Happy New Year! It’s that time of year. Time to look ahead and set some goals!
What’s on my list for this year? Well, let’s see.
Personality traits
Accept that our home is a constant work in progress. I’m always so annoyed that things can fall into disarray so quickly in our house. Let me give an example. We have a house cleaning service that comes once per month. A day after that house cleaning service comes, our basement can be a complete jumble of wires as Ken decides to disassemble our A/V closet. Or, I get aggravated with myself when I decide to move one piece of wall art to a different part of the house, because I thought I was “done” when I put that wall art in a specific location. Well, the house is never DONE. Actually, if it is “Done” then that means that I’ve reached that age when I want nothing in the house to change. That’s why our grandparents’ homes look like they’re stuck in the 1960s. So, I should EMBRACE the fact that I want to rearrange wall art. I shouldn’t be in some big hurry to redo our closets and kitchen all at the same time just so we’re “done.” And anyway, at least when our house is in disarray, that means we care enough to see it improved and aren’t sitting around on our butts all day “bored” because we have nothing to do.
Get out of the house. As I mentioned above, our house is a constant work in progress. And because I’m always anxious to see it “done,” (oh, and also because Ken and I are complete homebodies), we rarely go anywhere or do anything outside of the house, with the exception of vacations and Ken’s Friday trips to the movie theater (sometimes I go, sometimes I don’t, depending on how interested I am in seeing the movie). So, this is my goal this year to do:
- At least one activity outside the house per month (museum, new restaurant, etc.); and
- Make a more concerted effort to hang out with my friends. I’m a shitty friend. I never want to hang out, I hate the bar scene, and, I always want to use weekends to work on the house. Ken and I host a lot of parties, but I always feel bad because our interaction is always so one-sided. We like when people come to our parties, but we don’t like going to theirs.
Use my mornings more productively (The original title for this one was “Quit dicking around in the mornings). Here’s my morning routine. After Ken gets out of the shower, he wakes me up. I then go in the shower and he leaves for work. After I get out of the shower, I go on my computer and do complete mindless surfing. And about 45 minutes later, I start to get ready for work. What a complete waste of time! So, I’m going to try and skip the computer routine in the mornings. I’m going to be honest, this might be a tough one!.
Health and Fitness
Go to the doctor and get a checkup. Here’s the thing. I’m a bit of a hypochondriac. But I’m the worst kind of hypochondriac. The kind that avoids the doctor like the plague. Because they may find something dreadfully awful with me! That tingling in my hand? Pretty sure it’s a stroke. Leg hurting from working out? It’s a blood clot for sure. Headache lasting a while? That means I have a brain tumor, right? I avoid the doctor because I think that ignorance is bliss. But, if I’m going to worry about all these phantom problems anyway, why shouldn’t I just go to the doctor and actually find out if I have something real to worry about? And if there is nothing real to worry about, then I can stop worrying so damn much! Also, there are just too many health problems in my family. I need to take an active role in taking care of myself and focus on PREVENTION.
On a similar note, Lose the Weight, eat healthy, exercise. I’ve done it before. I realize that this is on a lot of resolutions lists, so I won’t belabor the point. Get strong, get healthy.
The ridiculous:
Watch the entire series of Sex and the City (not in one sitting. Preferably throughout the entire year). Wait. What the heck? You have a resolution to watch MORE TV? Isn’t that the opposite a resolution?
Well, no. I’m fairly pleased with the amount of TV I watch every week. Nothing excessive, but I’m not a “TV-is-evil-and-refuse-to-watch-it” person either. But most new shows suck-o. Then, what TV shows do I watch? It’s confession time. I TiVo Law and Order reruns on TNT. I have the TiVo set to keep at least 10 episodes. When I’m looking to unwind or just watch mindless television, I queue up one of the episodes, and watch it. I probably watch at least 5 episodes a week. And, 95% of the time, I’ve seen the episode. So this year, my mindless TV show will be Sex and the City. I purchased the entire series on DVD years ago. And, I’ve actually never seen the final season! So, mindless TV, here we come.
Blogging
Launch a new blog! Ken and I are working on a new blog! We’re in the early stages, and getting some quotes for logos. It’ll be entirely non-wedding related, but I hope to be posting on there by March! I’ll let you all know!
Take a more proactive role replying to comments on this blog, and commenting on other wedding blogs. If you’ve ever left a comment on this blog only to feel like you’ve typed something into a black hole, it’s not because I don’t love you. I so appreciate your comments. But laziness wins out. Almost every.single.time.
Follow a more specific workflow for my blog posts. I won’t bore you with the details of this, but hopefully the posts you’ll be seeing in the near future will have more external links and more photos and will be higher quality with regard to grammar!
Create a special archives page to make it easier for visitors to find the posts that interest them! I’ll be launching this soon!
Home and Household
Complete at least 8 crafty projects. My “Post Wedding Projects” should put me well on my way to this goal!
Stop spending so much money at the supermarket. Ken and I make decent money. However, I spend WAY too much money at the Supermarket (sometimes more than $350/month … and there’s only two of us!). Currently, I make a meal plan for each week, and just go to the nearby store and purchase what I need. I never pay any attention to sales or coupons or sales that warrant “stocking up.” But, perhaps I should. To meet this goal, I’m going to subscribe to the Sunday Washington Post so I can get the weekly ads and coupons.
Redo my home office. Already on track to do this soon!
Have a plan for redoing the kitchen. After spending money all last year on the wedding, planning any major expenses makes me feel a bit queasy. My savings account balance is nearly $6000 less than what it was this time last year, so I’d like to take some time to recover and spend less money this year. Well, that would not be possible if we remodeled our kitchen soon like we’re really anxious to do! In fact, we went to Ikea this weekend and played with their kitchen design program. We’re looking at about $6800 for cabinets (not including installation). So, instead of having a goal to actually redo the kitchen this year, I’m setting a goal to do the following:
- Track prices of appliances to determine the best deals (It will help that I’m subscribing to the newspaper so I can check out local ads!)
- Troll pinterest and flickr for kitchen inspiration ideas
- Get estimates from contractors for other things that will need redone in our kitchen, like switching from electric to gas, installing new lighting, and making sure our water line works to have a fridge with an ice and water dispenser
- Visit kitchen showroom type places for inspiration and ideas
- Research prices of flooring, backsplash, and countertops
- Research contractors who can assemble and install Ikea kitchen cabinets
Basically, spend the entire year planning our kitchen and then actually execute that plan in early 2013. The way I see it, we spent 13 months planning our wedding, which was just one day. I think it would be fair to spend the same amount of time researching something that will be in our home for a very, very long time!
So, there you have it! Some of my primary goals for the year. Doesn’t seem too bad, right? I’ll try to do quarterly check-ins to keep myself on track!
