This year, you will succeed.

That's right, this year you will all succeed at your new years goals—because I am going to remind you at the end of each month to review your goals, evaluate your progress, and adjust your goals as needed. You don't have to do this publically, but you will do it. And, if you happen to review them on your blog, it will be a nice reminder to everyone who reads your blog. Come on, pay it forward. This time next year, we will all be superhero's and will form an alliance that will put the justice league to shame.

For brevity, I am not going to restate the full details of each of my goals. If you would like to compare, here are my 2011 goals (but remember, they are not new year's goals, they are just goals I happened to set a week or two after new years).


1. Read:

• Iv'e read the Nov., Dec., January, and part of the Feb Liahona issues.
  
• I've also read a very long, albeit modern translation, "abridgment."of the Iliad.
  
• selections from St. Augustine's Confessions
  
• Exerpts of the Epic of Gilgamesh, Pyramid Texts, Book of Dead, Triumph of horus, Code of Hammurabi, and other Ancient texts.

2. Travel Nothing yet. I am a failure.

3.Walk Polo NO improvement yet. Still a few times a week only.

4. websiteI now know how to put up quick photo collections onto my website. I've only done it once for my sister's baby pictures (made it private w/ b's help) Still no home page.

5. Education I've watched 3 hours 40 minutes of typography videos on Lynda.com. learned a few typsetting/composition tricks as well as lots of things about fonts I didn't know (such as faux bolds vs. bolds, x-height, etc).

6. Build a better garden: So far all I've done is collect a heep of large yogurt containers to start seeds in.

7. Exercise: January=

• 12 trips to the gym in January,
  
• an estimated 2,310 calories
  
• about 8 hours (I read while I worked out, so it slowed me down a lot).
  
• lost 4 pounds for about a week, then gained 2 back (the week I ate PB Cups and didn't work out b/c of work)

8. Baking from scratch

• 4 loaves of bread (2 batches),
  
• Peanut butter (yum),
  
• cookies (thank goodness I gave 3/4 of those away),
  
• Peanut butter cups (Messed up with chocolate, must try again),
  
• buttermilk,
  
• chicken noodle soup (right now, for my cold),
  
• daily porridge,
  
• lots of smoothies.
  
• and many simple meals.

9. Sugar addiction: Only a few store bought infractions (though B made sure to round up the month by brining home more than he usually does to fatten me up), gone a few days each week (though not in a row) without eating candy/baked goods/etc. May not seem like an improvement, but believe me, it is.

10. Time management: Not sure how to evaluate this. I got a lot of reading done, wasted little time online, watched less TV, but was still a little late on my work stuff. Plus, I'm blogging right now, when I should be working)

11. Praying w/ B On and off, but more times this year so far than last year combined, so props to me.

12. Family Been less frivolous with money to save up for adoption (since the car wreck emptied that savings). Started going to bed on time, and charting my BBT- attempting to chart other F.A.M. factors as well so that I have data for a doctor to look at. Even made my own custom chart for it all with my own symptoms, etc. .

Four-Seed Buttermilk Bread

Remember this book? I decided that since the Challah came out great, I would attempt a third bread recipe from the book (Book recipe for bread attempt #2 disappointed me).


Here is some of the goodness in this (Four-Seed Buttermilk Bread) bread:

Blugur
sunflower seeds
Pumpkin seads
sesame seeds
millet
buttermilk (I made my own!)
honey (raw)
wheat bran

and the best part is it didn't taste overly healthy (probably because it does use lots of flour, so it isn't super grainy).
I liked it much, and would totally make it again.

A good butter or peanut butter bread, don't think it would be a good jam bread.

B's complaints: I used unshelled sunflower seeds, which made it too chewy. next time used shelled.

"...for at least a few years" : of work and motherhood

I was reading a former R.S. sister's blog entrywhere she was talking about being a stay at home mother, and how it doesn't drive her has crazy as it seams to do to many other stay at home moms. She briefly mentioned that maybe this was because she had the chance to work for 5 years in the field she studied before they adopted and she stopped working...

This got me to thinking about something I've occasionally thought about, but rarely (or never?) shared.

In college a photo teacher asked us each a question. "What would you like to achieve with your photography, after graduation, to feel satisfied." I didn't realize it then, but my answer said a lot about me.

Woman after woman answered "I'm just want to be a stay-at-home mom. " Only a few of them even bothered working photography into their answers— something like "take some artistic photos for my home," and "take great photos of my family." There were even a few ambitious "maybe do a few photo commissions when my kids are in school" (the class was for photo majors only and had only 1 or 2 males in it).

I remember thinking "what a waste."

Don't get me wrong, I actually do think that being stay at home mother is important; I know that I myself couldn't be as great of a mother if I was trying to be a working mom. I can say in all honesty, financial circumstances permitting, I have never wanted to be a working mom. (I do have friends that are working mothers, and I promise I respect them and don’t think they are horrible hell-bound people, but this simply wasn't something I’ve ever wanted to do.

But the idea of getting a University degree you didn't even intend to use seemed stupid to me. I mean, yes, family should be a high priority, but had these girls even considered a plan where they weren't married with 18 kids? or one where they might be widowed or have an unemployed husband and might actually need to use their expensive education to support themselves? Were they just majoring in photography because it was a good major to do nothing with?

So, never having really considered his question before, I tried to think quickly about what I should say. I considered saying "I want to be able to do photography if something thing happens where my husband cannot work."

But that isn't what I said.

For whatever reason, I changed my mind at the last second and told the teacher that, I would like to use my education to be the bread winner for at least a few years (whether I was single and supporting my self or if I was married), and as long as I was able to do that, then I would be satisfied to be a stay at home mother, one with the skills to work again if something happened where I needed to work, or wanted to go back to work when the kids got older.

He had a rather puzzled look on his face when I said this. Maybe he had just come to terms with the fact that all of these females that made up the majority of the major were simply a waste of his time as a mentor/teacher. I don't know.

but eventually he said that this was an answer no one had ever given him before. I couldn't tell whether he was happy about my answer or not. Maybe he hadn't yet decided what to think about that answer, but that is not the moral of this story.

The point is that I mostly forgot about this answer of mine. I started dating Brett, we got married, and for a while I was a bit unhappy (not with Brett, mind you... I mean, have you met him? Seriously, I scored big time there). I had had two scripts for life at the close of college, but my situation didn’t seam to fit into either script

(script |skript| noun, Psychology: the social role or behavior appropriate to particular situations that an individual absorbs through cultural influences and association with others).

Script 1- I would face my fears and be ambitious. I would go for an awesome internship in LA or New York— an internship that would get me started, even if I never made it big, and hopefully end up in the Album cover niche.

Script 2- If I got married instead, then I would embrace family life.

Well, I had a problem. I was married. Brett was still in school, and we couldn't leave and tackle the world. I did not want to be a wedding photographer especially because we had no intention of staying here long (oh look how great that worked out) so it would be a waste to build up cliental

I had no script for this. So, I worked. Dumb job after depressing dumb job. I was never quite happy with this place I was at— this place in life where starting a family wasn't practical—a place where leaving Brett behind to start a career elsewhere was just stupid (I mean, have you met Brett? Why would I even tempt fate with a long distance relationship?)

It wasn't until I finally got forced out of a job (company bought out), and almost started working in a grocery store that I realized my problem. So what if I couldn't embrace the photo career I had planed for? I wasn't going to be satisfied with a job I could’ve done just as well in H.S. . I needed to work with my education, even if that meant making minimum wage at a photo processing center. So I canceled on my Macey's Deli job one hour before training was to start, and I went job hunting.

Within a week I got two photo related job offers. Both more than I minimum wage, but less than I made at APX alarm doing phone surveys.

Best decision I ever made. The job isn't perfect, or glamourous... I could probably make more at photography else where, but the job does it's job, and I've been able to use my degree to support my husband through school for several years now, and it feels good. Really good.

So back to that blog I was reading. I think she was right. After working and supporting the husband through school for a few years, (and in my case buying our first home, or at least the first year and a half of it) I am constantly proud (gasp, deadly sin) of the huge contribution I've made to our lives, and I can honestly say that it’s help prepare me for the day when children come and I leave the financial responsibilities to B.

I needed to let him be a leach for a while so that when the rolls reverse, I wouldn't feel like one...

And that's where I become one of the odd few that could perceive infertility as a blessing. I think the Lord knew that I was one of the few who wouldn’t be crushed by the prospect of having to adopt, and that that in the end I would gain a healthy sense of accomplishment that would later allow me to eventually feel whole as a wife and a stay at home mother.

In with the New

These aren't New years goals, they are just Goals I happened to make/revise in January.



1.  Read: 4 fiction, 2 nonfiction, all 12 issues of the Liahona (I’m horrible at reading magazines). I can do 12 books, I’ve proved that, but in order to encourage more learning, I am giving myself more time to devote to nonfiction (because those are rarely “can’t put it down” books.)

2. Travel: There are many exciting landmarks here I have never seen, Heck. I haven’t even seen the Great Salt Lake. Because visiting nearby PARKS will overlap with some of my other goals, and because I want to use vacation time towards the upcoming family reunion, I’m not setting in stone any goals to see “washington state” or “DC.” Instead, my travel goal is to EXPLORE UTAH.
3. Stewardship: Polo is my responsibility. I took a life- form into my home, and it is not fair to keep him cooped up. He is such an easygoing loving pet, I don’t want to forget that dog’s need exercise, which is why I am repeating my goal of trying to walk him (not just take him out to potty) everyday.

4. Portfolio: This might be the year I finally put up my webpage. Most important though, I want to catch up on color correcting my personal /family photos. This was a goal last year that I didn’t do too well on. To be fair, I did better at keeping up with the photos I actually took in 2010, but I still have some old ones sitting & rotting; family bugging me for 2 year old photos...

5. Education: I’m one of those people who doesn’t do that great staying “current” in the field I work in. I don’t like that. Laziness leads to staleness. I do not want to be stale. I have a few months of free Lynda.com viewing. I want to watch tutorials on Typography, CS5 InDesign (software update changes), CS5 Photoshop (software update changes), CS5 Illustrator (which I hardly know at all), and various videos on web design/programing. (B is always wanting to teach me to write web pages).

6. Garden take 2: Hoping I’ve learned lessons from the inefficient gardening of 2010, I want to make a more successful Garden this year.

7. Exercise: (see, I can be like EVERYONE ELSE). I want to exercise 4-6 times a week, even if it is only 15 minutes. Last year I wanted to make exercise more fun and some of my unmet goals included taking a dance class, and going snowboarding and get all the way down the bunny hill with out falling. I’m not going to repeat those goals, because it is not what I am feeling this year. I might still incorporate those into my fitness, time and money provided, but right now I am leaning more towards the following: (a) Going to the gym when it is cold and icy, or when I don’t have time to travel. (b) get up my cardio endurance so that I can go biking with Nathanial a few times this summer without being a total draaaaaagggg. (c) Go on a hike (if even small, and down the street) twice a week (Brett upped this one, I had 3x a month). (d) Backpacking at least once! We’ve finally accumulated all the stuff we need now.


8. Baking from scratch: I made huge improvements last year, and I want to continue this journey... try to make salad dressings, have more things fresh, less additives, preservatives, and pesticides (because the less work your organs have to do to remove toxins). Oh, and because I really enjoy learning to cook intuitively... and almost everything tastes better homemade once you’ve found the right recipe. Exceptions might include Oreos. Also, I want to learn to identify edible plants, and try cooking with at least a few.

9. Addictions: I need to control sugar. This is going to be one of those lifetime journeys, I’m sure. Some people don’t have a sweet tooth. I am not one of those people. I’m not going to go for “no sweets,” because frankly, One cookie a day would be a huge improvement over my current habits. It is a wonder I haven’t gained more weight than I have. Too my credit, my actual food is much healthier than it used to be (since I have been doing more from scratch, eating occasional vegetables, learning to drink water), it’s only the sugar that gets me.

10.Time Management: I improved a bit last year. I still am not very disciplined, but at least I cut down Facebook and blog-stalking tremendously. I no longer check everyone’s pages for blog updates daily (usually 4-6 times a month now), I also now pretty much only check immediate family for status updates every few days on FB. Still, I am going to get better at time management. I will get my sleep schedule under control, I will get into more of a 9-5 work mode so that I force my self to work daily and uninterrupted time slots, so that I can more fully enjoy my spare time instead of having to put in 18 hour work days to catch up. It will make it easier for me to schedule activities and not say, oh, I can’t do it, cause I should get work done... and then not even get that work done.



11. Praying with Brett: We were never good at this, mostly because Brett was too shy to do it in front of me at first, and I was too stubborn to do it every time, and then later on my bed time wasn’t his. Recently we started praying fairly regularly, and for reasons i can’t figure into words, I really like it. It’s nice. I am grateful the Lord gave us time to come into this on our own time, instead of sending curses and trials until we learned to fall to our knees. I want to make this a habit.


12. Expand our little family: This will require quite a bit of over eating. Har har har har har...I’m thinking that April would be a good time to put our adoption papers in, get our profile ready, etc. As an alternative plan, watching my nephew's birth was absolutely fascinating. It has me vaguely considering fertility treatments simply because birth is so amazing, and I think everyone should watch a baby being born, and chances are that Brett will never get to see one if it isn’t me. If you’d like to be considered for delivery room access, please submit your application in writing. Brett’s telling me right now that in all honesty, he doesn’t really want to see it . Tough luck Brett, your in. Sure, I forged your signature in the application, but I did a good job, so it will stand up in court.

Brett’s suggested goals:
kiss brett once a day
make brett a smoothie once a week
Don't make Brett do dishes

Out with the Old

... or what I may or may not have done in the last year.

I'm not big on New Years Resolutions. It's not that I'm anti goal, Its just that I hate the idea of making them once a year, then giving up when you fail, and waiting setting the goal again a year later.

Goals are not annual things. You start working on them when you are inspired to, you don't put them off until New Years. You plan to succeed, and expect a degree of failure. When you fail, you reset the goal and try again. Many changes can take years. The point is to not give up, and instead keep hitting that reset button. You don't say, "Ug. I was going to exercise 5 days a week, their are only 3 days left and I've only worked out once... It is too late to make it to 5 days this week, so I'll just start again next week." No, you hit that reset button and say, "My workout week now starts on Thursdays. I have until Wednesday to reach this goal. If I succeed, I will try and do it again.

I had one goal that I worked on for at least 12 years. Did I make it? Heck yes I did. And i am really really glad I kept trying, because I have no doubt my life is better for it.

Because I kept hitting that reset button.

And 10 or so years into it, Yes, I was frustrated. You can't help but loose a little self respect when it's taken that long and you still haven't reached your goals. But at some point I realized something. I was failing my goal less and less often. Instead of having to hit that reset button daily, I was hitting it weekly, then monthly, then every 3 months. And each time I did something that contradicted that goal, it took less and less time before I caught and corrected myself, until...

Poof! It stuck.
I'd reached that goal. I had no idea it would have taken me so long, but I did it.

And that is why I hate the concept of New Years Resolutions. Too often we put unreasonable expectations on ourselves. Not that the goals are unreasonable, but that what may take one person a year to accomplish just might take us 12. And because we should never procrastinate our goals, because too often that means forgetting them.

Unverified studies show that those who write down their goals and track review them often are incredibly more successful. I learned that in a business class. Probably the only useful thing I learned.

And I know it is true, because last January, I wrote down goals. I wasn't planning on making life changes, nothing was really on my mind, but I had a cool idea for a jewelry blog for work...A charm bracelet for your resolutions. So I forced my self to think about goals I wanted to set, and guess what, many I'd wanted to do for years, but they never happened until 2010. Go figure.

I guess Resolutions aren't so evil.

GOALS I Succeeded at in 2010!


1. Make my own cheese and yogurt at least once! I know, it is odd, but I have been wanting to do it for a year now. (I made yogurt once, cream cheese once, and buttermilk once. )

2. (12, book) Read 12 books. I miss reading. It is about time I made time to do it again. {I did it! I really feel it helped balance out my life too. There are just somethings each person needs to make them feel more whole)

3.Travel. I never travel except for family occasions, and while I’d love to travel the world, I am going to start with some smaller goals: Get myself a passport and explore the state of Washington. (Partial Victory. We didn't make it to Washington State. We blame it on the cost and timing of Brett's Surgery, but who knows if we would have made it anyway. I did, however, get a passport! It's a start. Canada, Tia Juana, here I come!)

4. Get into a routine of walking my dog every day.(Partial Success. Everyday? Not really, but There were phases in the summer where he would get two walks a day for most days, and even in the winter, he gets good walks a few time s a week... usually.

5. Plant a garden. It’s going to have to be a balcony garden, but at least I have a balcony now!( I did so much better than I had anticipated! I lucked out with the ward garden plot. I killed a lot of plants, but I watched so many sprout! I ate a few measly carrots, had good luck with the snap peas for Brett, Ate several helpings of swiss chard, and burned many calories weeding and hoeing. Added bonus, it felt like nesting and also made me feel more "whole"/balanced)

6. Make everything from scratch. By 2011, I want to be box free… no more store bought cake mixes, brownie mixes, or pancake mixes, etc.(I'm actually surprised at how well I did here. Seriously, look in my cupboard. Sure, we may not make our own pasta, Brett may have some crackers in there, and we have a few pasta sauces, but guess what? I have homemade pancake mix in there. I have no mac and cheese boxes (though I cheated in cali over christmas) no boxed dinners, no soup cans, and I always make my brownies from scratch. We've made and canned applesauce, pasta sauce (too sweet though), Soup, Lamb stock, etc. I make soups and stews from scratch often, probably cook 2-5 times a month, and even my quick meals are more or less homemade)

7.Make exercise fun. I want to get healthy through an active lifestyle and by playing hard like a kid. Gyms just don’t motivate me.Though this fell far short of what I would have liked, I have to admit that I improved. I wen't biking (street and tame-mountain), and hiking a handful of times. it really makes me feel alive. And for the miserable days, I've even managed to make the gym more entertaining by bringing Brett's Ipad with me and reading free domain books on it)


8. Get a more normal sleep schedule. Still screwy, still tend to stay up late into the wee morning, but I have gotten a bit better. I manage to correct my sleep schedule more often, and when I do, I can usually maintain it for a week or so...


Now, to review these, my non successes, and new ideas and to set more goals!

Nursery

Our Ward has no less than 3 nurseries, and by no less, I mean exactly.
Because we have over 70 nursery aged children.
and 1-2 babies born per month.

But I don't know where they all come from, because we don't have that many women in R.S.. I guess they are all about teaching in Primary or something.

I'm sure they are not all active, because we only had 10-ish in our nursery, though I know at least 2 moms walked in and decided to go home, because after Christmas, our ward was moved into the "church during nap time" slot.

The retirement communitie's ward was moved to our old slot, so that they could get home in time for nap time. Claim is, they were getting ornery during the 1pm-4pm slot.

Yesterday B & I spent our first day as nursery workers at church. B mostly just sat in a chair and stared, but he claims he wasn't bored. It was rather low key. I'm surprised that many kids can be in one room without too much drama. There was the usual bloody nose and toy stealing, but seriously, not too bad.

I need to find some nursery friendly clothes though. I'm thinking of wearing jeans under all my dresses, because seriously, It's not exactly the kind of job for a dress.

What have I been up to?

1. Not reading your blogs
2. Not checking facebook

Hope nothing huge happened.

okay, I've kinda checked facebook... when my email tells me someone commented, but aside from that, I've only occasionally checked what's going on with just my siblings.

3. Work Party. The day before we went on vacation, we went to my work party. Last time I went, I came away from the white elephant with a copy of our magazine. Nice thought boss man. I left it at his house. This time we got free dinner at the spaghetti factory, everyone got a set of movie passes, and I won a croquet set... which is what I won at the last raffle I wen't to (and we don't have a yard). Someone traded us for their prize, $30 bucks worth of itunes cards. We may not have won the expensive things like ski tickets, but hey, much better. I am aware that this is there cheep way of making us happy without raises or a christmas bonus, but I'll take it. It's an improvement

4. I haven't gone running since that last post about running. hmmm. Well, it isn't Christmas break unless you gain at least 2 lbs.

5. We finished the remaining soda's in two days @ the hospital

6. Got back from vacation to find a flatscreen in my bosses office, a soda fountain and few thousand dollar ice/water machine in the break area, and a sink full of coca cola cups (come on lazy people, when work gives you free soda, wash your own %$*&^ cups, or at least use one of the deposable cups.)

I've developed a craving for soda after Christmas, but fortunately work has a weird assortment of sodas. Someone really likes Cola's and see's no place for Rootbeer or Lemon/lime. The only one I remotely like is Red Cream Soda. It will be fun to see who in the office gains weight now.

7. I've gone to the gym 6 times in the last 7 days.

8. I've been doing something I can't tell you about yet.

9. I've found a way to view Lynda.com free, and have been watching Typography videos. anticipating all the fun things I can learn after I'm done with typography? HTML? Illustrator?

10. I've been cooking a little more.

11. I still really like sugar.

More Jackson

Jackson J. Erskine

Jackson James Erskine
1-1-11,
7:28 am
8lb 5oz