five goals for 2010

I figured I'd outline my goals for the new year, while you all get to see some cute pics of my kids on their nature walk yesterday.

Goal #1: Don't over schedule myself. I've done a fair job of keeping the kids' schedules reasonable and in keeping with the overall seasonal rhythm for our family. Myself, not so much. I overextended myself the latter half of this fall by participating in a course that I really wanted to take, for many very good reasons, but which has sapped my time and energy away from my family, and made it very difficult for me to be present with them for large chunks of time. I think I've learned my lesson, and will stay away from that sort of thing (or at least keep it to a bare minimum) while my kids are still "little". You would think this would be an easy goal to keep, but for me it's a challenge, because in general I quite enjoy being busy, busy, busy, and there are so many things left to do in this life that I haven't even attempted yet. But I'm going to focus on my other goals for the year to help keep me present with my family.


Goal #2: Another major organization/de-cluttering project. I go through this every so often -- I feel the need to get rid of the mass of STUFF that has accumulated around here, and organize what is left into some sort of usable format. My goal is to find a place for anything we have left after a massive cleaning binge, so that when whatever it is is needed, we can find it, and whenever we're done with it, it has a place to go back to. Mostly we just need to have less stuff. I'm sort of a paradox -- ideally I would love to live in a little one-room cabin, with just the essentials of life around me. (Ask The Map Man about my desire to be in a small space -- it drives him crazy!) Yet I own more stuff than a house this size (small, yet still about 4 times the size I feel I "need") can fit. What I need is a 200 sq ft cabin to live in, and a 4000 sq ft mansion to stash all our stuff.... No, seriously, we just need a LOT less stuff.

Goal #3: Encourage growth of friendships for the kids. Finally, an easy goal to meet!! I've already got everything in place for this -- we're already involved in groups that meet regularly and have friends we see regularly. Getting together with them as often as possible and continuing to give the kids opportunities to deepen friendships is a big priority of mine for this year. To further that end, my friend T is organizing a new little Enki-ish co-op which I'm very excited about our family participating in. The only thing I really have left to do is to find some play dates for Zoo Boy, who has been a bit discouraged because J no longer wants to spend all day in pretend play, while the Boy most certainly still does.

Goal #4: Further movement towards self-sufficiency for our little homestead. This should be an easy one, too. While sifting through my priorities over the last year, I realized how important this is to my family, that we be able to grow as much of our own food as possible. We've already tried our hand at pigs (which we've decided to take a break from this year, as there are a couple of management issues we'd like to resolve before we do that again), and we've been very successful raising lamb, eggs/chickens, and ducks. We're going to add Turkeys this year as well, and possibly rabbits too. And a big goal of mine is to finally get a good vegetable garden going. I'm excited!!

Goal #5: Finish my book. Yeah, I wrote a book, on a whim, the first half of last year. It's nothing too earth-shattering, just a romance novel. I've actually been away from it for the past 6 months or so, giving it a rest before I come back to make some major changes. But it's been on my mind lately, and I feel ready to pick up with it again. It's no where near to the point where I would let anyone else read it (well, I let the Map Man read it after my 2nd draft), but I'm pretty pleased with it. I'm not sure if I'll ever seek publication for it, but I do want to get it to the point where I'm not totally embarrassed at anyone seeing it before I start on my next book. (I actually have fleshed out ideas for two more, none of them related.) It makes me feel a little bit like a writer, which makes me happy. And making myself happy was the entire point -- it's my own selfish little project!

So them's the goals -- we'll see how I do with them! I feel like I was pretty successful with the 2009 goals, hopefully I'll have that same feeling of accomplishment at the end of 2010!