up being such a rejuvenating time. I always come away from it feeling so grateful for this group.

2. Taking a day off work to have a girl's day with my mom and sister to celebrate my mom's birthday!

3. A weekend in the NC Mountains! We're staying at this AirBnB, which has its own little petting zoo, and I think the kids will have a blast!

4. Cam starts baseball this month! I really enjoy watching him play and I'm hoping he enjoys this season as much as past years.

What I Read in February

1. James: A Novel This book was very, very good. I will preface that it took me a while before I really got into it, probably because I was coming down from my Fourth Wing high in January, haha.

2. The End of Alzheimers I'm so happy I read this book and came away feeling hopeful and encouraged. This definitely has opened my eyes more to the impacts of diet, genetics, and environmental factors on our health, and also the healthcare system as a whole (combined with the government, big pharma, the FDA, etc). I'm currently doing more follow-up reading, particularly on the diet aspect.

3. Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less Brian listened to this audiobook and recommended it. While I agreed with everything in it and there were good reminders, I'm not sure I had any new takeaways. It was probably more pertinent to my work life and those who work regular jobs. It was a quick read and I enjoyed it.

4. Also forgot to mention that I started re-reading the Bible at the beginning of the year! I'm going straight through. I started in Genesis in January, finished Exodus in February, and this month I got through Leviticus and am almost done reading the book of Numbers.

5. Goosebumps with Cam, specifically "How I Got My Shrunken Head" and "The Barking Ghost". These are my old childhood copies and I think reading our nightly Goosebumps has really helped with Cam's reading overall. :)

What I'm Loving Lately

1. My morning gym time! I've been going to the gym 3-4 times per week since last June, however, I never found a consistent time of day to go. Usually I would try to go late morning, but mostly ended up going in the afternoon around 1 or 2pm, and it would always change depending on how my work day was going. 

Last week I started going when I wake up around 5:45am. Long story, but my internal clock goes off around 5:30am now due to Brian's New Year's Resolution to wake (us) up earlier. I'm two weeks in (going Monday-Thursday) and I really love this change to my routine. There is something nice about being up before everyone else and seeing the sunrise, and also having my workout done first thing.

2. I got selected for this Alzheimer's study through Duke-UNC Alzheimer's Disease Research Center. I am in the 25-43 age cohort where they do a one-time analysis of my current brain health. This will include all my labs, bloodwork, various cognitive tests, grip strength, visual and hearing assessments, a brain MRI, and a spinal tap. Afterwards, I'll meet with a doctor to go over my results. Then later, beginning at age 44, I can enter the longitudinal cohort, where they will repeat all of these tests annually and track my brain health as I age. Very excited for this as you may remember last fall that one of my goals was to get into an Alzheimer's study after finding out that I am in the 1% of people with two copies of APOE 4, which is the biggest genetic risk factor for developing Alzheimer's.

March Goals

1. Make an appointment to get a Real ID driver's license. I applied for my passport renewal last week, so now I need to tackle the Real ID. 

2. Continue finishing my baby books for Cam and Brooke. I've made good progress!

3. Order photo albums to store family photos. I want to get better about printing photos rather than just storing them on my phone, and also want to have the photo books in our family room so we can look through them periodically. 

4. Clean/refresh the sand in Cam's hermit crab tank.  Our hermit crabs are three years old and thriving! I have never once cleaned the tank (I'm not sure if it's ever needed) but I figured it couldn't hurt to pour out all the old sand and put in new, fresh sand for them.