Friday, December 26, 2014

Looking Ahead to the New Year


After being inspired by Our Busy Homeschool's post on the subject, I thought I'd take a few minutes to write down my thoughts on goals for the coming year.

While I try to stay away from (too many!) New Year's resolutions, it's always nice to stop and take stock of where we are and where we'd like to head.


PERSONAL Goals

  • Piano practice - I have not played the piano for almost an entire year - it went out the window as soon as we became pregnant. I need to start that up again. 
  • Restart the VLC diet after New Year's.
  • Audit my list of supplements and get it finalized to start at New Year's.
    • Also, work on finding the cheapest ways possible to buy supplements. (Suggestions, anyone?)
  • Restart my lacto-fermentation cultures - namely, kombucha! (My SCOBY cultures died during my long neglect of them this summer.)
  • Start Spring Cleaning
  • Work on my prayer life, as well as my Bible study habits. The current focus points of my prayer life are (1) growth in our parenting skills, (2) a peaceful home atmosphere, and (3) my husband's small business ventures and the state of our finances.
  • Go shopping for clothes. Oh, how I dislike shopping - but it's got to be done, unless I just want to take up residence in a nudist colony. 
  • Lose the baby weight. This shouldn't be too difficult - going back on the diet should take care of this. However, it will likely take a while! 



FAMILY Goals

  • Buy and plant fruit trees in February - I'm so excited about this! 
  • Make a "consequences chart" - a list of predetermined consequences for misdeeds to streamline the correction process in our home. 
  • Continue to work toward a streamlined chore system in our home.
  • Get the carpets cleaned. I know, I've only been saying this for four years now. 



HOMESCHOOL Goals

  • Finalize curriculum choices for 2015-2016 - primary decisions to make are English (Language Arts) and spelling. Other decisions to make include Bible, history/science, and assorted extras. 
  • Begin a daily "training time." (More on this later.)
  • Finish the school year, enjoy our summer break, finish all end-of-the-year book-keeping, and start our next school year. 
  • Develop a new chore schedule to start over summer break. 

Now to print this post and stick it somewhere that I will actually see it - as opposed to my usual action plan of slipping it into the mental file of "quickly forgotten blog posts."

Happy Boxing Day, everyone!!





4 comments:

  1. It made me smile to read your post! I've been narrowing my goals down and plan to post again about them around New Years.

    And idea on the carpet cleaning - what about ripping up the carpets? Really! We did that downstairs to make wheeling easier for Mason and it's been wonderful. We still have carpet upstairs (he doesn't bring the wheelchair up there) and in one area downstairs (just outside the bathroom where he lays for his enema). It is wonderful not to have so much carpet!

    I look forward to reading your curriculum plans as they are finalized too. We've settled on most of what we'll use for 2015-2016 I think. Now to tackle the last few months of this school year. We needed our December break and I'm not sure the kids will be too keen on getting back to the books in January.

    Have a wonderful week and a Happy New Year!

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    1. Yes, we have considered removing the carpet! When we replace it, that will be a definite option. I once visited a woman who did an absolutely gorgeous paint job on her concrete - it looked like antique tile!

      One of the hardest things for us is that we start school in May, but our homeschool convention isn't till mid-July - i.e. too late to buy for the year already started, and too early to buy for the coming year. Thus, we have to do all of our browsing online, something at which I'm not too good yet. That and I change my mind constantly!! :) But I'm looking forward to having my plan completed, and I'll be eager to see your plans too.

      We're starting school a week from tomorrow, and I'm guessing it'll be a bit rough too - a newborn who doesn't like to sleep (outside of mama's arms, that is!) and most likely a bit of a cranky start to the rest of the year. The challenges are continuous, aren't they? :)

      Diana

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  2. Those are nice goals--not too huge, but certainly ambitious enough!

    I can't think of goals right now. All I can do is be pregnant 1 day at a time. :) I'll probably be doing some real goal setting in the spring.

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    1. Being pregnant one day at a time is definitely enough!! :) I find that I do a lot of this sort of thing after a baby has been born and I realize how far things have fallen into disarray. We'll see how well I can do! :)

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