Meanwhile, today over at the Special Needs Blog Hop they're talking about goals for the New Year. Goals, mind you, not resolutions. Five things we'd like to reach during this New Year. Here are my five:
Get organized. No really. Perhaps I should say get more organized. Three years of just going through the paces and trying to keep up with the essentials has left us kind of buried in paper (among other things). Everywhere I look there are piles of projects that I'm going to work on "later". Well, later has come, my friends. So far I'm using this 21-day challenge except I'm letting myself work at my own pace and I'm not posting photos here because it would move too far away from my purpose. I'm almost done with the second challenge. (Clean off my desk in a day? NOT) I did get it cleared off in one day, but dealing with the detritus has taken another day on its own.
Get a shower. That's my incentive for getting up a wee bit earlier in the morning, which should mean I go to bed a little bit earlier at night. Didn't happen tonight, but you know.
Improve my writing. There's a 31-day challenge for this, which I haven't started yet. I figure I should finish the get organized challenge first. Being subscribed to these via e-mail and Google Reader is letting me do them on my own time schedule, which is kind of essential around here. In fact, I just noticed that 21+31=52, and if memory serves there are 52 weeks in a year, so even if I only get to one challenge per week I'll finish both of these by the end of 2011. SWEET.
Make my husband's lunches more interesting. He used to have this cushy job where he got to eat in gourmet restaurants every day for lunch (rough times, right?) Then when he decided to start our home business again, right before the economy tanked mind you, we cut back to brown bag lunches. That was over three years ago. During that time I've packed him a sandwich, a yogurt cup, some fruit, a drink, and a cookie or two anywhere from 2-4 times per week. Seemed like he could use a little menu variation. So one of his Christmas presents was a new lunch box and thermos. I can send hot leftovers in his thermos. Tomorrow he has requested left-over chicken, stuffing and gravy. Gotta beat cold cuts, right?
Get a clearer vision for who God wants me to be. I'm thinking about starting with Proverbs 31:10-31. My primary job right now is wife and mom. There are other things I do (writing, supporting my husband's business, leading our church's Sunday School, volunteering at my kids' schools) but wife and mom are at the top of the list. The Proverbs passage has long been held as the "ideal" woman. I think one large chunk of the things I struggle with comes from trying on my own strength to meet a lot of "ideals." I have high expectations for myself and for my kids, which is not all bad, except when it is. Loving has to come before expecting, I think. So instead of looking at the Proverbs 31 woman for what she does (I already do plenty) I'd like to find out more about who she is...her foundational character. I'm thinking that's how she gets it all done well. In the end...
"Her children arise and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her: "Many woman do noble things, but you surpass them all." (Proverbs 31:28-29, NIV, emphasis mine)There's doing and then there's surpassing. I'm tired of just doing.
Check out the blog hop...it's fun!
