my goals, and they be lofty goals, too!

I don't make New Year's Resolutions. I think, as a concept, they're damned from the start. If losing weight or quitting smoking is something you're so eager to do, you wouldn't have put off starting until New Year's. Picking an arbitrary date sometime in the future for a goal you decide is important in December (or earlier) is a sure sign that you're not really psyched about doing it, and soon whatever motivation comes with January first will fade away to the same uninspiring level you had when you first thought the thing up.

So I make goals. This year, I would like to lose weight, same as last year (after I gave birth, of course). I plan to continue to deny myself excessively large American portions of food, to keep trying to eat mostly plants, and hopefully to exercise, which I find exceedingly difficult to make myself do unless it's warm enough for a walk with the stroller.

I also would like to find a way to motivate Tom without nagging. The thing is, it's easy to nag less; you just stop doing it. But then stuff never gets done, deadlines pass, and all of a sudden it's my fault because I didn't remind him. So, I need to find the magical motivation in the land of unicorns and flying monkeys that will get Tom to do things he has promised to do, and knows he should do, yet needs to be nagged to do.

I want to take my kids to have their pictures taken, professionally. Ryan gets school pictures taken, but we rely on camera phones and digital cameras for the boys. I want to take the boys down to JCPenney's like I used to do with Ryan. I'd also like to get at least one good picture of all 3 of my kids together. And as long as I'm dreaming of a world without sitting fees, a new family picture would kick ass too.

I would like to get my blender cabinet. I have been nagging Tom (because there is no other way, dammit!) for months to build me a blender cabinet. Obviously, Tommy's big boy bed took priority, but now that it's done, I would like my cabinet. I have a very specific idea of what I want, but it is not what I will get. Tom will find a way to make it "better", with no idea of why I wanted it a specific height or width or whatever, and I will forever lament what could have been. But I have a waffle iron, panini press, food processor, food chopper, George Forman grill, and a coffee grinder and no place to put them. (Ironically I don't want to put the blender in the blender cabinet because it is red and looks nice on the counter.) I also have many plants that need to be on top of a blender cabinet in front of the window but which would, in its absence, merely fall to the floor and be eaten by the cat.