Ready to find out how I did with my first Follow Through Friday? Did I have a spectacular success or did my efforts go up in smoke?
The answer is neither. I didn’t get all three items on my list completed but I did get 1 done, 1 started, and 1 roughly finished. Here’s how it went:
The first item, clean off the desk was actually easy once I stopped allowing myself to be distracted and focused (oh, why is that so hard?) on the task. Here is one more look at the before picture:
Could I maybe give myself extra credit for completing a task that wasn’t on my list? I’m a bit embarrassed to admit this graduation card has been sitting here on the desk needing addressed and mailed since the third week of May!
Even though I had more than my fair share of distractions, I did stay on task and complete the job!
However, in the interest of being real, I’ll show what the bed looked like when I finally had the desk clear.
I did go back and deal with all these papers and I did NOT return them to the desk! See the bed was all clear and ready for bedtime.

The papers are sorted away and not back on the desk. No shots of the floor or surrounding areas are currently available. Ahem.
Finally, just to get an idea of our every day life, here is what the desk looked like at around 10a.m. this morning. Keeping it cleared off is not going to be one-time job. Ever.
Still, I’m counting item one on my follow-through list as done. The second item on my list did not go as well. My idea was to take care of it once my husband came home from work. That sort of sounds as if I was still procrastinating doesn’t it? This task pretty much fell apart when my husband ended up working late and not getting home until after 7:30p.m. I did begin the training but it took concentration and was an audio file as well. I had to stop as he was really too tired to entertain J while I completed it (G was off at a church function) and I kept getting interrupted. I was going to try again later after everyone was in bed but couldn’t get logged back into the site for some reason. I do plan to finish it this weekend if I can get back into the site. While I didn’t accomplish that item, I did have fun coloring with J which is something we hadn’t done together in some time.
The third task on my list was to create a daily summer schedule for the boys and myself. I’ve been struggling with this one and even found a few started and abandoned attempts while cleaning off the desk.
I simply started this yesterday, adding to it through out the day, then collaborated slightly with J while we were coloring last night (you have to love an 8-year-old that suggests “screen-free” free time!) and completed a rough draft that simply needs a little polish and either nicer printing or to be typed.
I decided what was keeping me from creating the schedule was the over-planning of it all. Once I scheduled in more free time in our days (hey, it IS summer after all) and our meal times, the rest of it fell into place pretty easily. I also opted to not make a schedule for our Saturdays and Sundays since they are seldom consistent. I’m sure we’ll be tweaking this as we start implementing it as our weeks are seldom the same with baseball and summer soccer plus swim lessons coming soon (hopefully!). However, it is done enough to give us a great starting point for next week.
So, did you pick three tasks yesterday? How did you do on your follow-through? Leave me a comment or link up your blog!

Does it count if it’s more than three tasks spread out through a couple of days? Yesterday I scheduled a home-cleaning catch up weekend… and I must say that today I’ve managed to follow it without any problems (except for picking up the living room… but there’s still time before I go to bed).
OM recently posted..A weekend to catch up
Absoulutely, it counts! Good for you.
I can’t say I will pick up 3 tasks on Friday by time Friday comes around I’m like…. OMG TGIF! and I attempt to flop… well as well as any mom can flop.
Good job on the desk though. I’ve been making baby steps on mine but it seems like every time I have it cleaned up it gets destroyed again because my desk is the household catch all for papers.
And crayons are awesome!
Look forward to see how things keep going.
Elizabeth recently posted..The last few days
Oh, I get wanting to flop on Fridays 🙂 You did see the day after picture of my desk, right? I think desks are going to have to be daily items–not that mine has changed since that picture except that it has more clutter SIGH.
I wasn’t able to get anything done since I found this challenge later on friday but next week I will be participating for certain. Thank you so much for coming up with such a great idea!
Andrea @the Distracted Housewife.com recently posted..Our Messy New Home: A Clutter Filled Kitchen
I’m glad you like the idea and I’m really glad to know I’ll have some company at the end of this week 🙂