New Years Resolutions - Looking Back & Forward

It's that time of the year again!  You know, the time of year when you make promises to yourself and your family that you won't keep and vow to change your life, only to give up on it a few weeks or even days later.

In the interest of stepping out against the crowd and actually changing my life for the better and keeping myself accountable, I'd like to follow up on the goals I made this time last year before I set any moving forward.  If you want to read last year's full post, you can see it here.

2013 Goals - Follow Up

• Have a healthy, happy baby in May.  I met this goal in the sense that we did have a happy, healthy Riley Rachelle, but we actually had her in June!  I only missed this goal by three days, and the point was more that she be born and born healthy, not hit her due date.  I got a little impatient waiting, but I know she came at the perfect time for her.  I give myself a check on this one.
• Be a more involved, active, and present member of my family.  This one is going to be a lifelong struggle for me.  I'd like to think with 12 weeks off on leave and working from home 2 days a week to be with my girls that I've gotten better, but there's still a lot of room for improvement here.  I am going to say this one is still a work in progress.
• Blog more.  This is by far the most posts we've had at the Lowe Down in one year, and I want to thank all of you for that!  Hearing how much you enjoy reading about our little slice of life keeps me going even when I don't think I have anything to say.  My goal last year was to blog twice a week, and we fell a few posts short of that this year.  Given that we had a newborn, I think we did pretty well.  I give myself a check here.
• Get the house decorated.  This will always be a work in progress for me.  I love to decorate and redecorate.  I don't think I'll ever sit back and look around me and say "done!"  But we got the majority of the house painted and decorated this year, even with Riley coming mid-year.  There's more to do, but I've actually relaxed and enjoyed the process for once.  Check here.
• Lose the baby weight.  This one isn't going well.  I have not been able to get motivated since having Riley.  No check here - more work to be done.

2014 Goals

• Lose weight.  I really can't blame Riley anymore, so I'll stop calling it baby weight.  This year I'd like to really get in good shape.  Ryan and I have a new elliptical machine coming, which was my favorite machine to use when I was pregnant with Alli.  We as a family are going to do a whole lot better on our eating in and cooking healthy meals for our girls.  We did all right on that portion last year, but there's always room for improvement.
•  Be a more involved, active, and present member of my family.  I told you this one was going to be a lifelong event.  I need to get up from my desk between 5:00 and 5:30 and stop working until 6:30 on the days I'm in the office.  I need to put the phone down and pick up the deck of cards.  And moreso than last year, I need to not let "grown-up" things like shopping and decorating and cleaning interfere with "kid" things.  I want to make sure Alli and Riley have a fun, wonderful childhood because I know that time is so fleeting.
• Get the house organized.  Two of the four members of my household are junk hoarders.  This is totally against my nature, and I get extremely frustrated when I'm surrounded by chaos.  I'd like to invest some time in organizing the cabinets, closets, and pantry and make sure we keep it that way.
• Take care of myself, too.  Not only do I want to lose weight so I look and feel better, but I want to be sure I take time to take care of myself in other ways too.  I want to paint my fingernails more, take time to style my hair, and get back into caring more about my wardrobe.  It's hard to be motivated to do that when you're overweight, so I hope losing weight really helps to motivated me on that.
• Continue to blog.  I love it, you love it, and I hope one day my kids love it.  Keeping a record of what we've done for a solid year helps me to feel accomplished and proud.  It also helps me to meet all of these other goals I've set.

Happy, happy new year to all of you.  May you resolutions be attainable, life-changing, and positive, and may 2014 find you counting your blessings and looking forward to what's coming.