Embracing Down Time.

It's funny, even though I'm so busy with work, baby and life, when I think about it, I actually do have down time now that I don't utilize very well. I'm sure we all do this but it really just hit me in the past week or two that I can really be inefficient at time management, if that's even the correct term.
This is going to come off as though I being pretty harsh on myself and I DO recognize that I am not a lazy person, but we all have room for improvement, right?

Lily goes to bed between 6-6:30pm every night. We start her nighttime "routine" around 5:15ish (yes, I have eaten my words about schedules. I'll save that for a later post) and once she is in bed, she's usually down for a solid 12 hours. We've worked SO hard to make that happen and it is a glorious thing indeed. It gives me peace and quiet, especially since Dustin works 5 nights a week. Not that I prefer that he works nights, but it does give me "me" time.

Yet, here I sit at 9pm, un-showered for the day, 5 loads of separated laundry in my room, a full dishwasher, and I won't even begin to list the things I could clean....yet, here I sit. It's like I go brain dead at sundown now. I don't even answer many phone calls during time, or cook for my working husband ::gasp!::. I'm shocked at my own laziness sometimes!

Why is this? Sure, I'm tired, but why then don't I go to bed at 9pm instead of 11:30 or 12?Other moms run rings around me and still manage to be in bed by 10pm!

This is what I do during said down time: I internet, watch TV, eat dinner, text message, do an ab workout every night and recently started doing yoga from a free program On Demand (THANK YOU VERIZON FIOS!!!1), so I am doing something...but nothing really productive.

So, the point....
I'm working on some goals for this down time:

• Obviously, one of those goals is to work on my fitness level. I want to lose 10lbs and tone up. I have 2 beach vacations coming up, one in June and one in September, and I want to try shape up this spare tire. I will try to devote 45-90 minutes of physical activity in the evenings.
• I want to attempt to have my family eat healthier. Now that my kid eats adult food, this has been a bigger deal then it ever was. We aren't terrible eaters by any means but we were eating out a ton and we don't eat anything but carbs very balanced meals. We have have cut back on eating take out (sorry, Outback to-go girl) and I have been cooking once or twice a week. My goal is to make that more consistent and more well balanced. 
• I am going to attempt to do one household chore a night, whether it's wiping down the chair rail or sweeping the garage, it's ridiculous that I sit here and ignore these easy things. 
• Eventually, I would like to add crafting to the mix. Scrapbooking isn'y my thing but I would like to do some type of hobby/crafting to put my mind to better use.
• Read. I have the third installment of the Twilight series sitting on my nightstand....where it's been for about 6 months. Again, brain activity would be good.

Now, if someone would just hold me accountable for these things....