Resolutions

Tis the time of year for reflection. And revisiting the resolutions from last year. Which can be affirming and depressing at the same time. At least is was for me this year. I pretty much batted a .500, which is pretty good for baseball and far less impressive for goal setting. Still, if I try and look at the bright side, I did pretty well. But then again it depends on the way you look at it. I failed miserably in a few categories. But I guess that's the challenge, isn't it? Why set a resolution you can accomplish without any effort?

To start out with the positive, here are the resolutions I kept:

#1. Run my first half marathon. Check.

#2. Read twenty books. That was accomplished by the skin of my teeth. Many of them have been listed along the side here, but they are (in order of completion, and without authors - sorry, authors)...Blink, The Memory Keepers Daughter, Grace Based Parenting, Friday Night Knitting Club, The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, Committed, Unaccustomed Earth, The Story of Hansel and Gretel, Half Broke Horses, The Red Tent, Memoirs of a Geisha, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, The Girl with the Dragon Tatoo, Mockingjay, The Winter of our Discontent, Water for Elephants, Into Thin Air, Hidden Power and House Rules. Whew! Twelve of these were read for book club and the other eight were random additions. I have been watching way too much Friday Night Lights lately and haven't read nearly enough. I have a long list that I'm hoping to read in 2011. We shall see...P.S. They were not all good books, so this is not a public endorsement ;). My favs? It's hard to say but my top three would probably be: Guernsey, Into Thin Air & Grace Based Parenting

#3. Launch my bow business. Check. It's not going crazy or anything, but it's about where I want it to be. It keeps me busy from time to time without being too busy, which is a very fine line. I enjoy it, so it's a nice little release.

Now that I'm feeling pretty good about myself, this little list brings me back to reality. My failed resolutions:

#1. Make at least one new recipe a week in 2010. Hmmm. I really did try on this one. For a while, at least. I even kept a list of all my new recipes with star ratings along the side. Impressive, I know. I think I made it through the second week of March before my little system completely derailed. I really don't know what went wrong besides life (and my patheticness) getting in the way. Of course I made new recipes here and there throughout the rest of the year, but not with quite the same intentionality.

#2. Meet or chat with my Younglives mentee once a week. Ashley, if you read this, I'm sorry. I know that we have kept up over the last year, but not with the intention I had wanted. There were certainly weeks that went by, especially in the summer months, where I basically fell of the planet. Lesson learned from my first two failures: Resolutions that require weekly commitments do not work well for me (unless it's eat ice cream or chocolate or something like that. Sigh). It must be a personality flaw.

#3. Learn to sew. Now this one is probably my most embarrassing failure yet. If you want to maintain any amount of respect for me, just skip this number. But it was a resolution so I must reflect upon it. I asked for a sewing machine for my birthday in March. I got it. I was also invited to about ten "sewing club" parties hosted by a friend. I did not go. And then I met a new friend this fall, Kelly, who asked for a sewing machine for Christmas this year. She asked me if I had a machine and which kind. Only then did I open up the amazon box and find out. Oh yeah, and this conversation happened about a month ago. So yes, my brand new sewing machine sat in a box downstairs for about nine months before I opened it.

I used to tell people that dressing up for a workout was half the battle. I could absent-mindedly put on my running pants, sports bra, t-shirt, and shoes. Then I would eventually think "gosh, I'm already dressed. I may as well go". I thought this same logic might work for my sewing machine. If I got it as a birthday present, I'd pretty much certainly learn to sew. Wrong.

I will say, however, that I did get out my sewing machine for the first time three weeks ago. This is entirely because my same friend (Kelly), ended up buying the same machine. And my other very inspirational go-getter of a friend (Carly) practically dragged me to her house to make a project that she a) found b) planned and c) held my hand through. And after Carly and Kelly threaded my machine and walked me through it, I did finish my first project (this is what it was supposed to look like) and this is what it ended up looking like (a purposeful view - can you really see any of it? Not really.)

But I will not say that I accomplished my resolution because I still do not know how to sew. The good news? If my friends stay as diligent, I may be close to accomplishing this roll-over resolution in the year 2011.

That brings me to my new resolutions:

#1. Learn to sew.

#2. Go on a twice monthly date with my husband. We're hit or miss right now in the date department and I think he deserves a resolution. He is the love of my life, after all.

#3. Become a birthday remembering, hand-written-card-sending person.

#4. Spend quality God time each day. Stop putting ridiculously high expectations surrounding it. Start planning it around Clara's schedule, not necessarily before she wakes up, when I'm a lazy pile. Stop getting mad at myself for my inconsistency. And start really praying for people,every time I say it, especially whilst hand-washing all my dishes, which takes about an hour each day. Geesh. This one may be a little hard to reflect on. My education background keeps whispering at me "measureable and attainable"...

#5. Start selling my bows at my hairdresser's business (who offered) so I can make them on my own schedule.

And that seems like enough for this year. It's an odd number so I'll either do better than this year or worse. Hopefully not worse.

In all seriousness (since half this post has been sarcastic...which my lovely friend Amy recently pointed out is kind of my writing style), this time of year is a great time to reflect and goal set. There are things that I'd like to improve on in the year 2011. And I'm excited to attempt to accomplish my goals. What I'm even more excited about, though, has nothing to do with me and my plans and that is watching the Lord work in our lives this year. I know that he has much in store for us, and ultimately, that is what I want to see in the coming year.

Skiing & An Alteration

I know I've mentioned before my love of cross country skiing. It is the best. It's not nearly as thrilling as the down-hill variety (which I also love), but it is so serene. Even though the ski trails are less than an hour from our house it feels like we could be millions of miles away. And sometimes I need that escape.

It also doesn't hurt that xc skiing ranked as the #1 calorie burning exercise in Jono's exercise science book from grad school. The best part? It doesn't feel like the most intense workout (most of the time).

We were able to introduce our friends to our favorite winter sport this past week. Jeff and Katy were in town from Pasadena over the holidays and so were Sara and Andrew from New York. And they were both willing to join us in an adventure.

Here's Jeff with our little marshmallow, preparing for departure.

The girls: me, Sara & Katy.

Jono took on the challenge of pulling the Claranator. Thankfully this limitation made for a more level playing field for the rest of us (I'm pretty sure he's posing - I hope so, at least).

Stopped at a junction.

We celebrated our trek with some Didier's chili and yogurt. And then Katy and I did something kind of wild...

Yes, we got our noses pierced. Katy had one in college and I loved it. I'd been wanting one for a while but teaching always stood in the way. Recently I realized that I could actually do it. And so we did.

It actually wasn't all that painful or terrifying. The worst part, actually, was that I decided to watch Katy get hers, after feeling pretty proud of my toughness in going first. That was a mistake. I immediately felt woozy and light headed. And had to wait in the back room for a few minutes until I regained composure. Really embarrassing, I know. And to think I entered college having declared nursing as my major. It is a good thing I came to my senses and changed my mind.

Christmas

I know I said that Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday but I was lying. Or at least it was a partial truth. Christmas has to be tied for first. I just love it for completely different reasons. Of course the actual day is lovely (and eve, so maybe two days). But so is the entire month leading up to it. The count down, if you will. I love the whole month of advent. I love the gift planning/shopping/scheming/wrapping nearly as much as the opening of gifts. The Christmas card receiving! The baked goodies. The lights (including these lovely ones a few miles away). The decorations. The gingerbread houses. The Christmas Eve Service. All the traditions. The time spent with friends and family. And of course, embedded in everything is the reason for the season, the celebration of Jesus' birth. There is much to love about Christmas.

This year was a pretty relaxing Christmas for us. We spent Christmas Eve and a little bit of the morning with my family. Since it was the Vaughn family "off year", my sister and brother spent their Christmases far away...with their in-laws. This left just my parents, our little family, and Ethan to celebrate Christmas Eve together. We invited our new friends, the Blomgrens to join us. It was a wonderful, relaxing day...

Clara absolutely adores her "Uncle E"...

She threw the worst napping fit I've ever witnessed on Christmas Eve and ended up sleeping for two hours straight with Grampy on the recliner. Looks comfortable, huh?

Here are Kelly & I with our little girls (Norah is fifteen months) in their Christmas outfits. How is it that I didn't manage to capture any family pictures?

Our little necky lover.

Grampy reading to the girls.

Here are a few from Christmas morning. As you can see, she was quite thrilled with her new baby doll and elmo slippers from grammy and grampy.

Then we loaded up our car for the .5 mile drive to Jonathan's parent's house. There we spent the whole day as a family eating well, opening presents, playing games and enjoying a relaxing day.

Miss Sophia was excited about all the action.

And both the girls had a fabulous time opening presents, sharing/stealing them from one another, and playing like mad. This Christmas was much more exciting than last year, let me tell you!

A lovely little Christmas dinner spread.

And of course the Hook family traditional talent show. This year Clara stole the show with her lovely Jingle Bell performance.

A great finale to our evening, which pretty much summarizes our stage in life with little ones: All eight of us gathered round the laptop to watch Elmosong, yet again, on youtube.

And it seems that after a long weekend of fun-filled time with family that I realize, yet again, that we did a pretty ridiculously bad job with pictures this year. Has anyone figured out how to fully enjoy their day/relax while carrying the camera around their neck constantly to capture all the great moments? As for me, I usually resort to yelling at my husband to... "Get the camera! Hurry! Take a picture. No, from that angle! Shoot. You missed it". And I'd rather if my tendency was not this way. Do help, if you have ideas. Besides hiring a full-time family photographer, of course.

Gingerbread Houses

After a weekend with about twelve cancelled plans (slight exaggeration) because of a sick little lady, it was really great to gather as friends for something a little bit Christmasy. Last night we went straight from our santa date to the Troupin/Nixon household for some gingerbread house decorating.

Clara was really into it.

For about twelve seconds. Then she decided it was more fun to play with the frosting and scour the floor for dropped candies. The discarded candy + santa's candy cane probably contributed to the fact that she stayed up later than ever before last night.

The others had a slightly longer attention span. The adults, of course, finished it off. And then we watched Polar Express. For about ten minutes before heading home for Clara's early bed time. She didn't sleep because of her sugar high; we should've stayed.

Despite all this, it was great to gather with friends. We had a lovely evening.

Santa

We went to visit santa today. And Clara actually liked him. She did scream for a few seconds (we missed our photo opp., sadly) and then she was over it. He asked her if she wanted a baby doll. To this she replied "yesss", which is a good thing. Her grammy has one under the tree, ready for the Claranator.

But it wasn't santa that Clara was thrilled to see. It was the stuffed polar bear. I wish we would've known. Taking a picture with the polar bear is free.

Goodnight Moon

This Christmas we decided it was time to get a flip video recorder. We called it a joint gift. Until now we've recorded small bits and pieces of Clara's first 1.5 years of existence via the digital camera. I don't think we'll regret this purchase. It's about time, really.

Our first official video? Clara reading her favorite night time story with daddy. Oh, how her little voice can melt a mama's heart.

The Little Things

One of the most interesting parts of parenting, I think, is watching our child discover what she loves. I know that we can push her towards things, but I swear to you it does absolutely no good unless she has the desire to pursue something herself.

Take throwing balls for example. Wouldn't it be great if she could play catch? We thought so. Of course we've taught her. She can put her hands up and catches the ball quite successfully. She can throw pretty well too. But despite our efforts, she will not do it more than once. She simply is not interested. We have tried, trust me. And then there's elmo, or her bike helmet, or pickles, or her tutu. These are all things we've exposed her to, but becoming slightly obsessed with them? That was all Clara. She certainly has a little personality of her own.

Even when it's surprising - or different than we expected, it is so fun to discover what brings her joy. Here are just a few fun things we've done lately that she's loved...

Spending time with cousin Eeya, of course.

Wearing her bike helmet + tutu + climbing inside her toy chest + being with her cousin. What could be better?

Helping daddy string the Christmas tree lights.

Watching daddy set up the toy train set from his childhood.

Checking out the light display at a park by our house.

Playing with friends at Mobias, especially "Pawker & Giffin" (two of Clara's four boyfriend obsessions, along with Levi & Andrew). And enjoying sweet little Hollyn & Amy too.

Riding the "choo choo tain" at co-op, to the music room (that + snack are Clara's favorite parts, by far!)

And that's what we've been up to lately. The little things. You can't get much better than that.