Parenting

Quantifiable things

1. I have exercised this week.  I’m stretching each morning and trying not to fall on my face. I’m following the Workout Trainer App on my Android and while I’m not in love with it, it’s better than nothing for a free exercise course to get me started.  Also, my friend Monaca and I agreed that we’re not getting any skinnier meeting for sweet rolls and floofy drinks, so we’re going to try walking in the future around Rose Rudman trails instead.

This is not Rose Rudman, but a walking trail close to home that I can use in the evenings. And these are the sweet kids playing there.

2. I have figured out a better daily schedule, but it includes me getting up at 5am.  Umm.  I’m not getting ahead on that plan, so I re-revised it and now I’m getting up at 5:30 and doing the aforementioned exercising in the comfort of my own room. Whee!  I’m also writing a bit more, not fiction yet, but daily stuff and a little poetry that’s rattling around in my brain lately.  Also taking care of the kids and trying to make life more sane.

3. I’m doing a Bible study off the YouVersion app and answering its questions. Not as good as going to one with other people, but way better for scheduling.  For real people, I’m going to a weekly book study on Raising Resilient Children (that’s the authors website).  It’s a really good book and has challenged me to respond better to my children.

A good book about child rearing. Go, read it! :)

4. Today I’m booking our trip to the UK for June.  Thursday night Nick and I are discussing our hotel options and more detailed itinerary.  Whee! (Two goals for the price of one?)

5.  I downloaded the My Fitness Pal app for the iPhone, since the SparkPeople app cost a ridiculous amount of money for the update (it used to be free).  So now I have two fitness pals (one a very skinny lady indeed and one person who I don’t remember at the moment) and I can track my food weirdnesses.  Whee!

See, we're eating healthier already! :)

See, we’re eating healthier already! 🙂

6. There is never going to be a #6.

7.  Scaling back on the internet, I figured out how to add people to my acquaintances list on Facebook, so they practically never show up.  It even suggested people.  Some of them I didn’t acquantintize.  Yeah, not a word.  Whatever.  Also, set all my newsreader subscriptions to Mark All Read so I’m not tempted to try to catch up and so am just starting over.  I may dump some, we shall see.  I also set my FB notifications to archive immediately so I’m not having to see them all the time.

NY Resolutions and 2013 Family Motto

Yesterday my little family took a tour of the house and looked around.   I mean REALLY looked at things: the socks on the floors, the fingerprints on the walls, the dishes on the coffee table, the unmade beds, etc, etc.

Messy bathroom

Messy bathroom

Then we had a little refresher talk about kindness.  We’d talked at church about ways to be kind to others at church (holding doors, handing out hymnals, bringing water to the disabled during fellowship time) and out in public (again holding doors, giving someone with less stuff the first turn in line at the grocery, etc).  We needed to think about how to be kind to each other at home. We talked about things like putting away items (clothes, dishes, toys, towels) when we are done with them so other people don’t have to, cleaning up our messes as we make them so they don’t get stuck on so someone has to scrub (rather than wipe) later, and wearing headphones when we’re with our personal electronics so we’re not disturbing the people around us.  Then we talked about our 2013 Family Motto.  We’ve never really had one before, but as I was reading FlyLady and trying to get back on my cleaning schedule, I’d really liked hers and thought we’d co-opt something like it.  “Be as Kind as can be in 2013”

 

My resolution this year is simply to take a bit better care of myself. To choose ME this year instead of others more often. Because I haven’t done that in a long time and when I look at myself and pay attention, I see that I am another year older, another 20 pounds heavier, and stressed out beyond belief. So I’m going to just be good to myself this year and see where that takes me. 🙂  My best friend mentioned that I need to break that down into a list of Things To Do, so I can check things off at years-end, which is not something I’m very good at remembering to do.  In fact, looking back, I fulfilled NONE of mine this year and didn’t appear to make any resolutions at all the several years before that (at least on the computer.  I might’ve on paper, now that I’m thinking about it).

 

Resolutions as Things To Do:

1. Exercise a couple or three times a week.  This can include, but is not limited to: walking, swimming, yoga, some kind of Wii sports, whatever gets my heart rate up, actually.

2. Drop a couple of my less-than-enjoyable obligations.  I already have two in mind, but I’m not sharing those here yet. 🙂

3. Investigate the idea of going back to school to be a media specialist for schools.  I’ve been asked about doing that a lot lately and while I don’t know if I am interested enough yet to go through with going back to school, I’d at least like to look into it.

4. Plan our trip to the UK.  Go there.  Enjoy ourselves as a couple, rather than as parents.

5. Date my husband more this year.  By more, I mean at least once a month go somewhere not chore related on our own and smile at each other.  Whee!

6. There is no #6.

7. Figure out a better daily schedule, so each day doesn’t feel like a crisis situation.

8. Pay attention to what I’m eating and drinking so I don’t eat a billion pieces of chocolate or all the french onion dip in just two sittings.  I don’t know how to make this one quantifiable yet, as the last two programs I tried that kept track of that stressed me out more than helped me.

9. Scale back on my internet time somehow.  I think this will involve dropping some of my newsreader subscriptions and the facebook friends I am not terribly close to will go to unchecked for updates. I’m also turning off a bunch of notifications, as I spend half my time these days seeing double updates, as facebook sends them to my inbox and the phone posts them twice.  So that will be done, too.

 

So that’s quite a lot for now.  Some steps have more than one step.  So exciting.  I’ll set myself a phone reminder to check the list midyear and see how I’m doing. 🙂