New Year's Resolutions

I haven't made resolutions in years, and I don't think I've ever made them and then reviewed them at the end of the year.  Isn't a blog an excellent accountability tool, however?  In past years, I was pretty vague about what I hoped to accomplish (which also probably made the resolutions pretty useless--can you quantify "getting in shape"?), so I'm really specific this time around.

So, in 2011, I hope to:

1. Still be running at least 10-12 miles per week by December 31, 2011.  I started running (or, more accurately, ralking) in March of this past year.  That deserves a post of its own, but I finished a 5K and a 10K this year, and will be running a half-marathon with Missy and Laurie this weekend.  John is getting back to the gym, so I think we will try to plan a few races to do together this year, and hopefully that will keep me motivated to keep running.

2. Get us to the church on time.  By on time, I mean the 9 am service.  Our church has a contemporary service at 9 am and a traditional service at 11 am.  John prefers the hymns in the 11 am service and I prefer the 11 am start time (especially when I'm on call), but they only do Sunday School during the 9 am service.  So for Will's sake, we really need to make it to the 9 am service.  Maybe we'll try baths on Saturday night instead of Sunday morning?

3. Make a sweater.  Anna's little wrap barely counts; I want to do something a little bigger.  I already have this planned out--I'm going to make a Wonderful Wallaby for Will.  I bought the pattern on our trip to NYC, I just need to order the yarn.  I'll also probably need to brave a knitting session at our local yarn shop, because I think I'll be heading there for help if this project goes south (I've found there's only so much you can learn about knitting from the Internet).

4.  Make a quilt.  My plans for this are a little more nebulous.  I want to do something like this, but I'll probably start out with something more like this.

5. Memorize Colossians.  I think.  I'm all indecisive about what to commit to on the scripture front.  Our pastor challenged the church to read the entire Bible in a year, there's a new Beth Moore study starting in February, and then Ann Voskamp came up with this lovely plan to memorize Colossians (that even has its own Facebook group).  I think I'm sticking with Ann and the Beth Moore study, and I'll do the One Year readings once I'm done with Beth. And somewhere in there I'm supposed to be reading some continuing medical education...maybe not as important in the hereafter, but very important in the here and now. :-)

6. Video the kids at least once per week.  I was sooo disappointed with the grainy videos I took on our fancy camera at Christmas, and a little sad in general about how little I pull out the real video camera.  I forgot to charge the battery for Christmas, so I charged it afterwards--and when the camera had power again, I discovered that the last video I'd taken was of Christmas morning last year!  Pathetic.  So more videos this year (although I won't be posting them to the blog unless we invest in a new video camera, 'cause our old one doesn't allow computer edits; do I hear a sigh of relief?).

7. Print the blog.  I'll probably do this soon, I just need to go back and complete one or two December posts and Anna's birthday party post.  I'm going to post those under the dates they actually happened (because what's the point about posting about Anna's first birthday now when we're 3 months from her 2nd?!?), but I'll do a post with links to them when they're done.  I think I'm going to use Blog2Print--anybody tried this or have recommendations?

8. Print some Shutterfly photo albums.  I give this one a 29% chance of success--Will's baby book on Shutterfly has been in progress for about 4 years now.  I think I can, I think I can.

Okay, that's all I've got for now.  I should probably add drink less coffee, stress out less, and compose less wordy blog posts, but really, those will never happen. :-)

How 'bout y'all?  Any resolutions?  Anybody want to memorize Colossians with me??

Easter in September

I'm joining in Friday Faves at It's Almost Naptime again--the topic du jour is favorite old hymn and favorite modern hymn or praise song. As usual, I have a hard time picking just one of each, so I made a little playlist. :-)

My all-time favorite hymn is Christ the Lord is Risen Today. I loved singing it at Easter in our church in Blountstown, and loved that we sang it at a pretty fast tempo--makes it seem even more joyous. If you only listen to one song on the playlist, please listen to that one--it's Ashley Cleveland's recording, with a bagpipe introduction (awesome!) and a kickin' beat.

My favorite modern hymn/worship song is also an Easter tune, The Resurrection Hymn (See What a Morning). I have it on my iPod for year-round listening, and posted a YouTube video of it at Easter this year...couldn't find it on playlist.com but click HERE to go to my previous post to listen to it.

My other two favorites are In Christ Alone (who doesn't love that one? so beautiful) and Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing. Am I the only person who grew up thinking the verse about Ebenezer was maybe about the hymn-writer's kid? This is a better explanation. I also loved the Baby Bangs posts on raising her Eben-ezer. If you don't follow her blog, go HERE and HERE to see those posts. Those struck a note; I felt similarly when we hit the magical 6 month mark with Will. :-)

Head over to It's Almost Naptime to see more favorite hymns and praise songs...I'll close with my favorite verse:

Love's redeeming work is done, Alleluia!
Fought the fight, the battle won, Alleluia!
Death in vain forbids him rise, Alleluia!
Christ has opened paradise, Alleluia!

Birthday Hints...John, are you reading this?

It's Almost Naptime is hosting a "Friday Faves" blog carnival, and today's theme is favorite perfume. I was inspired to join in this one because I was trying to order some scented wipe cubes for Anna's cloth wipes yesterday and had a tough time picking scents--I didn't understand the scent descriptions. What the heck does bergamot smell like, anyway? I stuck with familiar things...vanilla, oatmeal, birthday cake (!), etc.

However, I saw Missy's (Naptime Missy, not our Missy) post, and thought that perhaps by researching my two favorite perfumes, I'd find out what went into them and therefore what scents I like. So here goes...

My all-time favorite is Dolce and Gabbana Feminine perfume. I first sniffed (haha) this one out in Florence on my first trip there with Annie Jo. I loved it but didn't buy it because I thought it was pricey--I think I received it for Christmas from Mama, though. I've had a few bottles since then but am currently out.

According to Amazon: "Young people are sincere, candid, and realistic. Their nature is the inspiration for D&G. Introduced in 1999, D&G Feminine is a clean, crisp, and uncomplicated fruity floral with hints of musk."

Fruity floral with a hint of musk--is that vague or what? Uncomplicated sounds good, though. And as for the "young people" part, well, in 1999 I was young people.

My other favorite--and what I'm currently wearing--is Banana Republic Rosewood. Love it, and sometimes it is on sale at the outlet.

According to a perfume blog (which is awesome--they describe perfume like wine, cracks me up): "This warm and alluring scent unearths a soulful sensuality. Fusing bergamot champagne, white tea leaves, and white amber are sure to enchant any suitor. Sweet, but not cloyingly so, this is a scent that is both cuddly and quite “dressed up”. I don’t get any “champagne”, but I do smell sweet tea"...."in the drydown, the warm aspect is underscored by a creamy chocolate note."

AHA...chocolate AND sweet tea...no wonder I like it. And, apparently, I am a fan of bergamot.

Alright, if you want to join in, go HERE and follow the directions.

Things that made me smile today

• I saw the baby turkey again. I took more pictures--still grainy--but here's a little video:


• This blog post by Big Mama made me laugh. I looooove mixed CD's, that's all I have in my car right now (well, besides 2 Christmas CD's that I haven't removed from my disc changer). And, for better or worse, my musical taste doesn't appear to be that different from her 7-year-old daughter. Thank goodness for MP3s--I remember holding my pink boom box up to the TV (during "Nick Rocks," I believe) and trying to record music directly from the TV. Those were some quality recordings, I think the static made them extra special. :-)


• This post from "It's Almost Naptime" made me laugh and cry at the same time. I have met Black Jacket Lady, she also shops at our Publix. I encountered her on a Sunday afternoon (before Anna), when Will and I were shopping. John was at work, and we had no food besides croutons and Crystal Light, so I had to shop with Will. He pitched a five-alarm tantrum in the checkout aisle. I wanted to die on the spot, but since we were only 10 feet and one credit card swipe from the door, I decided to save his discipline for the car and hopefully keep his screams from escalating. Some grandmotherly-looking lady (age-wise, I mean--she clearly either had no grandchildren or had extremely well-behaved grandchildren) shot me the dirtiest look from 2 aisles over. I know it is no fun to listen to a misbehaving child--I simultaneously wanted to apologize to her, get mad at her, and explain that I DO discipline my child, it just lately has not been working very well. Sigh. Since that time, I shop in the evenings or weekends when John can watch the kiddos--and we've learned to occasionally subsist on croutons. :-)


• This little face makes me smile all the time--especially now that she gets sooooo happy about the smallest things. This is her before we left to run errands yesterday: "We're going to the bank AND the dry cleaners?? Really?? That is so COOL, that is exactly where I wanted to go!!" She slept through the whole trip, but the smiles on the way out the door were awesome.
• And, it's Mama/Nana's birthday today! So Happy Birthday! (I won't include which birthday it is...except to say she's not quite 60...not yet...)

Now back to packing for our move next week. Packing does NOT make me smile (which is why I wanted to do this post and remind myself of some fun things--and, of course, procrastinate). Anybody want to share what is making you smile at the moment?

Another perk of being a girl

I have commented (complained) multiple times in our household about a certain husband's total inability to locate something that is not in plain sight. A typical scenario: John in the living room, late for work, saying "Where is my jacket?? I need my jacket!" Me: "Did you check the coat closet?" John: "Yes!" Me, going over to the coat closet, opening it--voila! His jacket. John: "Well, I didn't look at all the coats in the closet."

Will has inherited the same tendency. He loses his puppy at least 5 times per day and goes nuts looking for it. I will tell him to go check his bedroom--he'll walk in and out of the room 2 or 3 times, still unable to locate the puppy (which is so grubby that I would think he could locate it by smell alone). I'll walk into his room, look around, and voila! Puppy. Not hidden at all, usually right on his bed.

I was blaming this trait on some gene that John had passed on...never did it occur to me that this was because they were MALE! But then I found this post from the CDW, in which she explains it all...I am shocked we didn't learn this in medical school...read on:
http://countrydoctorswife.blogspot.com/2009/02/why-i-have-uterus.html

Be a sweetie, wipe the seatie!

I have to post this link to a CNN/Oprah article on what may be my number one pet-peeve. The only thing that raises my blood pressure more is those folks on the interstate that ignore 3 miles' worth of signs to get into one lane, then try to merge at the last second and hold everyone up. Arrrrggghhhh!

Here goes nothin'...

I made this blogspot a little while ago, then decided I didn't have much to write about. But I'm gonna give it a whirl--mainly because we only have 3 months left in North Carolina and I have a long list of things I want to do up here before we go. So I figure this blog will be my accountability partner to prevent us from spending every weekend saying we "should" have gone there or done that. And of course I'll include pictures of what we do!

PS--I'm having a little trouble coming up with a blog title, so suggestions are welcome. I came up with "Will's Paparazzo" and "Not-so-chic Mama" (instead of "One Chic Mama," a popular blog, hahaha...), but I think they're lame. So send some good ideas my way and I'll be grateful!