January Resolutions

Last year I made it through April in my monthly resolutions. So if I make it through May this year, that'll be an improvement! I'm making two resolutions this month:

1. Stride School!
Couch to 5K "class" three times a week that culminates in March with a 5K. I need this push. I am always so off and on (mostly off) about running and I need a new motivator. 

2. Bathroom closet
The top half of my bathroom closet needs a couple more shelves built into it and it needs to be caulked and repainted. Ugh. I really don't want to do this. But I need to and I hope hope hope that making it a resolution will make it actually happen. I have 24 more days to get it done!

January Resolutions: How'd I Do?

Instead of making whole-year New Year's resolutions for 2014, I decided to do monthly resolutions this year. I made three (and a bonus) resolutions for the month of January.

Get up at 5 am every week day

I did pretty good on this one. The last week of January I didn't keep up with it, but it was because I was going to bed too late. I really, really enjoyed having the extra time in the mornings. I didn't do as much of the blogging and reading I wanted to because I found I had to really do active stuff n order to just not fall back asleep. I did get cleaning and ironing and laundry done, so that's awesome. It was really, really hard for me to actually get out of bed (though it always is, whether I'm getting up at 5 am or 6:30 am), but once I did, I was glad to not have to just rush to get to ready for work. I'd like to try to keep it up in February. 

Read The Interestings

Done! Read and then reviewed here. 

Get our entryway looking like it's part of a house where people actually live

Done! I really like the way our entryway looks now. I wrote about it here (note: the pictures are terrible in the post because that tiny little light-less room is really hard to photograph). 

Bonus: Run three times each week 

I counted this as a bonus because I already work out Mon-Tue-Thu and Wednesday evenings are taken up with a committee meeting. That means I would have had to run every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday in January to achieve this, and I knew life had a very good chance of getting in the way of a very specific requirement like that. I am really happy with how much I've been running though. I ran 15.7 miles in January, and I'm up to running 1.5 mile straight. My fastest time is a 11:59 mile. This is not a fast time in the world of running, but it's great for me. In December, I was still running a 13:00+ mile, so I know I'm getting stronger and making progress. 

Let's Try This Again

It's January 2014, and it's been quite a while (nine months, to be exact!) since I've posted on here. I don't even really know why I stopped posting, but I want to give it another try. I loooooove January and the new year and resolutions, even though I'm pretty terrible about keeping them. For example, I made four resolutions last year and I only kept one (well, half of one really - I donated money every month to Kane's Krusade, my favorite dog rescue group).  But I'm not giving up on resolutions! I will, however, alter my approach to them so that I don't fall into the insanity rut. 

So this is my 2014 approach to self-improvement: monthly resolutions. I'm going to pick a few resolutions that I think I can complete in one month. Some of them will be things that I can hopefully turn into habits, but I won't expect that to happen. They're all kind of centered around some overall goals that I have for myself: read more, run more, blog more, keep doing home projects (even small ones), save money, and get more organized. You know, just self-perfection. No big deal.  

January Goals:

• Get up at 5 am every week day (and by extension, get to bed on time so that waking up at 5 isn't torture).

• Read The Interestings.

• Get our entryway looking like it's part of a house where people actually live.

• Bonus: Run three times each week (I'm counting this as a bonus because I already work out Mon-Tue-Thu with my friend Kate and Wednesday evenings are taken up with a committee meeting. That means I would have to run every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday in January to achieve this, and life often gets in the way of very specific requirements like that. So I'm going to run as often as possible, but not feel bad if I don't get in a run every Fri-Sat-Sun).

I am so excited about 2014, and there are so very many things I want to do. These goals are a only a small part of that, but I think by keeping my monthly targets reasonable, attainable, and practical, I'll be more likely to achieve them (or at least stay on track to achieving them). 

Cheers to a great year!