Looking forward

No New Year’s resolutions around here. I really liked Xan’s post the other day and I enjoyed reading Annie Rie’s post Six at Sixty. I have accomplished many things over the past year and will continue to make my lists and continue to check items off those endless lists. I much prefer my to-do lists to resolutions.

Am I going to start a New Year’s list? Heck no, my other lists are still way too long! There are times I feel like I have been sitting around and I wonder if I have accomplished anything, but when I start to think about the things I have done and the things I have accomplished I lighten up a bit. Not all things are huge and noticeable.

I am happy to have the opportunity to explore new things, plant more vegetables, walk next door to visit the neighbors, and be involved in some local community things. I am grateful for my husband and my family, and the time we have had together and the memories that go along with living our lives. I look forward to more exploring, more veggies in the back yard, more visits with the neighbors. I look forward to more memories and time spent with family (and friends.)

Tomorrow is a new day. I look forward to many new days in this New Year. I hope you do to.

Sincerely, Emily

 

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Oh why not: New Year’s Resolutions

Eat sensibly

Buy one item from Eileen Fisher (and only one, as it eats up the clothing budget through 2023)

Local beer

Local whisky

Do every household project that costs under $50, seriously

Get out of town

Watch everything on the Netflix queue

Speak a foreign language to a native

Get over it

Homemade pasta (that’s for you, Susy!)

Find a nice girl for my son (any takers?)

Call my father

Write to Congress

What are your resolutions?

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New Year’s Resolutions and all that Silly Jazz

Well here we are again, teetering at the edge of a brand new year.  The possibilities are endless, the potential profound…

The resolutions annoying!

I don’t know about you but I make grand and sweeping resolutions each year.  I’ve had elaborate  plans in the past that were to make my home and garden a sanctuary, a haven, a shining example of beauty and orderliness.

Then reality up and bites me and I am back to the exact same place I was on December 31st.

I still have the same amount of kids (sometimes more from the previous year), there are still piles of laundry that won’t do themselves (darn them)  The self-cleaning kitchen of the future has yet to be invented and… the camel still eats the roses!

So this year I am trying something new…

Instead of making resolutions I am forming a plan.  A concrete plan with steps to implement and a specific goal in mind for both my house and my garden.

For my garden instead of saying I will grow enough vegetables so that I will never have to buy any at the grocery store again (yes that was an actual resolution) I am going to put in a strawberry bed.  I have a spot, I have a plan of how I want to build it, it is a very specific and attainable goal.

I have a short list of projects that are reasonable and do-able over the year.  I no longer have grand visions of garden clubs wanting to tour my garden because it is the most neat, orderly and beautiful they have ever seen…no I just want a bigger strawberry bed.

For my home it is not about adding onto or decorating it with scrumptious fabrics and deep paint colors…it is simply about de-cluttering.  Over the course of the year I plan to go room by room and sell/give away/get rid of that which we don’t use.   I’m not going to make the resolution that I will keep my  house clean from now on…hahaha….I have 5 kids that is never going to happen, yet that has been a past resolution…one that crashed in about mid January!

But getting rid of most of the clutter…that is attainable.  Especially if I get rid of the clutter when no one is looking!

I  need to find a way to make it easier and simpler to keep the house clean.  Not by cleaning more, but by having less to clean…

The same applies to the garden.  I don’t need to build gazebos to sit and drink tea under…but I do need make a few changes that will keep my garden from taking over ever spare moment of my time.  I need to work more efficiently…not more.

So no big resolutions this year for me except this one…

I will simplify my life

And I have a plan to do it…

So what about you and the new year…any plans/resolutions/ideas that you want to share with us?

Kim can also be found at the inadvertent farmer where she raises organic fruits, veggies, critters, kids, and…a camel!

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