Project Discover Week #8

As a reminder, Project Discover was spawned from my 2017 word of the year, discover. My main life priority right now is finding a new professional adventure. After a year-long sabbatical, Mr. Misadventures and I have set up camp in the Pacific Northwest, restarting our careers in an area of the country we've always wanted to live in. Besides looking for a job I am focused on three things:

1. Discover(ing) Portland
2. Discover(ing) Exercise
3. (re)Discover My Blogging Mojo

At the moment I am failing horribly at discovering Portland. Call it weather or my hubby's study schedule (he's studying for a professional certification) or readjusting to a stable life where we aren't moving our house on wheels every week or two, but we just haven't been able to do a lot of exploring.

When we do get it out, it is mainly to get fresh air and exercise. We are currently living close to the Columbia River and along the river is a really great walking and biking trail so we haven't had to venture out too far to get our needs met. We go out to run errands, but I don't think that counts as exploration.

So thus far two months into our stay in Portland, I'd say I was not doing a job good on getting #1 done! I mean my friends Esther and Jacob of Local Adventurers (who by the way I haven't even seen yet!) have been here since September and have done a ton of amazing things, they've even got an ultimate bucket list with 101 things to do in Portland and I've got nada.

I've got to step up my game. The weather seems to be getting better, it is time to say hello to Portland!

Each day that Mr. Misadventures and I go out walking, we go further and further. We managed four days in a row last week. We'll get in four this week, but it sure would be nice to go daily. We just need the weather to cooperate a little bit more. I've got my rain pants now, but if it is pouring it is just not fun. We've decided once we get out of the RV we will definitely get some sort of exercise equipment to accommodate the PNW weather!

So I'd say from a discovering exercise perspective we are well on our way. We are looking forward to getting on our bikes and going further and pumping the heart harder.

We are also working on changing our lifestyle from a diet perspective, at least short term. We have begun by cutting carbs – bread, pasta, rice, etc. and are focused on greens and proteins. We are headed to Phoenix next week to take care of some household projects, but when we return we've decided to try Adkins. That means for the first two weeks (or more) we are going to try to stick to 20ish carbs a day.

Do you know how much carbs and sugar are in things?! Yikes, just the one cup of milk in my daily coffee has 12 carbs! And 13 grams of sugar, tell me, why does milk need sugar??!! Looks like I am going to be drinking a lot more unsweetened almond milk lattes!

After we shed some pounds we can go back to a diet of moderation, but for the moment, we need to try this out. Do you know how many amazing photos of food I pin on Pinterest or like on Instagram? It's going to be pure torture I tell you!

Speaking of Pinterest, and trying to get my blogging mojo back, I've spent a lot of time creating images this week. It's actually been kind of fun. It has forced me to go through and update older posts which is like visiting old friends. I give them an SEO once over and refresh and update content and images. Then send them off to Pinterest land.

Some posts get such a work over that I am republishing them, like yesterday's A Typical French Breakfast post which remains one of my most popular posts ever written (from a traffic perspective). The majority of the posts I just edit and update. Either way, it is a good way to start going through the 2,458 posts that are out there!

I'm continuing to love Tailwind. It is a real time saver. I'm thinking about gathering up all my thoughts on the tools, methods I followed, and what the results were into a post. I'm giving it two months to see if there is a positive impact on my traffic. If not, after that, I am going back to using Pinterest “the old way.”

It's been a long time since I guest-posted anywhere and I have started to remedy that. I wrote a post on LinkedIn for Bloggers this week on Show Your Blog Love and I've got a post coming up later in April on a fantastic blog, Why Girls Are Weird. Krysten is going on vacation and I will be holding down the fort one day towards the end of April, I'll let you know when it happens.

I've got guest posters appearing here soon as well. One next week and another the week after. Got to share the love, one of the best things about the blogging community.

I'm looking to guest post on other blogs, reach out to me if you want to host me!

Thanks for all the support on my sponsored posts. Last week was Arlington, this week Osaka, and next week you'll be seeing a post for Orlando. Also, I'm really excited to be writing about Custer State Park in South Dakota. Watch for that post on Sunday! You guys always do an amazing job helping me to support my sponsors – thank you!

That's been my week, what have you been up to?

You can follow along every week in my Project Discover Weekly Updates.

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