Resolutions Revisited

Before we really get started with 2015, let's check in and see how my resolutions for the last six months of the previous year went. Shall we?



Marriage:
- Celebrate our fourth wedding anniversary. Check! The traditional gift is fruit or flowers, so we gave each other two botanical paintings by Emily Jeffords. Oh, and we went out to dinner.

- Finish reading Brideshead Revisited together. Not even close. We're committed to making significant progress over the rest of Christmas break though.

- Go on at least three dates. Check! After our babysitter went to college this fall, we found a couple new sitters and have been enjoying lots of date nights. We went on three dates in December alone.

Claire:

- Actually place picture books on hold for her at the library. Check! This has become a regular part of my weekly routine and we've all really enjoyed discovering new picture books.

- Do a basic art project with her at least once a week. Nope. It's just too hard to find the time with a baby sister around who eats crayons. I'd say art projects happened more like once a month.

- Get her potty trained, except for naps and nights. No again. We tried a three-day potty training boot camp right around her half-birthday and it was a miserable failure. The potty just really stresses her out right now.

Maggie:

- Celebrate her first birthday. Check! We threw her a first birthday party. I made her a quilt and birthday banner with the fabric from her monthly photos.

- Get her weaned. Not quite yet. We're down to just before nap and bedtime right now.

- Transition her to just an afternoon nap. Check! Although we really didn't have anything to do with it. She gave up morning naps on her own at eleven months old.

House:

- Improve the landscaping in the front and backyards. Maybe? We didn't really improve the landscaping, but we did manage to stay mostly on top of mowing, weeding, and raking. We also acquired a barbecue, picnic table, and a few more outdoor toys.
- Hang art. Check! Our walls are no longer bare.

- Get an oval coffee table. Check! We found a lovely oval coffee table on Craig's List. No more sharp corners for small children to injure themselves on.

Crafts:

- Make a play kitchen. Check! After sitting in our garage for quite a while, we finally turned our $25 Goodwill entertainment center into a play kitchen as a Christmas present for the girls.

- Make doll bunk beds. Check! For Maggie's birthday, we bunked two doll beds from Ikea and painted them turquoise.

- Make Halloween costumes. Basically? I didn't actually make anything, but we dressed up as Wizard of Oz characters for Halloween and were pretty darn cute, if I say so myself.

Health:

- Join the Y and go at least twice a week. Not really. If you averaged out the whole six months, I probably went more like once every two weeks. July was great, but in August and September Maggie developed really bad stranger anxiety and hated being left in childcare. Things got much better in October and November, but I didn't go once in December. All of a sudden Claire and Maggie got much better at playing together at home and I felt bad making them leave the house earlier in the morning so I could go work out.

- Actually make lunch for myself. Check! I've made a habit out of sitting down for real lunches, even if it's just a peanut butter sandwich, rather than grazing the entire afternoon.

Faith:

- Do a good job of leading mom's group at church. Check! At least, I think so. Our once a week play group and monthly book club have been pretty well attended. Our family's goal was to attend morning mass beforehand, but we fell off the wagon in mid-October, when Adam got really busy at work and could no longer come with us. Maggie is at that stage where she can't make it through a whole service sitting in the pew, so there's not much point taking the girls by myself if we're all just standing in the narthex.

- Make Thanksgiving and Christmas meaningful for Claire. Check! For the most part, at least. With the Jesse tree, Advent wreath, and lots of picture books, Claire definitely understood the gist of Christmas. Thanksgiving, not so much. We did a "thankful leaf" project whenever we could in November, but it was harder to explain gratitude to a toddler than I thought.

 

Adventures:

- Visit a Seattle attraction at least once a month. Check! I definitely felt like we got to explore our city more, especially once Maggie cut out her morning nap.

- Maybe visit my family in China? Nope. We briefly thought about going in November, when we found out my dad's contract would be up a little earlier than planned, but ultimately we didn't feel comfortable leaving Maggie for a week at only thirteen months. Plus, after a solo long weekend trip for the Edel Gathering, I realized that I would miss the girls way more than I expected to.