What’s Cooking for 2011

So much for hopin’ folks.  The rest of my family was not able to escape the flu bug.  Last night we heard some coughing on the monitor around 9:30 and knew what it could mean.  Sure enough, within a few seconds I heard the tell-tale sounds of vomiting, followed by the screams of  a toddler who had no idea what on earth was happening to her.  Tim and I raced up the stairs, cleaned her up and comforted her, but within 20 minutes she was vomiting again.  She threw up four times between 9:30-11:00 (on me and her pajamas every time) and then, thankfully, was done for the night.  The next morning she seemed happy and energetic, climbing on the furniture. Breaking the rules is a sure sign she was feeling better.

At this point Tim didn’t stand a chance.  He spent the day in bed, but hasn’t vomited so maybe he didn’t get it quite as bad as Meghan and me.  Needless to say, there wasn’t much cooking going on in this house today, let alone new recipes being created, so this will be another recipe-less post.

I thought I would take this chance to share with you my goals for 2011.  I know, I know; New Year’s Resolutions seem hokey.  Outdated.  Corny.  Cliche.  I can’t help it.  Setting goals is something that’s been ingrained in me for a long time.  My dad had a set of tapes, Zig Ziglar: Goals How to Set Them. How To Reach Them that I swiped and listened to in my car to and from school and sports’ practice at the age of 16.  There were always Tony Robbins’ books lying around the house and I picked them up and read them.  So while goal setting may seem trite to some, in the words of the Monkey’s:  I’m a believer.

Let me give you a little proof that goal-setting works.  In 2006, I purchased Zig Ziglar’s Performance Planner, which is basically a day planner with added space for goals–a time-management tool that walks you through the goal-setting process.  In the beginning of the book, there is a section for setting lifetime goals.  It encourages you to “dream big” and write down what you would wish for in your wildest dreams if you could achieve anything your heart desired.  I had to really push my self to think:  What exactly do I want to accomplish? I’ve never shared this with anyone, but in that section I wrote down that I wanted to win a Teacher of the Year Award.  At that time, I thought that was a far-fetched dream, and I was really only thinking of winning the award for my local school.  In 2007 I was Imagine Schools National Teacher of the Year.

I tell you this not to toot my own horn (as my dear friend Jillian would say), but instead to illustrate that goal setting works.  When you take the time the think about what you want to achieve and put it on paper, you are taking the first step towards turning your goal into a reality. So here’s a peek into my goals for 2011 and the steps I’m going to take to reach those goals:

2011 Goals

1.  Be the person I want Meghan to become.

When I see Meghan repeating my phrases and gestures, I know I am the biggest influence in her life.  How I act and what I focus on in my life matter.  I have to be the woman I want my daughter to become.  This means that I have to keep God in the center of my life.  She doesn’t know when I’m saying silent prayers of thanksgiving or for help, so say them out loud.  She needs to see my relationship with God so she can model it.  This means I have to have a kind, loving, and patient attitude towards everyone in my life, because that is how I want Meghan to be.

2.  Develop a fitness schedule and stick to it.

Talk about a cliche for a New Year’s resolution!  Seriously, though, this is an important one.  I am a total outdoor fitness kind of gal, so when the weather turns cold I tend to put exercising on the back burner.  I need to find ways to workout indoors that don’t bore me to death and how to fit in in my schedule on a consistent basis rather than just haphazardly when the mood strikes.  To do this I’m going to set monthly goals and have weekly plans.

3.  Increase my blog readership by 200%.

Since Happy Healthy Mama launched in September, my blog traffic has steadily increased.  I would like it to continue to reach more readers and plan to make that happen by posting regularly with quality recipes and topics my readers are interested in.  I also will make an effort to always write as well as I can and try to improve my photography.  In addition, I will be an active member of the blogging community.

4.  Balance my fiction and non-fiction reading.

My reading was largely non-fiction in 2010, and I want to achieve a better balance for 2011 because I love and appreciate fiction.  To do this I am going to force myself to alternate between fiction and non-fiction books.  My goal is to read a minimum of one book per month.

5. Write three pieces of fiction.

While this blog is a great creative outlet for me and satisfies my writing itch, fiction is where my true love lies with writing.  Three pieces seems like a small goal, but it would be three more pieces than I finished in 2010.  In 2010, I started 2 pieces of fiction and finished 0.  I will do this by scheduling time for fiction writing once per week.  {Can you tell I’m big on schedules?  I do well with structure in my life.}

6.  Continue to take steps toward a more natural, toxin-free way of life.

I continue to learn and implement new ideas, I’m taking baby steps, and want to continue. I will do this by setting monthly goals and tracking my progress.

There you have it.  These are my personal goals for 2011.  I’m totally committed now, right?  Once I hit “Publish” these are out there for the whole world to see.

What about you?  Are you a goal setter?