A Time For Everything

 

Image courtesy of IMGBIN.

It's 2025 -- can you believe it?

On the whole, aside from how quickly the year flew by, it was a pretty good year.

On the other hand, in reviewing my 2024 goals...I fell really short in three of five of the major categories.

The journey to being debt free goes on, and I'm making progress. Mom's house finally selling and the money being dispersed really helped. But I also implemented some other protocols that have been keeping things on track. I haven't kept reading financial books as I intended, but debt is reduced. I do plan to re-read four of the books that had the biggest impact though.

The path to health and wellness took a left turn at Albuquerque. Instead of losing ten pounds, I'm now twenty-ish over my preferred weight. My eating is far from healthy. I'm using the Hinge Health app once again and was doing both yoga and Pilates for a while, but they both fell by the wayside.

BUT

I'm getting back on track starting this month. I received a bike for Christmas, so riding my bike is a thing I can do as well.

Writing was the biggest fail, but I've accepted that my brain is not yet ready to be creative in that way again, so I will continue to fill my well with reading, watching, and listening.

Housekeeping and Home Improvement were also a fairly big fail. I have no housekeeping plan in place and didn't improve much of anything inside the house. The back yard is another matter--made a few improvements there and I mostly kept up with the falling leaves. The weather / temperature will be the biggest factor in how much more I can do.

Letters to my grandma went out more regularly and, as I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, I met and exceeded my reading challenge. My pattern offerings on Etsy remained roughly the same...

So that's my report card on not just the fourth quarter, but my whole year as far as my 2024 fresh start goals are concerned. It wasn't great, but, sometimes, that's life. An you can start fresh at any time.

Speaking of starting fresh -- let's get to this year's fresh start goals!

Jen's 2025 Fresh Start Goals

1. Send Grandma a monthly letter...to be sent no later than the second Friday of the month. Yes, she's still alive, much to my delight and surprise. She was moved into hospice last spring, and turned 99 I think on her birthday in August. So if she makes it to August 23, 2025, she'll turn 100. That's very good news for me!
2. Read 60 books for the year. This includes the Bible (#5 on this list), so aiming for 59 other books. Quite a few will be be repeats from previous years because I enjoy them that much. And as mentioned above, there are four financial books to re-read, one each quarter. That brings me to 55 other books.
3. Home Improvement -- a) get the oven fixed, b) clean out and organize both hall closets, and c) clean out and rearrange my bedroom closet
4. Yard Improvement -- a) trim and maintain the holly hedge, b) plant flowers, c) finish tidying up the back yard in terms of things growing in the fence (we have a lot of random weed vines that I'm trying to eliminate) and kill/remove the random weeds in the "lawn"
5. Another read-through of the Bible. I've done two years of the "One-Year Bible" where you get some Old Testament, some New, a Psalm and a Proverb. I've also done a chronological read-through where you skip around and read the Books in the order in which they were written. This year, I'm reading the Bible beginning to end in the order in which the books appear.
6. Lose ten pounds. The ultimate goal is twenty, but I'm going to start with ten. Eating right and exercising is the only way to make this happen, so they don't get their own line items.
7. Self-Care -- gonna try this again. Mostly home pedicures because my feet are in bad shape as well as coloring my hair on a regular basis. But also things like crafting and puzzles.
8. Add Patterns to Etsy -- I've been saying this for years too, and last year I attempted setting up my own pattern website, but couldn't get any traction on customers clicking over from Etsy for the expanded pattern offerings, so I'm just going to stay with Etsy and get to adding. I'm going to stick with the goal of one non-hockey pattern per quarter still.
9. Take better care of my car -- regular car washes and vacuuming as well as cleaning the leather.

I looked back at the last four years of goals and I seem to be pretty set in my ways.

The new things added are Yard Improvement line item and Car Care. That's because I want to be more active and things need doing. I left off any writing related goals. I struggled all of last year to make any sort of progress and I decided to let things lie for now. The car care is probably self explanatory...

So HAPPY NEW YEAR to one and all.

All the best to you and yours.

 

 

Image courtesy of IMDB.

DH, DD, and I went to see this a couple of weeks ago as part of DH's birthday celebrations and it was really cute and somewhat of a tear-jerker. (Your mileage may vary on the tears, but mine flowed.)

From IMDB: After a shipwreck, an intelligent robot called Roz is stranded on an uninhabited island. To survive the harsh environment, Roz bonds with the island's animals and cares for an orphaned baby goose.

DD and I saw the trailer in one of our viewings of Twisters and made definite plans to see it. It's based on the book of the same name by Peter Brown.

I highly recommend the film, although I think by now it's no longer in major theaters. But if it comes to a streaming platform, definitely give it a watch. Also it has a message or two or three.

* * * * *

I'm a little late in my fresh start goals third quarter review, so quickly -- I'm not doing all that great. I made progress on five of twelve line items. *shrugs*

Sometimes life takes a detour. It's not a bad thing, but you're just not traveling the road you thought you would be. We'll see how the fourth quarter goes.

* * * * *

HOCKEY IS BACK !

So DD and I attended the home opener, which our boys in Victory Green won. They also won their season opener a couple of days prior as well as the two games following, to start the season 4-0... Then they lost game five to a team they probably shouldn't have lost to, but losses happen--can't win 82 games. We have tickets to Teacher Appreciation Night in December and the two bobble head nights in the spring. :0)

* * * * *

Hope you're well. Back in a couple of weeks.

 

Image courtesy of IMGBIN.

That's not to say 2023 wasn't productive because it was. I read sooo many books** and learned a lot of things. Mostly about finances: where I want to be and how to get there.

** Official book count (of books that I read) according to Goodreads was 55, but I probably read three or four of them twice. I even listened to the audio version of a couple of titles on top of reading the book. Also unaccounted for is all the fan fiction and hockey articles I read and podcasts (hockey or history) that I listened to. That's A LOT of input.

I've determined that I need to re-read some of those books, but there are several books I've never read awaiting their turn. So re-read immediately or go for the new info first...

Okay...started reading a here-to-fore as unread-by-me book:  Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey. :)

* * * * *

So...jury duty...I ended up being excused. They'd apparently gotten enough jurors for whatever case they were fixin' to prosecute, so I've done my duty for 2024 / 2025 according to my very last minute email.

* * * * *

2023: The Year of Abundance

Last year was supposed to be the year of abundance... And in many ways it was: family, love, time, productivity, and healing. But not in as many other ways as I'd hoped (financials, to be specific), but I'll take what I learned from all that reading and keep on moving forward.

2024: The Year of Doing

As you've probably gleaned from most of last year's posts, I'm on a mission to get out of debt and put money away for retirement.

That means that there will be little money left for anything other than debt-reduction. What I will have available is time and energy, so I'm going to turn my attention to doing the things around the house / yard that need doing.

Housekeeping, as you also know, has been an ongoing challenge for me, so that's part of the equation, but what I'm really talking about here are things like cleaning out the sheds, hauling off the yard debris we've gathered over the years from fallen trees and/or branches, clearing out the back corners of the yard behind the sheds. Etc, etc, etc... I've started the list, but there's plenty to get done.

* * * * *

So the moment you've all been waiting for! (lol)

Here are they...

Drum roll please...

My Fresh Start Goals for 2024

So back in October, when I gave my 3rd quarter report, I mentioned that the 2024 goals might look & feel different, and so they shall... I thought I'd mentioned that they'd be divvied up into categories, but I can't find that in a post, but it seemed the way to go.

• Finances
• Keep reading...
• Reduce debt / pay off a credit card or two.
• Health & Wellness
• Lose ten pounds
• Continue to utilize the Hinge Health app
• Get into a yoga routine
• Start eating healthier again
• Writing
• Spend time in the manuscript one a week.
• Housekeeping / Home Improvement
• Implement a housekeeping routine
• Carry out various home improvement tasks
• Miscellaneous
• Monthly missives to Grandma
• Read 57 books in 2024
• Increase my cross stitch pattern offerings

As listed, these aren't specific or measurable, but I do have a MS Word doc with all the details mapped out. Go me!

* * * * *

And last but certainly not least, in December, I lost another dear friend...

Goodbye dear Regina. You were a kind, gentle soul, and I know you're living your best life in heaven.

Taken in Granbury, June 2023. Regina is up front in the left corner.

Taken at Lake Conroe, June 2019. Regina is second from left, in the pink shirt.

* * * * *

Take care, dear friends.

Chat with you soon.

 

 

Image courtesy IMGBIN.

Hey there! Hope you're well. As you can probably tell--blog post title anyone? lol--it's time for my quarterly check-in.

The third quarter was a bit rough for several weeks as the anniversary of Mom's death in August hit me a little harder than I expected--which is to say I didn't expect it to hit me hard at all. Add to that the triple digit temperatures we'd been dealing with for weeks and weeks (and weeks) on end as well as "the turn" I mentioned in my last post.

So all that to say that I probably didn't do very well with my goals since the whole year hasn't really gone the way I anticipated. So, without further ado, let's dive in.

1) Send a postcard to my Grandma in Denmark monthly: I've been keeping up with this. August was Grandma's birthday and she got her usual flower delivery along with a letter.

2) Finish & publish Finders Keepers: not done; not gonna get done although I do want to finish it some day. Whether that actually comes to pass is hard to say. Just want to be realistic...

3) Exercise minimum 3X per week: I fell of that wagon. Grief and heat took its toll. I need to get back to doing my Hinge Health exercises if nothing else.

4) Read 52 books, including 6 non-fiction: I've read 49 books this year so far, ten ahead of schedule according to Goodreads. Six non-fiction books done and dusted. I've read seven so far, with one more waiting in my Kindle. One book tends to lead to the next, so I imagine another one or two will appear before the year is over.

5) Keep up my writers group duties on a weekly basis: I'm caught up as of this post but I wasn't very diligent about keeping up weekly. Mostly monthly, but summer is slow... And maybe I need to take a lesson from my history and reassess my plans going forward.

6) Add one non-hockey pattern per quarter to Etsy shop: Didn't happen. My plan became to have my own store and leave minimal patterns on Etsy, but due to a factor beyond my control, that project is currently stalled.

7) Self care: working on it. Sorta. I think. I think I need to do better.

8) Complete a home improvement project or two: Didn't happen; isn't gonna happen.

9) Read / listen to / watch my writers education items: Didn't happen; isn't gonna happen.

10) Continue to cook /eat healthy / adhere to a food plan: let's just say...I could be doing much better.

11) Stay on track with / up my game with the housekeeping: fell off the wagon here, but trying--albeit not very hard--to hop back on.

12) Keep blogging: I addressed that a couple of weeks ago. :0)

13) Write articles for my writers group newsletter: fell off the wagon here too and with everything else going on in my brain, I just haven't had a whole lot of inspiration. I have an article in progress, but it definitely needs some adjustments.

14) Finally study the Personality Strengths in depth: you know it's been three years and I'm pretty sure this isn't going to happen this year...

15) Get through the Bible in one year: totally on track here. And I've already decided that next year I want to go through the Bible in chronological order.

16) Keep up with / solidify my Goodreads habit: did pretty good until a month or two ago and other than tracking my book reading challenge, I couldn't care less about it any longer. So...we're done with that.

I've given myself grades in the past, but that's not where I'm at right now. Life has reached a crossroads and some of these goals no longer serve me. And that's fine. That's life, right? As the fourth quarter progresses and I assess where I am and where I want to go, I imagine that many of next year's goals are going to have a different look and feel to them.

I hope you're all well dear followers.

See you in a couple of weeks.

 

 

Well here we are again...time to see how I'm doing with those 2023 Fresh Start Goals. Without having given it much thought before settling in to write this post--I'm feeling good about things. Let's see if reality bears that out!

1) Monthly postcards to Grandma are being dutifully sent. I think I've finally got this one snockered. A+

2) Finish & publish Finders Keepers, book five of the hockey series... I didn't even open any documents in the first quarter. In the second I dig up all pertinent files and set to making sense of what I had. But they're not making much sense. I keep coming up with questions...why did I do this? Why didn't I do that? What does "that" even mean...whatever "that" is.

I've concluded that it's a hot mess in a dumpster fire and I seriously considered writing book six and then swapping the two in publication order. Since they're not linked chronologically, it wouldn't matter.

However, my game plan has changed and writing has taken a back seat for a while longer.

3) I am definitely exercising 3X per week; more often usually. And I'm reaping the benefits. Go me!

4) I'm on pace to read 52 books this year. Ahead, actually. Very very ahead. And definitely on track for the six non-fiction reads. In fact, I think I'm going to probably blow right past six... I'm on my 4th non-fiction book at the moment. :0)

5) I'm definitely not keeping up with writers group duties on a weekly basis. However, I spent a lot of time in the last couple of weeks a) getting caught up and b) contemplating how to streamline the duties so I can start training other people. I have new fish to fry and I don't want to be locked into being treasurer forever.

6) My Etsy shop does have a couple of new patterns for Q2. :0) I've got several things in the works, so Q3 should be fine. I'm also working slowly, so slowly on creating my own online store so I can list all me creations rather than being limited because of listing fees.

7) Self care...has been a work in progress. I'm not sure what I actually had in mind. Some of it was making sure I was seeing doctors and dentists in light of my mom's cancer and death, which I have done/am doing/will be doing. But it was also going to be things like pedicures and coloring my hair and taking time to do puzzles and cross stitch and read. All of which I do. But nothing seems part of a routine. And maybe that's okay as long as I stay in touch with myself...

8) There are no home improvement projects on the horizon at the moment. Mostly because I don't have the money right now. But perhaps I should create a fund and award myself some paltry amount each week. I did eliminate the monthly fee on my savings account...

9) I haven't regularly read anything / listened to anything / watched anything from any of the articles I've saved or the conferences I've purchased...and in light of me taking a longer than expected break from writing, this isn't a priority.

10) Doing pretty good on cooking / eating healthy -- as in I'm cook and eating more regularly. Is it all as healthy as it could be? No, not really. Is there a food plan and do we stick to it? Mostly, yes.

11) I'm doing well with the housekeeping plan. Finally. The little planner sits on the end of my desk so that I look at it each day when I get home from work. it takes me about an hour to accomplish my chores each day and every room in the house gets touched every week. Is there some deep cleaning that needs to be done? Yes. Am I going to be the one to do it? No. It'll have to wait until I can fund hiring a body to come in.

I do have a name though. A friend got robbed by one of her housekeepers and while I don't have any expensive jewelry lying around, there's still a fear that something meaningful or expensive will go missing.

12) I'm blogging. I'm blogging. I haven't missed in quite some time.

13) I've written a couple of articles for my writers group newsletter, but it's been a couple of months since the last one, so I guess I should come up with something soon.

14) Much as I love my Personality Strengths, I'm not sure when I'm going to get around to studying them in general, in depth. I own the books, so that's not the problem, but so many other books that pique my interest in that moment get my attention. But I imagine there will come a time...there is a time for everything, after all.

15) Bible reading / listening is on track. I haven't missed more than a day and I get caught up right away.

16) A visit to Goodreads is on the weekly schedule weekly, so it's going well so far.

I'm making progress on the important things, so I'm counting last quarter a win. Do I have room for improvement? Sure... Leaves me something to keep striving for. :0)

Hope you had a lovely weekend and here's to a great week.

 

 

Image courtesy of Pinterest.

It's that time again, dear readers, when I review the progress of my stated goals for the year. So without further ado, let's jump right in.

#1) For the first time in however many years, I can say that I am on track with sending postcards to my Grandma in Denmark!

#2) I haven't yet opened the Finders Keepers file, but I will starting in April. My annual writers retreat is in June this year and that's the project I'll be working on. And in preparation for the retreat, I'll be reading through what I've written so far, maybe making notes as to tweaks to make and scenes to add, etc.

As a side note, I'm "on track" with this--I hadn't planned on looking at this book until the second quarter to begin with.

#3) I'm not on track with exercising 3x per week... But I'm getting there. I was diagnosed with bursitis and prescribed PT as a result. Most of my "homework" on that front is basically yoga, so in order to keep my hips feeling fine and in actual good working order, I guess I'll be doing yoga for the rest of my life. I'll work my chair gym routine back into the mix and that will all come to fruition this quarter. 

Image courtesy of IMGBIN.

#4) I'm most definitely on track for reading 52 books this year, including those six non-fiction titles. According to Goodreads, I'm four books ahead of schedule in general and, as I mentioned at the beginning of March, I've read two, working on the third of my non-fiction books.

#5) I'm not on track for keeping up my writers group duties. I am mostly on track, I just haven't found the best schedule for staying current with it. Still working on that aspect of it.

#6) I added a non-hockey pattern right at the beginning of the year and haven't spent a whole lot of time working in this sphere of interest. I was for a while and then I had some higher priority things come up, but I am on track. I have the next three months to complete and list the next pattern or set of patterns...

#7) I'm definitely on track for self care. This encompasses a wide range of actions from watching TV to working on cross stitch patterns to doing my PT to hockey games to doing nothing. But I'm prioritizing it over many other things.

#8) I have not completed a home improvement project as of yet. I was hoping to do up the middle bedroom properly as the guest bedroom, and bought an actual headboard/bed frame for that purpose. But that project might have to be scrapped, but A) we'll see and B) I'm not technically off track with this either.

#9) I'm definitely off track with regards to reading / watching / listening to writers education. At least as far as my original intention went. I wanted to do something weekly, but as I mentioned, self care has been a priority which sometimes also means sleeping in rather than reading / watching /listening to something. I've done some--but not as much as I'd wanted by this point. The second quarter would be a good time to get this back into rotation.

#10) I am WAY OFF TRACK on the cooking / eating healthy / adhering to a food plan route. That is a priority in the second quarter as part of self care. But DH recently found an exercise plan of attack that will help with both this and #3...

#11) My housekeeping efforts are way off track as of right now. I did good for a while and then...I didn't. I've started penciling things back into my lovely little housekeeping planner.

#12) My blogging is most definitely on track...

#13) I have submitted one article to my writers group newsletter and am working on a second. So on track.

#14) I haven't gotten to the Personality Strengths books yet...

#15) Daily Bible reading / listening is on track. :0)

#16) Goodreads is up-to-date in terms of reading challenge data. This blog cross-posts there. I just need to pencil in the "ask-me-a-question" monthly or something.

Considering last year, I'm feeling fine about my progress. I'm feeling much better in general, both mentally and physically, but I'm still cutting myself some slack.

Hope you're all well. Have a great weekend.

 

 

 

In my 01/16 Fresh Start Goals post, I left three four of my goals a bit undone, so for accountability's sake I've come back to document that I did as I said I was going to do...

...which was to a) get an exercise regimen in place, b) get my treasurer's tasks identified and scheduled for each month, and c) have a workable housekeeping plan in place.

Here's how those goals are going to happen:

A) First of all, since Mom died, I've worked on getting back to my daily step counts. Every hour at the 50-minute mark, barring being in a meeting or at an event where getting steps at that point isn't feasible, I dutifully get up and get my steps in. Over the past several months, I've worked at upping the minimum average daily step goal.

Surprisingly, my phone tells me I've been averaging 5K a month since August. June and July were mid-4K, but since then I've been doing well. For some reason, I thought I was still cruising along just under 5K, but that doesn't appear to be the case. So 'well done' me. I don't have any desire to up that much further at this point....

...because getting steps in the manner in which I get them doesn't seem to burn an appreciable amount of calories. The doing of it mainly keeps me from getting stiff while I sit at my desk and work all day. Which is no small thing for me right now.

I'd been trying for weeks at the end of 2022 to get back to using the elliptical/recumbent bike, but I just couldn't seem to make it happen. Also it's very tedious, so there's just no enticement there. I might need to tie it to some sort of tv/video consumption activity. You know, pedal while watching something. Problem is, I don't tend to watch stuff on a daily basis.

I've also been wanting to get back to doing yoga. The problem there is also time. But I found a chair yoga plan for seniors. No, I'm not officially a senior, but these exercises will take all of ten minutes and get me started. I can upgrade in a month or two.

So I've been doing chair yoga at the end of the work day before I leave my desk. The rotation is three days exercise, one day rest. I'll definitely have to make a point of doing these on the weekend even though I may not be at my desk.

So steps, chair yoga, and I'm thinking about walking Rascal daily. He could use it, he would enjoy it, and I think I'd enjoy it too. But...time...we'll see.

B) After taking some time to think about the various treasurer tasks as well as pulling out the "duties by month" document I have, I outlined a schedule and noted it in my planner. I'm in my planner every day / week, so I should be good to go.

C) Finding a workable housekeeping plan was a challenge. And honestly I didn't really. (YET) But I did start noting chores in my housekeeping planner. For the past couple of Sundays, I've looked at the week ahead and, keeping in mind the rooms I want to focus on, as well as rooms that need constant focus (baths & kitchen), I listed tasks to accomplish each day.

So far, it's working pretty good. If I see something else that I want to do, I just leave myself a note in the planner and then, when I schedule for the next week, I pencil it in. I should probably keep a master list of random tasks like cleaning the oven. Is that a monthly task? Quarterly? Annual? Even annual would be better than not-at-all, eh? lol

And--I forgot to mention above, but remembered along the way...

D) Watching & reading all that "writers education" I paid for or stored up. I forgot that until I re-read my big goals post from a couple of weeks ago when finalizing this post. >face palm< I've blocked some time on Sunday mornings after grocery shopping for this. I need an hour off my feet after that big event, so it's a good time.

I'm not sure if this is the final plan for all of the above, but it's a start, and sometimes getting started is the hardest part. As I keep on, I can tweak and alter how to navigate things based on results. Is something working? Is it not? How could it work better? Become a bit more efficient? Would it make more sense do things that way instead of this way? Etc... Etc... Etc...

So there we go. More plans, more rules, more parameters. We'll see how these tasks pan out.

Here's to a great week. Catch you on Thursday.

 

 

 Image Courtesy of IMGBIN.

NOTE: The words in the image above really don't matter.

It's finally time for me to share my goals for the new year. Most of these goals have been on-going for years, some are newly added.

For example, I'll write monthly postcards to my grandma until she dies. That could be this year. Or it could be a few more years down the road. She seems to be a tough old bird for the fact that she's 97 years old. But this year's goal is to be on time with it.

At this point, reading probably doesn't need to be on the list anymore. I read daily. I don't think that's going to change anytime soon. But having it on the list means I can get an easy A on my quarterly report cards, lol. But more importantly I can challenge myself, as I plan to do this year, to read things other than romantic fiction.

Most things are listed for accountability sake--a place to note the intention for reference purposes. They're gonna get done by hook or by crook anyway. My writers group duties for example. Writing these blog posts is another example. Sometimes the hope / point is to up my game...

Some things keep getting listed in hopes that I'll finally find the right system to make it easy to continue year after year...housekeeping, eating right, and exercise come to mind. :0)

So what's on the list for 2023?

The list grew from the ten I usually post to fifteen. Oh my. Whether I officially commit to them all remains to be seen. Let's take a look:

1) Monthly postcards to Grandma: I'm planning this for the second Friday of the month. I've scheduled them , so no more vague thoughts of "it's been a while since I last wrote to Grandma."

2) Finish and publish Finders Keepers: I know I've been saying this for months now, and I do want to finish and publish it... I just don't know anymore if I want to commit to doing it in 2023. Other things have snuck up the order of importance. But I didn't want to remove it completely. I guess I'll see how the first quarter plays out and go from there. So this one is on hold for now.

3) Exercise minimum three times per week: this is super important. Last year was a rough year eating- and exercise-wise, and I'm not pleased with the changes to my body. I need to get back on some sort of regular regimen. A plan of attack is in the works and will be in place by the end of the month.

4) Read 52 books: As I've mentioned, I read a lot. That's never gonna change. This year, however, I'm going to add some non-fiction to the plan. I'm going to branch out a little this year and toss at least six non-fiction books into the mix. Every six weeks or so, I should mention a non-fiction book on the blog here. I've got three books teed up already. Not read, mind, but bought and ready. I'll be logging those 52 books in Goodreads because that makes it easier to track and harder to fail.

5) Keep up with writers group duties weekly: I really, really need to stay on top of this. I also really need to know what needs to be done. I've dug out the very old PPM as well as a breakout of duties by month, and I'm going to figure out what I need to do and when, from the weekly and monthly to the annual, and I'm going to add those tasks to my planner.

6) Add one new non-hockey pattern to Etsy per quarter: I've determined that trying to create jersey patterns in advance is a waste of time, since the bulk of the patterns I've already made have never been bought.

BUT! I want to have more stuff. I have a few things I've been tinkering with over the years, and I'm going to commit to getting at least four new patterns listed.

I have officially added a listing for Swedish Dala Horses. One down, three to go.

7) Self-Care: This includes things like coloring my hair regularly and taking better, more consistent care of my feet, but it also includes things like doing puzzles, crafting with DD, watching movies, and playing video games again.

I realized that I haven't done much of any of those in quite some time, and I really miss them. I've had a hankering for losing myself in a video game. Now, this one goal might blow a lot of the others out of the water, but I really need to get back to doing things I enjoy just for the sake of enjoying life.

8) Complete a home-improvement project or two: Just something, you know? Like officially finishing the guest bedroom. Or cleaning out one or both of the sheds. Aside from the guest room, I don't have anything specific in mind, so we'll have to see what crops up.

9) Writers Education: I did pay for three years of InkersCon and have a year's worth of blog posts by a particular person to read through, so even if I'm not writing, I can be learning something new or remembering things I've already learned.

10) Cook / eat healthier: Along with my exercise plan, eating better just makes sense, or what's the point, right? I need to incorporate more veggies and low sugar fruits, and just generally approach this with a more balanced regimen in mind. But that might mean cooking... Hmm...

11) Come up with and stick to a housekeeping plan: Same song, different dance. After pondering the pros and cons of one room per month, I feel like one room every two weeks, including windows, is a decent balance. It's certainly better than what I've been doing. I've not yet come up with a workable plan, but will have something in place by the end of the month.

12) Continue to blog: I don't want to quit completely as I'm not sure what path the writing will take. I do feel as though I spend a lot of time coming up with topics and then writing up the posts. But I suppose if I'm not writing fiction, writing blog posts will at least keep the writing muscles from atrophying.

I can't decide if I should do one or two per week as I've been doing, but for a while it seemed like I had more random tidbits to share than a single weekly post's worth. I guess I'll shoot for two and see how it goes. If I have to cut back to one, that's okay.

13) Write articles for my writers group newsletter: I already told the newsletter editor I'd do this, so I guess I'm committed. :0) Maybe every two months or one per quarter. This too will keep the writing muscles warm while I wait out the fiction-writing feels. As a matter of fact, I have one ready to send to her. Just needs a last once over.

14) Finally study Personality Strengths in depth: I have a book to read. A physical one, so that should be a good jumping off point for me. I also have the follow-up book to read. I guess this goal crosses over with #4 / reading non-fiction.

15) Get through the Bible in a year again: I did this last year, although I didn't put it on my official list. I bought a Kindle copy of the NIV One-Year Bible and made it through. I had two, maybe three times when I got behind, but caught back up by reading double entries for a few days in a row.

I was going to invest in an audio version for this year, but DD told me that the Holy Bible app for your phone will read it to you!! And ... the app allows you to choose your preferred translation. I just so happen to prefer the New American Standard, so I was really excited to learn this.  And it works like a peach.

So there you have it ~ my expanded list of personal goals for 2023.

With lots of detail so I know what I have to do to get good grades.

Take care and Happy New Year one last time.

 

Image Courtesy of IMGBIN

It's time once again to revisit the goals and see how I'm faring...

Mom's been here for three months now, and as you can imagine, her presence has definitely had an impact on my ability to get things accomplished.

But let's dive in, shall we:

1) send postcard to my Grandma in Denmark monthly--doing well so far, if only to let Grandma know how Mom is doing so she doesn't worry. On the other hand (SADLY), my grandma might not be around much longer, if her last letter is anything to go by. She'll be 96 or 97 in August, so she's definitely earned her eternal rest when it comes. Until then, I'll keep sending her missives.

2) exercise regularly / up my game--tilt... Mostly anyway. I'm mot exercising like doing yoga or using the elliptical. But I am having to circle the yard three and four times a day to get the little dogs moving in order to get their bowels moving. I do need to re-implement some sort of regular regimen, but that's not happening until after the annual lake retreat at the end of July, so...

3) continue to cook / eat healthy / adhere to a food plan--tilt! That's been thrown into the wind. Life, right now, is not conducive to this, so we are eating atrociously. But that too must change. So going with the same note as the exercise--after I return from the lake.

4) stay on track / up my game with the housekeeping--also TILT! I struggled with this before Mom arrived, so all the extra tasks I'm juggling have thrown this task completely into upheaval. Although in the last couple of weeks, I was able to find some semblance of a routine for fitting in some basic tasks. We'll see how long it lasts.

5) keep up with writers group duties on a monthly basis--um, no, sorry...

6) publish one book & do my best to finish and publish a second--one book has been published, but only because it was completed and ready to go late last year, early this year. Taking the WIN though! I'm working on the second book every day, but it's slow going because I've lost a lot of my morning writing time. And because of various factors, it's hard to really submerge into the characters' points of view to get their emotions on the page. But I'll get there.

7) hone /learn my craft--sadly, no -- it's the time factor again, but life is calming down and smoothing out, so I'm hoping I can find an hour or so a week to devote to this

8) double my Etsy inventory--honestly, I've been working on this, but I'm nowhere on track and I'm not going to catch up; not that it's a major deal in the grand scheme and I'll have more than I did at the beginning of the year. And also, I decided to leave Etsy...that's a process in and of itself and will take me at least to the end of the year. So I can already say this one will be a fail if we go strictly by the original intent.

9) read, read, read a lot of fiction--I'm not going to read the 104 books I originally challenged myself to via Goodreads, but I'm doing all right on this front. I have to read daily. It helps keep me sane. I think I adjusted down to around seventy books, give or take and I'm on track.

10) keep up with / solidify my Goodreads habit--not so much. This is a publishing related thing and one of the tasks that fell by the wayside with the usurping of my time by other tasks. And that's fine. Something has to give and this is one of those many things.

All things considered, it's not going as bad as it could. And I do have extenuating circumstances, so making progress on anything is a win in my book.

Have a great week.

I'm a bit behind in regards to this sentiment, but I hope the transition from 2021 to 2022 was all you wanted it to be--whether that was a glass of champagne, watching the ball drop on TV, or sleeping through it. My New Years was fine. Busy selling a record number of fireworks (for a New Years Eve). :0) Even got see a few fireworks on my drive home.

As I mentioned, my goals list needed some adjusting after the decision was made that my mom was coming to live with us. We've all got some adjustments ahead of us--not just physically in the house, but socially and emotionally and financially as well.

My original list for 2022 had grown to twelve goals, up from the eight of the last couple of years. With the new dynamics around the house coming, that's not feasible any longer, so this list will contain fewer goals. Maybe eight, maybe fewer, but not twelve!

And so, with further ado...

1. Send postcards to Grandma in Denmark. Still gonna try to get 100% on that. Considering this is my mom's mom, maybe having my mom here in the house will be the kick in the butt I need to finally make this happen monthly.

2. Continue to exercise regularly. Someway, somehow I need to up my game even though my home gym will be sharing space with hubster's home office. Of course I usually exercise in the wee hours before he's awake, so maintaining (ahem--getting back to...) my exercise schedule shouldn't be a problem at all.

3. Continue to cook / eat healthy / adhere to a food plan. With Mom coming and her health issues, there's really no choice about this. It's gonna be to everyone's benefit. But a food plan to accommodate her needs is now in the mix as well.

4. Housekeeping. Gonna stay on track with a schedule & routine. With another person in the house, it'll be even more important.

5. Keep up with my writers group duties. I do have to create a report for the monthly meeting, but I tend to let some of the other duties slide for months on end and then spend hours getting caught up. This year, I’ll endeavor to spend whatever time is needed keeping everything on track in real time.

6. Publish the one book that's ready to be published & then do my best to finish the second Christmas book and get it out on the world. That's it. No pressure. And if the second Christmas book doesn't happen, it doesn't happen.

7. Hone / learn my craft. I paid for two virtual conferences (2020 (half price!) and 2021) and have three year access to all videos--so I'm going to spend the time to watch any and all that interest me. I've also been receiving blog posts via email from an author whose information / idea resonate with me, so I'm going to make my way through all those posts I've been saving up as well as poke around her website.

8. Double my Etsy inventory--which isn't as hard as it sounds. It's mostly a "file / save as" endeavor and then change a few details. It's just time consuming and tedious, but something I can do while listening to podcasts or watching TV.

9. Read, read, read a lot of fiction to replenish the well. My Goodreads Challenge is at 36 books...that's three a month and, quite frankly, I can easily read two a week, so I might need to go raise the bar a little.

10. Keep up with / solidify the Goodreads habit. This is more of an author thing with specific tasks to do on the back end of my profile. And which I can do in those early morning hours in place of the writing.

Okay, so that's ten, but they're all low-key, low pressure items. For example, the Goodreads thing is maybe once a week, and I'd be doing #9 anyway, just not as much of it. I'd also being doing #5, just not in a keeping-up-with-it sort of way.

Now gone from the list: complete a household project; deep dive into my personality strengths; finish 2 books, publish 3 books.

The weight's been lifted already, to be honest. I don't know what's to come with Mom being here. I imagine other weights are gonna come and go, but many of the things on this list need to be done anyway, so maybe they shouldn't be here. On the other hand, I'm trying to raise the standard of some of them, so there they are.

Take care and here's to a better 2022.

Have a great week.

Happy New Year!!

Hope you had lovely and fun celebrations. As usual, I was helping DH sell fireworks, but this year we had Sonshine with us so it was just like old times. :0) I'm not looking forward to putting him back on a plane bound for Seattle, but once he's gone, it'll be time to knuckle down, get back on the wagon, yada yada yada.

But what does that mean for me in terms of specifics?

1) I absolutely have to write my Grandma on a regular basis. I still have the post cards I bought last year, and it was a good idea, so I'll stick with it. I mean, sometimes writing a letter seems both daunting and tedious when nothing much changes from month to month. The specific goal is to send a post card monthly and a letter quarterly.

2) Still gotta call my mommas too. The once a month timing seems good for this task too, so we'll stick with that.

3) Walking the dog...yup. She needs the exercise and quite frankly so do I. The specific goal to start is to walk her Tuesday and Thursday afternoons. I generally work from home those days, so I will take a 15-20 minute break and get the dog and myself out of the house unless it's raining.

Looks like most of last year's goals are being carried forward. But, as I've done for the first three goals, I'm going to set specifics. On we go...

4) Cook and eat better. Meaning no more bread-based carbs for awhile. And then just maybe my carb-lite tortillas at some point. Other than that, more protein and green veggies. More fish if I can track it down in my WalMart that has been re-arranging foodstuff again. Less red meat. More keto, maybe.

5) Re-institute the cleaning plan. I really wanted to hire someone to come in and do some stuff like mop the floors and scrub the bathrooms, but that's not going to happen anytime soon, so that means I have to make a concerted effort myself. So I'll be digging out the box of index cards and scheduling chores. This system is from a book called "Sidetracked Home Executives: From Pigpen to Paradise" by Pam Young and Peggy Jones. It was recommended by a friend many moons ago.

6) Reduce body fat and maintain current body weight. Losing the four pounds I've gained over the holidays isn't going to be too difficult, so I'm not overly worried about it. Losing the inches is going to be a challenge. The first little bit probably won't be too hard, but once I reach that plateau again...ugh.

Part of the plan involves not eating after 7pm and not eating before 9am. I might extend that daily fasting stint by an hour for a week or so to jump start everything. I don't often eat after 7pm regardless, although I have cheated a bit and have eaten my morning meal anywhere from 7:30am onward. Warm water is a really helpful way of feeling full and defeating the hungries. I'll be drinking a lot of warm water in the next couple of weeks.

7) Work on the writing career, such as it is. I'm not trying to make a living wage off the writing, but I would like to make enough publish a couple of books each year as well as travel to the GRL Conference each October. So the goal for 2019 is to publish at least two books. I have book 7 of the Ten Rigs Texas series 1/3 to 1/2 complete. I also have book 1 of another three-book series at some partial point of completion, not to mention an epic historical (that does need a lot of editorial work) at about 75% completion. I also need to flesh out all the recurring characters for the next 6-9 book series I'm planning.

~*~

Okay, so, the first seven goals are carry-over/repeats from 2018 as well as one or two that are from as far back as 2017 or 2016. I don't need to make "attend more Stars games" a goal again, because just finishing out the season with the current tickets I have will be enough and I can't imagine that we won't remain partial season ticket holders for next season. :0)

That means I need three new-for-2019 goals. Let's see what we can come up with...

~*~

8) Get some stuff around the house done. Aside from the general housekeeping of #5, I have a few projects that I'd like to get done. One such project is the hallway bathroom. I think I mentioned I want to paint all of the tile eventually. Unfortunately, there's a lot of tile so it will have to be done in stages. The toilet will probably have to come out because there's tile halfway up the walls. Most of the other projects are smaller and require less effort, but it would be nice to finally get them taken care of. I can enumerate them all later so I have a place of reference.

9) Expand the sampler pattern offerings at my Etsy store. Let's shoot for minimum of one new pattern a month. It helps that I have a handful at various stages of completion and quite a few additional ideas. The biggest hurdle is that I like to have real life samples to take pictures of instead of just the image the pattern program generates. As you can guess, that's the most time-consuming part.

10) Spend more time together as family, including DD. I was recently reminded of how much fun it is to play board games. As a result, I bought a new one--and funny enough it was one we had years ago but that we never apparently figured out how to play. DD and I both got games for Christmas as well. So I'm going to shoot for one game night a month to start an we'll see how it goes.

So those are my goals, with specific measurables, for the new year.

How about you?

Last week, I reviewed my progress or lack thereof on last year's goals. I didn't do nearly as well as I thought I had, nor did I have as many goals as I thought I had. But it's spilled milk or water under the bridge and there's no use in beating myself up. I can't go back. I can only move forward and try to do better.

Several of last year's goals are being carried over. They're that important. Let's start with those.

1) Writing to my Grandma in Denmark. This is important. The woman is in her 90s. She's not going to be around much longer in the grand scheme of things. In order to make this easier to accomplish, I think I'll find some postcards depicting Texas and send these along monthly with a few notes and then go for a longer letter every couple of months. Honestly, there's not a lot going on in my life, but I know my Grandma doesn't care that much and would like to hear from me, her only granddaughter.

2) Calling my moms monthly. Again, not much going on in anyone's lives, but you never know what's going to happen and not just to someone who's older. I drive the streets every day. I could be the one who leaves this world far too soon. So yeah. Monthly phone calls to say "HI" and "I love you."

3) Walk the dog three times a week. I took Rayna into the vet a few months ago for some reason or another and mentioned a limp she gave into seemingly randomly. It turns out she tore something in one of her "knee" joints and has developed arthritis. One of the ways to help combat the pain and stiffness of that, not to mention the excess weight she's carrying, is to get her on an exercise regimen. Plus I could stand to be a little more active at the end of my day, so Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays are the days I'll take Rayna for a walk. These are all days I'm at home--so instead of driving home from work, I'll walk the dog. Good for her, good for me. Now if the temperatures would warm up just a little.


4) Cook & eat better. Honestly, we're doing okay. Not great, but okay. We usually eat fish once a week and chicken every one to two weeks. It's the "scrounge" days that get us, so I guess that means planning another one or two healthier-ish meals on a weekly basis. Maybe incorporate chicken weekly. Maybe adding a pork-based meal weekly as well. With leftovers, at least six out of seven days ought to be covered, right?

And the last carryover goal is...

5) Re-institute the cleaning plan. All I have to do is dig out the box of index cards, re-sort them, and get started. There's just so many other more fun things to be doing than cleaning. :0) I guess until I can afford a cleaning lady, I'm it, eh?

As for new or similar/adjusted goals, let's see...

6) Work on my writing career--such as it is. I'm not looking to be a New York Times Bestseller or support DH and myself with my writing, but there are a lot of areas to improve upon and that need my attention. The sub-list is as follows:

a) publish books 5-8 this year. Books 5 and 6 are written. They just need final revisions and formatting. Books 7 has been started, but I'm not very far along. Book 8 has characters and a vague plot line.
b) spend some time on marketing the series and the books.
c) enter a contest or two to increase readership.
d) choose an aspect of my writing to work on and, you know, work on it.

*There are probably a few more things, but they're vague notions at the moment.

7)  Now that I've finally reached my weight goal and have maintained that weight for three months, it's time to work on a different aspect of my physical health.

As a side note, I officially started my journey in January of 2012. It took me just under five years. I knew it was going to take a while; I was in it for the long haul, and I never got really discouraged. YAY me. :0)

My new endeavor is to reduce fat--not weight--just fat. I have way too many jiggly spots and losing weight does not automatically mean you've lost fat. Just as gaining muscle does not mean you've lost fat. Fat doesn't turn into muscle. They are made up of two different things. I started the fat burning process once I reached the weight goal and made a bit of progress, but my cruise and holiday hiatus has reversed the process a little. Again, come January 2, it's back to work and back to a stricter diet for a time.

8) Now I can't reach this next goal without DH, but I'm putting it on here anyway because he mentioned wanting to while on the cruise. And that's take dance lessons... DH took ballroom dance lessons many moons ago before I'd met him and he enjoyed them a lot. I just think it'd be fun and then we can dance at family events or on next year's cruise or even just go out dancing.

9) Do more crafts! This was on this goal list a couple of years ago and I didn't do much better, but I always get nostalgic for my craftier days around the holidays. I've been cross stitching some small hockey related things, so I need to keep on going. I also have some other, larger projects rolling around in my brain. And maybe I can get a head start on next year's ornament and make something decent, not only for my kids but for my close circle of writer peeps who also get ornaments each year. Another friend of mine (shout-out to N!) does felt crafts and she's made me some lovely felt ornaments the last couple of years. That might be a fun new craft to try.

10) Take ballet and/or ice skating lessons. Part of this stems from the "be more active" mind set, but also from a get-more-flexible and build-up-stamina thought process in mind of staying healthy and active as long as possible as I face my 50th birthday this year. Also, they look fun, and the ice skating, of course, stems from my new-found love of hockey.


11) And my fluffy goal for the year--attend more STARS games. I'll say five more games between now and the end of the season in early April. Fingers crossed they make it to the playoffs and that I can afford a playoff ticket. :0) Then we'll say three games once the new season begins in October. So eight Stars games in 2018. And if I travel to a city that has a hockey team, chances are I'll buy tickets to a game if there's one being played while I'm there.


So there you have it. A decently ambitious list. How about you? Have you got a goal or two on the record for 2018? Do share.

On this last blogging day of 2017, it's time to do a final review on the goals I set at the beginning of the year. I've done quarterly check-ins, but now it's time for a final grade.

1) Write to my Grandma in Denmark every six weeks or so. I'm going to fail myself. I've not sent my dear Grandma a letter since the summer. Bad Jen. I'll be recycling this goal for sure.

Grade F

2) Call my moms every month or so. Didn't quite hit every month, but most of them. This goal too is moving on to 2018.

Grade C

3) Cook/eat better. Didn't do as well as I wanted to on this one either. Finances make it harder to eat well, because healthy food is more expensive than unhealthy food. But we'll keep on keeping on with this goal too because DH is ready to make progress on his weight loss endeavors now.

Grade B

4) Clean out and organize my writing room. I did a couple of things a couple of times, but there was no major overhaul here. Is this task important enough to carry over into 2018? Nah. The state of my writing room isn't bothersome, so...

Grade D

5) Re-institute the cleaning plan. I thought about it in context of my quarterly goal updates and at no other time. I still really want to do it, so this goal carries over as well.

Grade F

6) Publish six books by September 2017. Well, nope...didn't get six books by the ninth month. I did get four books out by the twelfth month though. No major extenuating circumstances to blame. Just ran into a bit of writing road block in completing the sixth book, so all deadlines and tasks required got pushed farther out.

Grade F

7) Reach 120lbs. to 125lbs. as a weight goal. Reached this one in October. I've kept the weight off. I only gained about 4 pounds on the cruise and lost that easily. I've been enjoying the holidays and will get back on the wagon come January 2.

Grade A+

8) Walk the dog three times a week. I reported that I'd started this back at the third quarter review, but got lazy about it rather quickly. This goal is definitely moving onto the 2018 list as it's become more important to the dog's physical health than it was originally. So yeah.

Grade F

Well-- I didn't do so hot this year, did I? Average grade is a D-. Gotta do better next year, eh?

Hope you have a safe and lovely New Years!

My list of goals for 2014 are just there on the left. I updated you on them two month ago. Nothing's changed except that I have gotten closer to my goal of 120lbs. I cleared the 130lb. hurdle and have settled comfortably in the one hundred twenty range. I'm very happy with that. Next year will be more about toning what's left.

Anyway, it's time to look ahead to 2015, to determine what I want to accomplish and make plans and set goals.



I've gone round and round with myself regarding writing for publication. I've had conversations with DH and several friends on the matter and have to come to a few conclusions, none of which I'll bore you with at this point. I have friends who are supporting themselves with their writing. I have friends who aren't. Yesterday, I met a teenager who'd made a bit of cash throwing a few things up on B&N. If he can, why can't I? Follow through. Yeah, a huge problem of mine. So maybe smaller, concrete goals that I can reach and check off the list along the way. Some serious thought on this is in my near future.

My proofreading business...I don't get a lot of return customers. I've gotten positive feedback from almost everyone. No negative feedback to me directly. I'm not super-expensive and I don't feel I'm super cheap either. I'm not sure where the disconnect is. I'd really love to have a small cache of clients who avail themselves of my services consistently. I have a simple listing on one author site, but I suppose I ought to consider advertising regularly. Something else to think about.

My house and back yard will be ongoing, but I'll think about specifics. Re-decorating DD's room will definitely be on the list.

Of course reading will be make the list again, as will getting healthier.

All right. So. There are the generalizations for next year. I'll be thinking about them for the next little while and will determine specifics.

I challenge you my friends and readers to look ahead and do the same. We can meet back here at the new year and compare notes.

After brunch with a girlfriend, I spent the day alone...a nice little surprise,and I enjoyed it greatly. I generally don't make resolutions anymore, but I wanted to get the new year started with a clean house and yard.

So I alternately read and cleaned my house--I don't have the energy or stamina to go on a full-scale rampage any longer so I have to work then rest, work then rest, etc...

My main bathroom almost as clean as I can get it. It needs a little more scrubbing--I have a green tile floor and the grout is a lot stained and needs some TLC, but that was beyond me yesterday. Not that I didn't scrub and mop the floor, 'cause I did, but the grout needs some extensive elbow grease.

My kitchen, hallway, and living room was swept throughout the day. A (small) section of my backyard was raked and the leaves bagged for pickup today. And the patio, which could have won a Redneck-of-the-year contest, was tidied. I even did a few loads of laundry.

A another week's worth of days like yesterday would be a lovely way to get my new year started on the right foot.

My goals for 2009 include getting my kitchen and living room finished, and getting grass rather than weeds to grow in my backyard. On the writing front, I'd really like to finish another manuscript.

What are your goals for 2009?