New Year, New Goals

I've never really made New Years resolutions, but I wanted to make some small goals for myself this year.  After our family grew by one this fall, I just felt the need to reprioritize my life and really focus on what I want to get out of it.  I'm going to take a page from my very wise and not very much older sister and try to do a goals check-in every month so I keep my goals at the front of my mind.  

1. Physical health: 

• Eat better:  We are doing really well with weekly meal planning and I'm actually learning to like cooking.  I want to keep this up.
• No more than 1-2 diet pepsi's a week (I have an obsession, and I don't like tea or coffee...and I'm tired a lot.)
• Start back with working out.  I haven't quite decided how I want to go about this one but I'm going to start with Jillian's Michael's 30 day shred this month and I'd love to find some spin classes near me.

2. Emotional health:

• Spend less time watching t.v. and more time making sure my kids, my husband and myself are happy.  This makes it sound like I don't pay attention to my kids which is the opposite of true.  I've just been feeling pretty overwhelmed with everything I want to and need to do.  I think the root of my problem is how much t.v. I like to watch.  I just need to cut back.
• Get out with my husband or alone at least once a week.  This is for my whole family's good.  I will be much more tolerant and tolerable to be around.  (Now I need to find some baby sitters I can call on at a moment's notice.)
• Try to spend more time on my blog.  It's not that I want to be a really popular blogger or anything.  But I do really love my blog for many reasons: a. I get to vent and get my frustrations out and share woes with other mom friends of mine, b. this is where I go back to when I want to remember something specific about Kayla/Brody from the past.  It's like my own personal memory bank and I don't want to slack off on that because I know I will regret it later.  (This is another reason I need to watch less t.v.)

3. Personal goals:

• Photography:  I was going to potentially start the 365 Photo project (still debating whether I can feasible keep up with this.)  I desperately want to take classes and actually earn a photography certificate or something (this is just how I believe I would best learn) but if nothing else, I'd like to try to find 1-2 new techniques each month that I can learn about online and practice.  
• My 101 list.  I've been seriously slacking and I want to bring it to the forefront again.
• Really focus on trying to progress my career in the direction I want it to go.  I know I only work part time, but I love my job and I still want to be able to move forward.

I want to be a whole new Melissa this year - a better mommy, wife, daughter, sister, friend.  I want to set a really good example to my kids.  That's what's important to me.

(Oh I would also like to buy a house with my husband soon.  That'd be great.  Brody would like his own room (a.k.a. Mommy would like Brody in his own room. Not that I don't love cuddle time, but I think he might sleep better.)

Here are some random photos.  Brody seems to like tummy time and Kayla seems to like to do tummy time with Brody.  So I get lots of pictures of them there. :)

P.S. Do you like the new blog look?  Justin actually helped me with this one. :)