Alrighty then! The year is officially over, so I think it’s a good time to wrap up my 2010 goals list!
Wrapping it up
I really slowed down on my goals in the last few months of the year, but I did manage to cross a few more items off the list:
Completed:
- #18 Make a Santa outfit for Wyatt’s Imaginext Batman. — I slipped this one in last week and I wrote a Batman Christmas poem to go with it! Awwwww…yeah!
- #27 Set up a light box for photographing food and crafts. — I’ve got a new system involving sheets of foam core and woodworking clamps that I learned about at BlogHer Food. I can also throw a natural light lamp into the equation when I really need to. It’s all a little wonky, but I think it works pretty well.
- #29 Add five new foods to Wyatt’s eating repertoire. — The five new foods are: chicken, stews/casseroles, snap peas, sandwiches, and tacos.
- #30 Do a potato stamp art project with the boys. — This was another one that we did in December. It wasn’t very successful because they decided that they wanted to just paint with brushes instead of using the potatoes but it was fun for the two and a half minutes that it lasted.
- #64 Make more lists. — I guess I’m not technically positive that I made more lists this year than I did last year, but I made a heck of a lot of lists this year. Honestly, I think this post alone is probably enough to tip the scales.
- #65 Print and frame a “Get Excited and Make Things” poster for my office wall. — Whew! I did this one yesterday. It’s kind of ridiculous that it took a whole year for me to wrap this one up because it took all of five minutes, but I’ve got this in a 4×6 frame sitting on a shelf in the living room that I walk by all the time now.
With those last few items, that puts me at a grand total of 43 of my 73 goals completed! Wooo!
My Favorites
Here are my favorites of the goals I completed:
- Learn to crochet — I’ve wanted to take up crochet for a long time and it was really satisfying to finally get it. And I adore my first major project, this giant granny square lap blanket:
- Learn to make marmalade — Wow! I never would have realized it, but this one little goal triggered a love of canning! I can’t wait to experiment with this more this year. Pickles are definitely on my list now!
- Take my kids to Iowa in the warm months — We had a great trip to Iowa to visit Grandma and Grandpa. I loved taking the boys to do all of the things I remember so fondly from my summers growing up there.
- Make 30 scrapbook layouts — I always love scrapbooking and it was really nice to get back into the habit of making pages again.
- Read To Kill a Mockingbird — I’m so glad I finally read this book. It’s stayed with me over the months and I’m still thinking about it from time to time.
The Stuff I Didn’t Do
Here are the goals that I did not complete:
- Actually make those pretzel crayon thingies for Wyatt’s lunch.
- Assemble paper Christmas train with the kids.
- Assemble paper Christmas village with the kids.
- Assemble Project 365 scrapbook. (started!)
- Bake bread.
- Clear out the basement storage room and Freecycle like crazy.
- Clear the clutter from my bedroom.
- Do another photo-a-day project. (started!)
- Etch glass.
- Find five reliable, healthy, delicious soup recipes. (2 found!)
- Finish my book proposal.
- Get a new couch.
- Get rid of half the stuff in the office.
- Go on more than one date with Zach.
- Go out to a grown up restaurant with another couple.
- Hold another diaper drive for Help a Mother Out.
- Knit August a cute hat.
- Make a twinkie cake.
- Make Augie more felt food.
- Make car organizers for each of the kids.
- Make felt gingerbread men for the kids.
- Make macarons.
- Make red beans and rice from scratch.
- Make some felt flower barrettes.
- May some air dry clay flowers.
- Organize my crafting.
- Set up a desk for Wyatt.
- Stay in a hotel alone for a weekend to sleep late, scrapbook, blog, and do whatever I want.
- Take a day (or weekend) trip to Santa Cruz.
- Take a letterpress class.
- Take Wyatt to the King Tut exhibit.
There are 30 things on my goals list that I didn’t complete, and that’s OK with me. When I drew up this list, I was going to be happy if I completed half and I actually made 60% so I think that’s pretty good. Since the whole point of this project was to do things that would make me happy, there is absolutely no point in beating myself up for the projects I didn’t get done! Still, I think it’s worth looking at what fell by the wayside to see what happened there. I found that most of the uncompleted tasks fell into three main categories:
- Crafty projects I lost interest in as the year went on
This is pretty straighforward. I had a bunch of very specific projects on my list — make red beans and rice, make felt food, car organizers and gingerbread men for the boys — but as the year went on, I found other projects that were more interesting to me. I think there’s something to be said for setting specific crafty goals, but it’s also kind of ridiculous to force myself to do one fun thing when there is another fun thing I would rather do. Next year I’m planning to set a quantity of crafty projects to complete rather than spelling out what those projects should be.
- Things I couldn’t afford
This one is also pretty straightforward. There were a number of goals on my list that I really wanted to do, but we just didn’t have the money for. Letterpress class, a hotel stay, and buying a new couch are all worthy goals, but paying for groceries and health insurance takes priority.
- Things that require that I not be a slob
Yeah….the slob factor. I had nine “organizational” items on my list and I completed fewer than half of them. And of the ones I did knock off…things are back to a state where they need to be tackled again. I guess I’m not sure what I should take away from this. I’d really rather have an uncluttered house, but I find that this is one of my biggest challenges. Maybe just, “try harder next year”?
In Conclusion
I liked this project! I much prefer setting these smaller, more specific goals to the big, grand New Year’s resolutions that I’ve tried in the past. Having things that I could regularly tick off my list really made a difference in my satisfaction levels and it made me feel like I was progressing as the year went on. I also found it helpful to have the list posted on my blog and to summarize the progress I made each month (or most months, at least).
I’m already working on a new list for 2011, so I’ll be posting that in the next week or so!
What goals did you accomplish in 2010? Are you planning anything fun for the new year?
