New Year Habits, Hopes and Goals

I don't like the term "resolutions," especially paired with New Years. I think there is just too much of a connotation of you plan to do better, but New Year's Resolutions so often fail, that telling someone that you have made one almost negates it as a legitimate goal.

So I have made some resolutions, because although I don't like the term, I do like the idea of using the New year as a fresh start on commitments that you have always intended to do anyways, but I am going to call them New Year habits that I want to establish.

Don't judge me too harshly for these habits I am trying to establish... because I know for most of you, they are already so second nature that it is almost sad they are the habits I want to establish.

One of them is simply to "try" every morning. In previous years there were days that I would put forth effort in my outfit and hair and makeup... but they were usually special days, like conferences or a date night etc. The rest of the days, I wasn't a slob... but I really wasn't trying- no makeup, hair in ponytail kind of days. Blake has mentioned to me on occasion, that he likes it when I try (not that he doesn't like me when I don't try) and I think that it was somewhat sad that I would try more on a regular basis for the parents of my students than I would for my husband who sees me every day. So... since the year started, I have taken the bit of extra time in the morning to make sure that my outfit, hair and makeup look good before I leave and I hope to establish and keep this practice as a habit.

The other habit that I have done well on off and on is picking up the house each night before bed and getting it back to a base level good. Our house is never really messy, but when there is a sweatshirt out here, shoes out there, it starts to pile up and look cluttered. But if I put all those little things away every night, then the house will stay clean. Also, my half of kitchen chores is the drying and putting away, but there would be some nights that I would leave some things in the dish drainer, and then those would pile up into a huge chore. So instead, I am making sure that all dishes are as put away as possible. My New Year habit is to make this a nightly thing, not just a sometimes thing.

My 2012 hope is that we have our child home sometime this year.

My 2012 goal is to continue training, and do my 10k, and half marathon this year, and prepare for next year's marathon.