Happy New Year

I am thrilled to report that my deepest Christmas wish, the one I had actually been praying for, came true--JoyBaby crawled on hands and knees on Christmas Eve! Then a couple days later she crawled over to the coffee table and pulled herself up into a kneeling position. My husband and I are thrilled.

So, anyway, it is a new year and I have a few resolutions. The first is to declutter my house. The second is to watch less TV and give ImagiKid less screen-time overall. Thirdly, I plan to make the decision on what I want to get my master's degree in so that I can begin taking classes this fall. I am well aware that many people's New Year's resolutions fall flat, including many of mine in the past, but I am going to create an actual plan to help me accomplish these goals.

I am goint to use the book It's All Too Much by Peter Walsh (#2 on my Winter Reading Challeng List) to help me declutter my house. I have also enlisted my husband's help with this one, and as per the book's instructions, he has helped me sit down and write out our vision for our home.

As for watching less TV myself, I plan to only watch shows I have set timers for on DVR and also go through and edit my list of timers. I realized how much more productive I have felt the past couple weeks with all my regular shows on hiatus for the holidays. I think that I have been allowing TV to take me away from things that are just as relaxing but also give me a greater sense of accomplishment. I am also going to start giving ImagiKid coupons for screen-time each day. I think this will help me set limits more firmly and also teach him to be more aware of how much time he spends watching movies or playing V-Smile.

I guess I don't have much of a plan for resolution #3 yet. Even though it really only requires thinking and not any physical labor, self-discipline or imposing my will on someone else (for their own good of course), it is the most difficult of all. Making this decision will determine what I do with my life after my kids are in school. It will affect how much money I make, how much time I will be able to spend with my family, how satisified I feel in my career and with my contribution to society, and many other things, including some I'm sure I haven't even thought of. When I was eighteen, I moved away from home and went to college and after changing my major a few times, decided to be a teacher. I felt like I would be doing something that would help other people, and I do think that I did a decent job of being a teacher, even though I didn't do it for very long before having my son. But I don't know if any eighteen-year-old is really ready to decide what they want to do with the rest of their life. For that matter, I don't even know if I am ready at 28, going on 29! So, wish me luck with this one.

I searched on the web for useful information about how to keep your resolutions and this is one article I found interesting: A New Year's Resolution Revolution. A lot of other websites say some of the same things, but this one also encourages you to look at what you've done right and helps you focus on what areas you should truly try to improve. I also like this website, just for fun: History & Fun Facts About the New Year.