I always enjoy a new year, despite how cliche it might possibly be, I love the possibilities that there's something new on the horizon... or at least potentially something new, fresh, a new beginning.
Let's review last years resolutions.
1. Lose 65#. Looking back, I'm sad that I made that my #1 goal. There really are more important things to do in the world than be skinny. BTW, if you didn't know, you can be big AND beautiful at the *same time*. I know this to be true *lol* Having said that, I lost around 15# for the year. That's pretty OK in my opinion. I finished the year lighter than I started it, and that includes things that happened in my life like 6 holidays, tons of family dinners, a husband that loves red meat for every meal, a wedding, a funeral, a flood, quitting my job, and being home full time.
2. Read more. You know what? I did pretty good at that. I started out the year by always keeping a book in my briefcase that I was carrying back and forth to work. If I had it with me at all times, I might read in the car, or on my lunch break. Around the time that we quit (Which was April), I was up to 6-8 books. Since then, I don't think I've read but maybe 1 or 2 more. I'll mainly be a magazine/Internet girl. I don't think I'm a worse off person for not reading 50 books this year.
3. Scrapbook 50 pages just for me. Honestly, I don't' know if I met this goal or not. I know I SB over 50 pages for sure, but many were given as gifts. Which I love to do. Every Christmas at least one person gets an album. I started out by the end of January having around 25 pages done, so I'm gonna assume I met this goal.
4. Blog more. 2007 - 38 posts. 2008 - 248 posts. I'm gonna say, mission accomplished.
5. Save $100/mo for christmas. We did this as long as we were working at Kenton. When we left, I got in my money hoarding mode so I didn't set aside $100 specifically. I will say, I did pretty damn good at Christmas. I spent way too much on the girls (but we'll cover that later). I usually buy as I go. I did get to spend a LOT on the child from the tree, and Gene and I did something kinda special for just some random person I saw one day (we'll leave it at that) - so I think we did well.
6. Work on my photography business more. Mission accomplished! I actually forgot about that one honestly, but I did do it. So much done this year and so much more to do!
7. Increase my income by $200/mo outside of work. Losing your job, kinda blows that one.
8. Pay down our debt by 1/3. Well, we kinda did in a way by getting a reprieve on a huge bill. *think thousands and thousands*. We paid off cards, and didn't accumulate any other debt, so mission accomplished!
So out of 8 goals for the year, I'd say better than 50% is good!
So what about 2009?
Well 2009, I'm ready for you. I'm coming out of the corner swinging (saying that while wearing my jammies at 11:30 a.m.... tsk tsk).
I'm resolving to accomplish these things in 2009.
1. Print my photos weekly. I took probably 5000 photos last year, and have printed around 500. Oops. Ppl can't enjoy them if they are sitting on my hard drive. I'm going to start from NOW and print weekly the ones I want in albums - to remember forever. And in that vein, I'm going to try to figure out a better way to organize my pics. Right now they are auto arranged by date taken. Which is fine if I can remember when I took a pic. Like, I can remember that our engagement pics were taken on April 19, Torrie's post-bridal shoot was on October 5 and the girls ballet pics were taken on July 25, but it took me like 20 min the other day to find pics from early December of ice/tree. Just sayin.
2. Scrapbook more. This is never a bad resolution, what could go wrong *knock on wood*. There was a big ta-do over the Becky Higgins Kit of the Month which was a 365 project. Seems they didn't print enough *big shocker* and ran out in a couple hours. Looking at the kit, you realize that it's nothing more than some journaling spots and some page protectors. I've got that. So I decided that I'd at least play along some. I'm not going to promise every single day of 2009, but that'd be freaking cool if I could. I'll be satisfied with 75% of 2009. I'm basically designing a mini pic and journaling on a 4x6" template. Printing it, sticking it in a divided page protector and calling that day done. How cool is that? And it will cost me less too. $40 still in my pocket.
3. Lose 65# by the end of the year. It's a good goal. Why not keep it? At least it wasn't first right? I'm going to be happy, if I just finish the year lighter than I started it. 15 more pounds, would put me down one more size. That'd be pretty alright with me too. Overall, I'd be freaking dancing naked if I made my 65# goal. (at home - no need to scare the masses).
4. Work on the house more. I hate living in a construction zone. It's good to just do something for 20 min, but it sucks having lumber in your dining room - for a year. I'm so tired of it. I want to live in a finished house, but everyone knows, you NEVER LIVE in a finished house if you own your own home!
5. Book 20 weddings for '09. Now that's Gene's goal for me. I'd be happy with 12. He wants me to go clinically insane. I also want to get at least 10 seniors. Either way, promote Cease Fire Studios more, practice more, take more photos, get more comfortable. Give more photos.
6. Blog daily. I'm not doing too bad at this right now. In '08 there were 210 posts. I want to have at least one post for every day of the month. Sometimes that might mean I post 3 posts in one day and then miss a day, but I want to have at least 365 posts. Which I shoulda split this post in 2. LOL. I also want to start posting some projects. Fun things to bring ppl here, things that spur their creativity. It might be photography, might be scrapbooking, might be *anything*. Give it some time, I'll think of some stuff.
7. Spend less on Christmas and make more gifts. Every year, it seems I find something that was really cool that I end up making for almost everyone, or if not everyone, a whole lot of ppl. One year, I made composition book journals - about 20 of them. I've made lots of bears and scrapbooks over the years. This year, I made name frames. Those are pics where instead of the letter R, it is a photo of a pump. Or an S might be a swirly piece of wrought iron. Rarely does a gift go over really good with my family. No offense guys, but there's a lot of "oh this is nice". Grr. But this year, everyone seemed to like their name frames.... so I will continue to make things. Anyway, I feel like there's not enough homey handmade stuff, and too many pre-wrapped gifts in the $10 section of Target. You know, wallet caddies and golf ball shelves. This year I think I'm going to try to make something for every single person on my list. Unless I get Cole and Darrell.. they're gonna get gift cards. :p
And also, I'm going to spend less on Gene's granddaughters. I told them this year to burn it up, because this is the last Christmas I'm going to outdo Santa Claus. Seriously. Let the dude do his job. Maybe it's because cute stuff is easy to find, or maybe it's because I never got to buy for girls, but this year was worse than last year!! So, I told Gene AND the girls. Next year. One outfit (well, maybe 2), One toy, and One book and One handmade thing. No stockings. No candy. No shoes. No 47 toys. No craziness!
7 things. 1 less than 2008. Maybe that means I'm trying to simplify.
Ali Edwards each year has all her readers pick a word that will be their goal for the year. Just something to keep in the back of their mind that helps them go in the direction that they want to be.
Last year, I picked "It's ok". (I know, it's 2 words, technically 3). I just wanted to remind myself that it's ok to not be perfect. When things got me down I just said "It's ok, Ok?" And it worked! It *is* ok, and I finished up my year better than I started it.
Mine this year is Dedicated. This year I will remain dedicated to my goals. Not just the ones above, but every day goals. I want to dedicate myself to my family, to my photography, to MYSELF.
I am
Dedicated.
1 comment:
Sounds like 2008 was pretty good to you and you accomplished a lot. You've got some great goals for 2009 and I like the idea of printing pics weekly!
Post a Comment