12 in 2012

If you haven't checked out my 12 in 2012 tab yet, well, I'm about to give you an update! At the beginning of the year I set 12 goals, not resolutions, but goals of things I wanted to accomplish this year. Seeing as it's 1/4 of the way through the year already (WHAT?!?) I thought I'd give an update. Really, more for myself than for you, but follow along if you'd like. :-)

1. Read through the entire Bible!

**I've just started the book of Joshua. I've read 216 pages so far & am exactly 5 days behind. Some mornings when the alarm goes off at 5:30am, nothing is getting me out of bed, even God Himself. Sorry about that Lord. 

2. Read 24 books!

**Jump over to my Books I've Read tab to follow along! 3 down, 21 to go! I need to pick it up. I will say I'm in the middle of about 3 books at the moment. I need to get better at finishing them. :-)

3. Write to our Compassion child, Masereka, once a month.

**I'm a failure at being a sponsor mom. I haven't written to Masereka ONCE! This is causing feelings of guilt & failure. I do not think I should allow this to cause such strong feelings of shame, so I am officially changing this goal to once a quarter. 4 times a year, write to this little boy. Obviously once a month hasn't worked, but instead of beating myself up over it, I'm going to change it to what will work better for me. I love you all the same Masereka!

4. Not spend more than we make.

So far this year, we've saved exactly $71. Ok, not exactly something to boast about. I'm a little concerned too because we're about to put our house on the market, & we have a few projects to pay for before we can do that. And if you own a home, you know that projects are generally never cheap. However, I can say that we have a plan. I love having a plan! Michael & I are going to read & do a workbook by financial expert Dave Ramsey. The book we're going to read is The Total Money Makeover, which gives "7 organized, easy to follow steps that will lead you into a total money makeover." My hope is this will help us save more than $71 going forward!

5. Another financial one would be to pay off my student loans!

**CHECK!! What an awesome feeling it is to know we no longer have any monthly commitments to money sucking financial institutions!! Praise God for the freedom & financial ability to be out of debt. We do still have a mortgage payment, but we believe (and Dave Ramsey will back us up on this one) that a mortgage is "good debt." Well, as good as debt can be.

6. Have a baby!

**More to come...

7. Make a quilt!

**I have fabric! AND, some fabric is cut into squares! Wow, I must say, even I am impressed by my progress on this project. Usually, when I say I want to accomplish something that has multiple steps to it, I get motivated enough to buy all the supplies, then it sort of stops there. I have, let's just say... a few, projects that I've bought all the materials for, but they still sit in a closet somewhere, either half finished or still in the bag I brought them home in. Can I get an amen?! Am I the only one here?!

Michael & I went to Jo Ann's to pick out fabric a few weeks ago. Can I just stop a minute and say how awesome my husband is? What man wants to go to Jo Ann's to pick out fabric?!? He helped with the color scheme & picking out patterns & everything. I'm so thankful because he really does have a good eye for colors & hues, and he's very artsy & has such a creative mind! I'll say something is purple, he assures me it's blue, so I learn it's blue. I put circles & stripes together, he gives me a look, & I go put one pattern back. He's amazing!

I figure, I have until December to finish this thing, but I better get started! Here's the progress so far:

All my fabric to be cut

The squares are cut!

8.Go to the Denver Aquarium!

**Remember my Year of Dates post? Well, little does Michael know this is planned for November... Well, I guess now he does. 

9. Find a super delicious, yummy, authentic Ramen restaurant in the Denver area.

**See #8. But this time I'm not giving it away... =)

10. Michael's 30th birthday is in 2012 & I want to do something BIG!

**People! I need your help!! His birthday is September 3rd & I'm definitely going to need ideas on what to do! We won't be able to take a big trip (see #6). I originally had the idea to go to Chicago for a long weekend, but that won't work. If you can help me out with some ideas, leave a comment!

11. I want to grow something I can eat.
**Long story short, we're putting our house on the market in April! We want to move by September (again, see #6), so that sort of limits my abilities to plant a garden this year. Maybe I'll try a tomato plant again this year (massive failure last year), or some herbs? The problem is our current house faces East/West so the windows get direct sunlight for only 1/2 the day. Nothing that needs full sun will work. Ideas?
Can I say, however, how well my non-edible plants are doing?? This counts for something, right?

My African violet- there was a time the leaves weren't yellow...

My bamboo plant from college is like 2 feet tall!

12. Start one new tradition.

We've done a few new things, but I guess we won't know until the end of the year which one has become a new tradition. We enjoy participating in Denver Restaurant week in February or March. It's a week when restaurants have a meal special for $52.80 per couple. Last year we went to The Melting Pot & this year we went to Sullivan's Steakhouse. So, you can get a really good meal for a reasonable price.

There's also some things I would like to start doing around significant holidays, like Easter & Christmas. This one will take a bit more thought!

Glad you followed along until the end! Let me know if you have thoughts or encouragement to help me keep going! :-)