Forward Strong Goals and Happy New Year from Embroidery It

Dear Friends,
I’m sending very Happy New Year wishes to each of you.  May 2014 be a year of health, peace, joy and prosperity for us all.  God is great and may he bestow an abundance of blessings on each of us.I wrote in a previous post HERE that during 2013 my focus was on the word SHINE.  I mentioned that this has been a year of service for me.  I feel that 2014 is to be a year to care more for myself and I have felt the words FORWARD STRONG placed on my heart a few weeks ago.

Our son Timothy and beagle, Cindy moving forward strong.

I always write goals down each year in all areas of my life.  Some of these goals overlap into different areas so you will see some listed more than once.  These are not what I consider resolutions, but they are things for me to work on throughout the year.  I don’t beat myself up if I fall short in attaining them, it just gives me something to focus on.  It helps me move Forward Strong to have goals and know what I am to move towards.  I also think that sharing them helps me be more accountable in accomplishing them so here goes:

Family Goals

  • Spend quality time with family when they are home.  Say ‘yes’ to family games and movies.
  • Visit Katie and Emily twice a year

Home Goals

  • Remove paper from the home and keep remaining paper organized (#1 goal and more on this below)
  • Tidy home daily
  • Clean home weekly
  • Grocery shop one time a week- instead of several times a week
  • Menu plan weekly
  • Go to bed with a clean kitchen

Spiritual Life Goals

  • Continue habits of Daily Audio Bible and weekly adoration in addition to Sunday church
  • Become actively involved in the women’s group at church
  • Read St. Faustina’s Diary
  • Attend a women’s retreat like Captivating
  • Notice God’s blessings daily

Finance Goals

  • Pay bills every Thursday
  • Pause before making purchases
  • Balance checkbook and reconcile credit card statements monthly

Friendship Goals

  • Become actively involved in the women’s group at church
  • Join Crafters with a Cause
  • Maintain monthly contact with friends from New Mexico and other locations we’ve lived
  • Grow online friendships on this blog

Creativity Goals

  • Take one art class or attend a quilt guild meeting – monthly
  • Learn a new craft
  • Learn to digitize embroidery designs

Knowledge Goals

  • Learn a new craft
  • Learn to digitize embroidery designs
  • Learn to set up a true website

Business Goals

  • Follow written business plan and get my business up and running (stop talking and start doing here)
  • Create a true website
  • Learn to digitize embroidery designs
  • Blog 2  times a week
  • Listen to Entrepreneur on Fire
  • Develop a newsletter
  • Create a contact list

Personal Goals

  • Clean eating
  • 10,000 steps a day
  • Classical stretch daily
  • weekly creative time

Community and World goals

  • Choose a cause to support
  • Blog
  • YouTube videos
  • Women’s group at church

My all time #1 focus goal this year is to get the paper out of the house.  I mean ALL paper.  If it doesn’t get out of the house then there better jolly well be a place for it.  When I look at this house I see WAY too much paper and that includes books, magazines, cards, receipts, trash, mail you name it.  This is going to be hard because I enjoy paper crafting and I also enjoy journaling with paper and pen, but if I don’t have a specific space for paper, then I’m going to do my best to get it out of here.  I have a real weakness for purchasing magazines when I go to the store.  It stops now.

This may seem like a lengthy list, but I think it is good for me to stretch myself.  If I would reach all my goals, then I don’t feel I would be stretching myself enough.

It is a good feeling to look back at this list several times a year to see what has been accomplished.  Then I also need to see what goals need to be modified and what goals need to be scrapped.  It is a fluid list and subject to change and I’m quite ok with that.  Last year I hit about half of my goals.  This year with my focus being on FORWARD STRONG, I am focusing more on myself which means focusing more on my goals.

As I said before, God is Great and He wants great things for us.  God has given each of us gifts that He wants us to use for His good here on earth.  By moving Forward Strong, I plan to be using my gifts and talents for the betterment of my life and the lives of others.

Please know I am praying for greatness for each of you in 2014.
With much love and blessings,
Happy New Year,
Nancy