Getting ready for 2012

Wow! It's been a long time since I've had the chance to sit down and blog. Things have been busy with the holidays and getting ready for the holidays and celebrating the holidays, etc. Greg, Kirsten and I went to MS for Thanksgiving and Christmas this year. It was great to see my MS peeps again and hang out. It was also great to spend some quality time with my family too.

Short story about Christmas with my family.....My mom gave all of us pj's and slippers this year. Most of the time when she buys our gifts, she'll give Andrea, Hayley and me gifts that are the same, or very similar with the same idea. She does the same for Jonathan and Greg. This year, she gave Hayley and me matching pj's. They're really cute too. Well, my dad wasn't aware my mom gave us pj's or what they looked like. He bought her a pair, and when she opened them she saw they were the same as ours. So, of course, we had to take a pic of the 3 of us wearing our pj's. I'll insert it as soon as I figure out how to put it on here from my phone :).

Christmas was full of good times, great blessings, and yummy food....way way way too much yummy food.

The New Year is around the corner, and it's time for the list of resolutions. I've been thinking about this for a while and I wanted to try to look deeper than the typical lose weight, eat better, etc. Those are always given resolutions.

Before I write my list, I want to take a look back at my 2011 resolutions and give an update on how those turned out....

Top 10 List of Goals and Things I am looking forward to in 2011:
10. Get more comfortable driving on Atlanta's scary interstates
(doing good with that, Yay me!)
9. Getting fully moved in our house
(still working on it but definitely much closer than this time last year)
8. Hoping we'll have or at least be expecting baby #2
(praying about this....much medical drama with this situation this year)
7. Pay off credit cards
(not fully out of debt yet, but much much closer, and we have a plan that works)
6. Get office set up, and kiln hooked up so I can get back to work
(office is set up, and I sold the kiln...will get back into that later)
5. Go to Disney World
(done...we went in Sept.)
4. Studying, Jesus The One and Only Bible study with my girls
(done...great study and met some great new friends)
3. Catching up with some old friends
(done...took a couple of long trips to MS to catch up, and some came to Atlanta this summer)
2. Kirsten will be participating in her first wedding as a flower girl
(Unfortunately, we weren't in the position for Kirsten to be able to participate in the wedding. It was a sad, hard, and disappointing decision we had to make due to lack of finances and the expenses of traveling.)
1. Celebrating 10 years with Greg
(done...we didn't do much to celebrate since our anniversary fell on the first day of school and first day of Kirsten's dance class. We did have a small date that day. No gifts or cards were exchanged...but we went to Disney a month later, so that was our gift to each other.)

2012 Resolutions:
1. I will do my best to serve healthier food options to Greg and Kirsten. I eat a lot healthier than I used to, but I don't enforce these practices on them. I make things that are fast and easy, and with that comes processed foods with no nutritional value. I'll substitute the hamburger helper with veggies and fruit.
2. Work towards participating in a 1/2 marathon. Before Thanksgiving I made it up to 10 miles, but I hurt my knee. I hope it won't take me long to get back to that point and go further.
3. Get better with my thank you notes. This past year I really dropped the ball with my thank you notes. I want to get back on track with these.
4. Make an effort to be kinder to others. I don't mean being nicer, I mean being kinder. "Anyone can be nice, but it takes sincerity to be kind." (Beth Moore)
5. Get deeper into the Word. I do the Bible Studies and the homework, but I want to learn more, and go deeper.
6. Learn to sew.
7. Master my scroll saw and jig saw.
8. Keep in better touch with my MS peeps.
9. Catch up on the scrapbooks I have to do for Kirsten.
10. Practice counting my blessings every day.