2017 Goals

Hello again! After a couple years where blogging took a backseat, I'm finally back! I am now a stay-at-home mom with a three and half month old baby boy. Life is so different than when I last posted, but it is wonderful.

We are just a couple hours away from being done with the first month of 2017 already! How does time do that? That time-flying-by thing seems to have sped up ever since I've become a mom, which everyone warns it will. He's growing and changing so fast and I'm taking dozens of pictures and videos and writing down moments and memories as quick as I can.

I'm so excited for the next 11 months of 2017. I'm excited for all the development my little man will go through and all the fun family memories we will create. I always feel like a new year is a blank slate, with so much potential for creativity, serving, relationships, growth, and experiences. During the last couple days of December, I sat down to really think about how I wanted to spend my time this year, what I wanted to work on, to strive for. Here are the goals I came up with for 2017.


Monthly Goals: Here are the things I hope to accomplish each month:

• memorize a verse/small passage of Scripture
• read a book
• go on a baby-free date with my husband
• visit Easton's great-aunt and/or great-grandma
• call 2 different friends
• invite another couple/family over to our home
• write at least one blog post
• do one craft project
• deep clean one part of my house
• re-organize one part of my house
• make a new dinner recipe
• make a new dessert recipe
• take Easton's monthly milestone pictures
• weigh and measure Easton
• send an email to Easton for the future 

This month, I accomplished all of those goals! This blog post is just barely making it into January and was the final thing to check off. I'll write another post next week sharing what I did for some of those and what my plans are for them in February.

Weekly Goals:

• email with pictures to Easton's grandparents
• phone call to my brother
• me-time
• take Easton's weekly milestone picture
• exercise 3 times (yaaa....that hasn't been happening yet this year)

Then I also have tried to designate each day of the week with a different focus. I've tried cleaning schedules where you do one task each day, but that just doesn't work for me. I'm either in full-on cleaning mode or I'm not. So this new approach helps me to have one main focus for the day and know that if other things get accomplished too that's great, and if they don't it's okay too.


Mondays - Errand Day (grocery shopping, library, post office, etc. I try to save up errands for this day so I don't waste lots of time throughout the week going out to multiple stores)

Tuesdays - Sewing Day (go to my mom's house and sew for at least 2 hours--working on a quilt right now!)

Wednesdays - Cleaning Day (I alternate every other week with what I clean and add in portions of my deep cleaning and organizing projects for the month)

Thursdays - Project Life Day (devote at least 2 hours to working on my scrapbook albums. Unfortunately, I was only able to do this 2 of the 4 weeks this month)

Fridays - Creative Day (this was meant to be more open-ended to work on whatever I felt like whether it was my monthly craft, or more Project Life, planning, cooking, baking, etc. So far, this day has been filled with my part-time job and basketball. Hoping to be able to re-focus this day for more of a relaxed day)

Saturdays - Monthly Day (work on those monthly goals)

Sundays - Family Day (church, watching football, spending time chilling together, going out to dinner with my parents, getting ready for the next week by meal planning and figuring out our schedules.)


Daily Tasks
Each day I strive to:

• do my Bible reading and a devotion
• take a picture of something from my day
• take a picture of Easton
• take my vitamins
• read for 20 minutes
• drink 8 cups of water
• do my Bing rewards (if you're curious, ask me! It takes me 5 minutes each day to earn points and I can redeem $10 in Amazon gift cards in one month).

To keep organized with all this as well as meal plans, meetings, appointments, to-do lists, reminders, basketball, etc. I use an Erin Condren Life Planner.

This is my second year owning and using one and IT IS MY FAVORITE! No this, is not a sponsored post, but I love this planner a lot. So if you are searching for a great do-it-all planner, check this one out! I will do another post with more details about my planner and how I use it. Everyone has different styles of how they like to plan and it took me a couple months last year to figure out my system. But it helps me stay so organized, plus its super pretty and fun with all the stickers! Oh, and yes even therapeutic, but that may just be me. 😃


You may think that seems like a lot! Too much to try to accomplish for a new mom. And to be honest, some days it is. Some days, I get us fed and dressed and that's about it. And I'm learning to be OK with that. After this first month, I did pretty well on accomplishing it all. I wasn't able to get to Project Life a couple weeks and totally didn't read at all one week, but other than that I was able to catch up on things here and there. All the snuggles, books read, and play time that happened in place of it was so wonderful. Each day, week, and month will be different as he grows and his needs change. His nap times will fluctuate and his independence will progress. But I'm the kind of person who needs goals in place so that when I do have those free moments I know exactly what I want to do. If I didn't write all those things out in my planner each week, I would waste a lot more time watching TV or browsing social media.

So yes, maybe its' too much sometimes, and maybe it's a bit backwards to plan for all these things I may never realistically have time for, but it works for me and it helps me to stay creative. (And to my brother, if there's any chance in a blue moon that you are even reading this, yes I know you are rolling your eyes and laughing at my OCDness with being organized and goal-oriented.) But to anyone else who chose to stay with me for this long post about my desired plans for this year, I hope that maybe some of my goals sparked some ideas and inspired you to try and work towards something new. My method may not work for you, that's okay. Find what works for you and find ways to enjoy the little and big moments of 2017!

Whew, and now I'm off to bed. So goodnight to January and hello February!