January Goals Update

We are just over a month into 2012 which is a great mile marker to evaluate how I'm doing on my year-long goals. Here is a look at how I am doing on my big goals:

Read 48 books. I read 6 in January (that's 2 ahead of my pace for the year) - 4 were "normal" reads, one audio book, and one read aloud to my daughter. I use Goodreads to keep track of what I read.

Memorize 52 Scripture verses. My husband and I are working the Fighter Verses together. We have 4 out of 5 weeks memorized right now, so that's a solid start! Also, we are working with our 3-year-old on memorizing the "Foundation verses" - these are shorter and have a visual aid to help them remember the passage. She has 3 of 5 memorized, and then yesterday came out with our whole week one verse, which is much longer!

Work on our Adoption. We have made only a little progress here. We are looking at different agencies right now and talking with friends who have experience with foster care adoptions. Hoping for some real news to report at the end of February!

Organize and Declutter. I'm loosely using Home Storage Solutions 52 weeks to a more organized home as a guide. I worked on the kitchen in weeks 1-3, thanks to my ongoing battle against food waste, I have very little to do in the fridge and freezer, and I'm hoping to get a shelf up in my kitchen this week to store my cookbooks in a location that makes more sense. I'm happy with this progress!

I have new motivation for making our home more organized thanks to Organized Simplicity. As I'm going through old papers, trinkets, and a few boxes that have yet to be unpacked from our move (3 years ago!) I am asking "is it beautiful? is it useful?" If the answer is no, I'm getting rid of it! I highly recommend Organized Simplicity; its an easy read with tons of practical advice.

Lastly, I have a fun ongoing project for this year. Every weekend I'm writing down one or two highlights from our week - favorite family activities, important things that happened, or special memories. Sometimes these are big, but sometimes just a little thing that I know would be forgotten even a few weeks from now. We're planning to read through them at the end of 2012. If you would like to join me, now is the time! You could probably come up with something from each week so far in the year by looking back at your calendar. But I know that if I don't write things down, they will be gone from my memory way too soon!

Do you have long term goals set for the next several months? If not, I cannot recommend it enough. Making a goal and breaking it down into manageable smaller goals has been so helpful for our family. Its great to be able to look back and see that we are making progress, even if it is not always quite as much as I had hoped!

Here is my original goals post.