It’s been a weird couple of weeks. They kind of just flew by, which is very strange, but also very welcome, for February. February is usually so, so long, cold and miserable. It has been cold, but not nearly as cold as January. That helps for sure – I am able to walk more and wear less clothes (I am currently only wearing four layers, and less bulky ones, at that!) I have been sick, not miserably, but lingeringly… it’s been almost three weeks now and I’m still more congested and coughing than usual 😒.

Largely because I was sick, I have been spending a lot of time on social media these last couple of weeks, particularly the first few days, when I could barely get out of bed. On one of those days, I had a post get popular (for me) in a content creator group, and I got a flood of new followers. This inspired me to post a LOT… one creator I follow, who has grown considerably in the time I’ve followed her, recommends posting 8-9 times per day, approximately every hour; so that was my goal.

I managed to do it for 3 or 4 days, I think… it was a roller coaster. Some posts were super popular (for me, remember), getting hundreds of views, dozens of likes and comments… and other posts would get nothing. Maybe a few dozen views, no reactions. And there seems to be little rhyme or reason… for any of it. Social media is the wild west with a black box around it. It is impossible to get any clear answers😒

Did you know that the time that something is posted matters, even though we all know we see things days and even weeks after they were originally posted? 🙃 Fb tells me that’s a thing. It gives me the option to schedule my posts and recommends a time. I post at that time, and it flops 🫠. I reposted an old video that was popular the first time, at the time fb suggested, and it flopped. I posted a follow-up video… which I had also posted before, and which had done well the first time, but not as well as the first video… it performed considerably better than the first one did. It just doesn’t make any sense at all 😵‍💫🤷‍♀️.

Of course, the lesson in all this is that I need to stop trying so hard. I need to refocus my energies on the house, and just let social media do its thing. I know we have a compelling story. I have to believe that if we just work on the house, and tell our story as it unfolds, the followers will come. One of our new followers is literally so intrigued by our story that she went back to the beginning and is watching every one of our reels. It is honestly humbling, but also a sign. I do think it will help with our growth on social media if we can get into a rhythm of posting consistently. 8 times a day is definitely too much! After just doing that a few days that one week I am totally burnt out on it. I’m not sure what the right cadence is 🤔. I am hopeful that social media can someday be an income stream for us, but it is far too easy for me to get totally sucked in and spend hours scrolling, liking, and commenting. I need to find the balance ⚖️

Things on the house front are progressing, if slowly. James has moved from the third-floor parlor to the room across from the loft room (“Pat’s room,” though I think it’s been more than 40 years since Pat lived in it 🤣) and he’s made decent progress.

I continue to pick away at the second-floor parlor. It is a bit frustrating to think that I have been working on that single room for about three months now, but the reality is, well, complicated. As reality often is 🙃.

For our other major clear-out so far – our bedrooms – the primary mission was clear. We needed three rooms empty (or as close to empty as possible), so we had our own space, for at least a little of our own stuff, and that had to happen before we moved in (I mean it didn’t work out exactly that way, but that was the goal). Time was of the essence. We took stuff out of those three rooms and just put it wherever we could find room. We moved stuff between the three rooms. We put stuff in second-floor parlor and the front bedroom, knowing those rooms were next on the list to be cleared, and all that stuff would be moved again, relatively soon. Most of the stuff we put in the living room and first-floor parlor, which is certainly not a long-term solution 🤣.

Now that we live here, that strategy doesn’t make sense. We don’t want to move things just to get them out of the way. Now we are into the meat of the project, and we have to start making decisions. Not just what goes and what stays, but how they stay or go. Should things be donated, gifted to loved ones, or sold – sold on eBay, at a yard sale, in a collector’s group? Things that are staying – should they be put into circulation, or storage? If we’re going to use it, where will it go? Does it need to be cleaned, repaired, or altered in some way, or is it good to go? Does it replace something, so now that thing needs to be dealt with? If it’s going into storage… as is? Cleaned first? Packed in, or with, other things? Stored in the basement, on the third floor, in a closet? Is there even room for this thing in the basement, third-floor or closet!? It’s… a lot, ya’ll 🫠.

And that’s not even all of it. I have very real physical and mental limits. I have chronic pain and fatigue, and a moderate dose of depression and anxiety to boot 🤷‍♀️. I literally can’t carry all the boxes of books I’ve packed to where they need to go 😕. There are days I just can’t do much of anything 😩.

On top of that, there’s you know, life, and social media, and other distractions 🙃🤣. And then, instead of a very clear deadline like we with the bedrooms and moving in, we have very little time pressure. Maybe not enough time pressure 🤣. So, yeah, I’ve been working on the second-floor parlor since November, and I’m nowhere near done… and that’s frustrating, but also, okay 🤷‍♀️ I mean, if you try to eat at whale too fast, you’ll just get sick 🤣💗

That’s all for now. Tune in next time to see if we can clear the rug!

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