*Sign up for a half marathon. I signed up to do Thanksgiving Point’s “Tulip Run” Half-Marathon, and I’m stoked. Of course, signing up was the easy part…now it will be a lot harder to convince myself that I can afford to slack on a run (or two) a week…
*Take photos of at least two families/people to practice my portrait skills. I did half of this goal–I took portraits of my nephew before his baptism. Even though I love photography, this one was difficult for me—I guess a part of me still feels silly asking people to be my subjects so I can practice a skill. I’m sure most people would love having free pictures of their family (even if I’m not a professional yet), but I had a hard time mustering up the courage to ask. Maybe I’ll have to try this goal again sometime soon.
*Read through Deuteronomy. This goal required me to up the ante on my reading—I usually only read a chapter on most days (or half a chapter, if one of them is really long), but I had to read two chapters every night to make sure I finished on time. The good news was that this simple change convinced me that I needed to set the bar higher on my scripture-reading goals for February.
*Read two books on my lists. In case you haven’t been reading my blog regularly, I totally bombed on this one. I can’t even talk about it anymore–it kind of just breaks my little bookworm heart.
*Learn one new piece in my Piano Classics book. Although the Beethoven piece I chose isn’t “performance-worthy,” I’m still counting this goal as having been met. So there.
*Lower our monthly bills. For the past week, I have been on the phone daily with Verizon and CenturyLink, trying to negotiate for a better deal. It seems that I keep hitting obstacle after obstacle on this one, and I am SO frustrated with both companies at this point that I’m ready to switch providers entirely for both Internet and phone. I’ll give it one more week, but if I still can’t cut a deal with them (and actually get a rep that will work with me instead of trying to sell me something I don’t want), I’m switching to Comcast and a different phone provider.
Now for the February goals:
*Decide on name for photography business. One of my “big-picture” goals for myself is to open up my own little photography business over this year. I don’t want to start anything too big (until I feel like I’m really “good enough”), but I think a lot of people in our area will respond to a photographer willing to offer pretty cheap prices for decent family shots. To get to the goal though, I’m starting small, hence the reason why I’m just choosing to pick a name this month instead of doing anything else.
*Visit a new temple. One of my bucket list goals is to visit at least 50 LDS temples (and do work in them). Luckily for me, there’s lots of temples here in Utah I haven’t visited and/or done work in, so I have a lot to choose from.
*Spend at least two different days in the family history center. I really want to keep working on my dad’s line, which I’ve had some really awesome breakthroughs with in the last year and a half. The family history center is just a mile from our apartment, so I have no excuse to not go frequently.
*Read two books on my lists. Second time’s gonna be the charm, just you wait.
*Learn one new piece in Piano Classics book.
*Read through Joshua and Judges in Old Testament.
*And for my homemaking goal: Make weekly menu plans. In the past two months, I feel like I’ve been seriously slacking on my cooking duties; I used to cook pretty much every night, but lately I’ve been cooking on Sunday afternoons and one other night during the week. So, to prevent my diet getting any more out-of-whack than it already is, I decided to tackle this one, and NOW.
Now, here’s where you can help me:
1. If you get Internet through CenturyLink, how much do you pay a month for just Internet? I want to see if I’m getting swindled…
2. Do you do weekly menu plans? How do you go about it? I’m thinking about doing it by grocery list or maybe by meal-type (Mondays – Mexican night, Fridays – pizza night, etc.). Any ideas?
