Bienvenidos 2014!

First off, I want to say a HUGE thank you to friends and family that prayed for my dad, and continue to pray for my family, and me. Your prayers and words of encouragement have been felt, despite whatever distance is between us. The body of Christ is amazing! I know my dad is enjoying looooong, lovely conversations with lots of people and as my Tia Nancy said, he is singing in God's heavenly choir with gusto! So, despite 2013 ending quite differently than I ever imagined, God is still good and I am resting in His goodness as this New Year begins.

Looking back at my 2013 NewYear's goals, this is what I wrote:

• grow in the fruit of the Spirit
• read the rest of my mystery series
• run a half marathon... or 2
• work out. just do something
• be better at budgeting and saving
• be better at keeping in touch with others
• blog more? (there was literally a question mark there... I guess I wasn't too sure about that one)
• read 1 classic book
• invite people over for dinner

I would say I had pretty good goals in mind. Did I remember that I wrote those? Nope! I'm pretty sure I hadn't looked at those since the day I wrote them. However, I did accomplish some of those things this past year! 

Obviously, growing in the fruit of the Spirit is a lifelong goal, so I can't say that I am there quite yet. 

I actually re-started my mystery series from the beginning and JUST finished the last book I had already read... which means THIS year I will be starting to read the rest of the series! 

I did run a half marathon with my sister, so that was fun. Mike and I have already signed up for the BCS half next December, so that one is a for sure this year as well!

Sooo... hopefully since I've signed up for another half marathon I will continue to work out in some shape or form. One can only hope. 

As far as budgeting goes, I just downloaded YNAB (You Need a Budget), so we are trying something new this year. Hopefully this will help us budget and save, especially since Mike is back in school and we have more loans to pay off. Our goal is to pay off my small loan this year. Let's see if we can do it!

I think I did a fair job of keeping in touch with others. Haven't been too great on the bookface, but I have stayed in contact with friends.

I'm not sure if I blogged more or not... maybe that question mark was there for good reason!

Hmm... classic book. Did I read a classic this past year? Ummm... I honesty don't remember. I know I read books, just can't think if any were classics or not. This year Mike and I have cleared out one of the shelves on our bookshelf to add any books we read during this year to see how many we come up with. This should be fun!

And I think I can recall at least 3 times inviting people over for dinner this year! So, that's like, 1 invite every 4 months! Yeah! I could probably be better about that too. I think we could handle once a month!

Some of these past year's goals will stay the same and just continue on into 2014, but I think I'll add some more.

2014 Goals:

• Spend more time with family (talking on the phone, dinner, visiting, emails, etc)
• Pay off one of my small school loans
• FINISH my mystery series
• practice guitar at least once every week
• keep a list of those that I am praying for and pray for them often!
• finish reading the Bible all the way through for the 2nd time (currently half-way there!)
• continue to grow in the fruit of the Spirit!
• blog more?... yeah, let's just keep that one on there. It's a goal. If I put it on the list it might happen, but if it's not on the list, it probably definitely won't happen... right?! :)

I think that should do. (Don't want to overwhelm myself from Day 1!) Do I think I'll remember all these come July 23rd? Probably not. But maybe you can help keep me accountable with these things. What are your New Year's resolutions/goals? 

Happy New Year!

lisa