Happy New Year

I have a New Year's Resolution or two.

One is to just live simpler. Simply-er? What do I imagine this to mean?
Other than physically purging my life and home of clutter, it also means forming good day-today habits that eliminate my life of some stress.
Like saying "yes" more instead of no when asked to help with things. Taking a few minutes day to day to pick up the house, if only for 5 minutes. Toning down my inflammatory tendency to take on multiple projects at once.

Another is to do more. Which, is technically not something I've only just now resolved to do. And by "do more" I mean keep my mind and hands active. Finishing projects when I've started them and trying more new things. I've been pretty good at this for the past month or so. I made some nice curtains to separate the living room and kitchen, and some other drapes for the bathroom. I crocheted a hat last night (just before falling asleep 5 minutes before midnight.) and I also sewed the leggings I'm wearing today. I have 1 quilt top piece waiting to be batted and backed, and 3 other quilts that are coming along nicely, little by little. And I think I'm going to try buying a vintage pattern and giving that a go. I haven't followed a pattern since sophomore year of high school. I also got some cake decorating tools for Christmas to play with which has reminded me that it's been too long since I last made something yummy.

My big resolution this year is to go back to school. Hopefully Spencer and I will get our tax information back pretty soon here and then we can file and apply for some financial aid (what a time to apply though, ugh) and hopefully Spencer and I will haven't run into any big financial trouble and the savings we've been putting aside can allow me to return to college, at least part-time if not full, this fall. Spencer was thinking about taking some additional classes for experience and fun (he graduated from BYU last August if you didn't know already) which I would love because then maybe we could enroll in a class or two together.

So to sum up:
Live simpler.
Keep up my hobbies.
Go back to school.

I think I can manage that, which is why I liked making these resolutions. Normally I'd make resolutions that were extremely defined. Like "lose 25 pounds" and "finish sailboat/tailor's mannequin still life" and things like that were just, meh. As soon as I lost sight of those goals, then I'd feel crappy about it and just put it away in a closet to forget about or eat unhealthily and feel crappy about that too.

All I am worrying about now if whether or not I'm enjoying my life day to day and if I'm not, then I am taking little actions here and there to improve it, and most of all, I'm trying to be patient and focused. I want to allow myself an extra second to react, which allows me to think through my decisions better which causes me to feel a little more confident in myself and my abilities to improve my life and my home life.
And the best part is that I haven't really waited for 2009 for all this to start, but it's nice to put it into words for a reminder when things get hectic or I get impatient. If I have to, I'll write the words "live simpler, be patient and focus" on my arm everyday for a reminder. Maybe I'll just make that the motto/title of my journal for this year. That's probably a better idea.