My good friend Lesley took this picture of Christian. I just love it.

I am not good with resolutions. Big, sweeping changes just don't happen all of a sudden because it's January. And yet this is a good time of year to look forward and set goals. It helps me to post them on here so I can find them in a few months!

My original Things I Want To Do list was incredibly long, so I decided to divide them up by what role they fall under (wife, mama, etc) and limit myself to just a few per role.

To do for my self...

1. do an in-depth study of Proverbs 31 (I'd like to do something like Monica's Crafter's Walk Through Proverbs 31 as well)
2. start doing TTapp for exercise (I tried it for awhile in the fall and loved it, but it was too hard to hold the book open while exercising! I'm spending a little Christmas money on a video)
3. read 12 books for fun (in addition to all the "have to" books, which I enjoy, this will be the Grace Livingston Hill novels and Gone With the Wind and so forth and so on...I can't wait!)

To do as a wife....

1. plan a date night with Casey every month, even if it's just a park the kids in front of a movie and eat a nice dinner in the peace and quiet kind of date.
2. write Casey more notes and letters
3. have more fun
4. plan a short trip for our anniversary (15 years!)

To do as a mom...

1. plan more family fun (short trips and family nights)
2. teach Christian to sit in church with us like a big kid
3. work on my attitude (I may never control my frustration perfectly, but I'd like to do better this year than I did last year)

To do as a homeschooler....

1. go to a convention
2. get our year end reports in order
3. work with Brenna on her reading without either of us getting stressed

To do as a homemaker...

1. learn to make really good bread (so excited I got this for Christmas!)
2. grow vegetables and herbs (got this too!)
3. reduce our grocery budget
4. deeply declutter one room every month
Wish me luck!

Library Booksale!

I meant to post about our incredible library book sale months ago. We got all of this, about 60 items including books and movies, for around $20. You buy a box or bag for a set amount and cram as much in as you can. And I was happy to know that the money was going to the library, which we use constantly. With a good library system I really believe I could homeschool the kids for nearly free if it was necessary.
Some of these books are ones that will be passed along after we use them and some are ones that I've been interested in for ages.
Now the challenge is to start getting our own library organized!