New Year, New Goals

Though I'm not much of a "resolution" girl, I do usually like to set goals for the new year and pick my word for the year. After much deliberation and tossing around of words, I finally settled on the word CREATE for this year. I mean create in a much broader way than just creating art and crafts. While I of course want to create art and handmade items, I also want to create meaningful moments and memories, create new experiences and adventures, create life (hopefully) and create a healthy, happy and peaceful mindset everyday. My plan for the year is to infuse this word into my life and remember to create something new and meaningful each day.

Since it's 2010, I figure setting 10 goals for the year is a good idea. So here's my 10 for 2010:

1. Exercise more. I seem to have this goal every year and do better some months than others. I'm far from a sedentary person, but I do not have a good regular exercise routine. I hope to settle into one this year.

2. Reduce debt. This is a long term goal I've had for awhile, but I'm hoping to make more progress this year. While I'm not really a big spender, I do need to pay more attention to some of the little purchases I make throughout the month as they tend to add up. I'm also playing catch up with things like school loans and self employment tax payments, which means I have way more debt than I'd like to have.

3. Start a family. I've wanted this for awhile, but I'm crossing my fingers that this is our year. I am afraid though that this goal might negate goal #2 a bit, especially given our lack of maternity insurance coverage.

4. Decrease clutter and simplify our house. This may be my biggest challenge for the year. If you've met my husband and seen our house, you know how much of an uphill battle I have in front of me. But, there are many projects that are all mine. I am holding on to all kinds of old school and work stuff that I could get rid of. I need to improve my work and household filing system. I have lots of little projects stacked up that once completed would definitely declutter things. Of course, I could always purge a few crafty items, but we all know I'd just acquire more.

5. Stay current or at least not fall too far behind with my paperwork. This is an annual goal as well. Its so hard to make the extra time to get all my paperwork done when a)nobody read them and b)I work in the field all day long and the last thing I want to do during my "free time" is busywork. Unfortunately though, I must do this paperwork and I tend to let it go until it becomes such a headache and almost unmanageable. I would like to stay on top of it this year.

6. Finish projects. I have so many in progress projects. I would feel so much better if I could check a few of these off my list. This might mean I need to say "no" to a few things and get off the darn computer so that I can find the time to work on some of these projects.

7. Take more photos. Another goal I seem to set every year. I don't take enough photos, especially photos of daily life. I need to make more of an effort to get that camera out and use it.

8. Use it up. I'm a big stock piler of products and projects. I have WAY TOO MUCH scrap stuff, yarn, crafty projects, magazines, untried recipes, etc. My plan this year is to use it or lose it. See goal #4 and goal #6.

9. Give myself permission to relax. I really have been much better at doing this. 2009 was all about balance and I did my best to balance my time and make sure I made some me time. I hope to continue this trend throughout 2010, despite my above goals about getting more done :)

10. Think about my professional life. Set goals for the future. I love my job, but there is so much more I'd like to do. I have big dreams professionally, but haven't thought much about how to make them happen. I have personal goals that may effect my professional life (like goal #3) but I want to spend some time this year mapping out some manageable professional goals and ideas.

Here are my first Scrap for a Cure layouts for 2010. This month's kit, Romantique, on the surface is really not my style and a bit girlie, but I found myself creating pages quite quickly and loving the flowers and butterflies.