Christmas is over. The new year has begun. Now is a time of reflection. Our holidays were different this year. After a long month of going back and forth to the doctor, Brad was given a diagnosis of pneumonia right before Christmas. I was trying that week before to hold down the fort and keep going but I was battling sickness too. I also got the diagnosis. I decided not to take any chances and took the baby in since he had a cough that didn't sound good. His diagnosis was RSV. Ugh! From that point on we canceled all of our plans. Micah's birthday plans went out. All of our family gatherings were out. We would not be traveling but staying home for Christmas. This is the first time I can ever remember just staying home on Christmas day. Since we've been married, we have always traveled on Christmas Day to Brad's family. The only exception was the year that Micah was born but even then we spent Christmas Day with my family in Danville. My sister was the only family we had around for Christmas this year. She spent Christmas Eve and Day with us. We weren't much fun. We were just starting to feel better but still recovering so we took it easy. It was a very relaxing Christmas but also a little sad. The thing about canceling things like Christmas is that you can't really reschedule them. At least, not really. Brad's mom came to visit a few days later and brought all of her presents. We did Christmas with my family a few days after that. It's nice but not quite the same. We have stayed home so much of this break that we are beginning to get a little bored! Even though it really was relaxing I actually think I'm now all relaxed out! It is also interesting to think that our year ended the same way it began-sick. Last January I was just pregnant. I had morning sickness and then on top of that our family caught some of the viruses floating around and Brad and the boys were sick! It felt like it would never end. It was a constant stream of everyone feeling terrible and going stir crazy because we couldn't leave the house! I was pretty disappointed when this winter hit and we all had a round of sickness again.
Now I'm looking ahead to January. January is a month I usually dislike. I never liked it when I was young because it meant Christmas was over and we had to go back to school! It also always feels so long and like winter will never end. To add to my dislike of January my mom died during the month 6 years ago. Again, not much good comes from January. I usually just can't wait until it's over.
I am trying to find some positives this year though. In 2013 we added to our family but other than that I don't feel like much happened. I know that alone should seem pretty big but maybe since he was our 3rd it didn't seem like it! Of course, it definitely changed things for us. These past 3 months since Mason was born have been eventful as we adjusted to life as a family of 5. I feel like things are just now mellowing out. I'm hoping for something big this year. I don't even know what but God knows. I have often felt like the past few years we have been stuck in our place in life. I'm hoping that this is the year that changes in some way. I have some ideas of the changes I'd like to see but I think God has bigger ideas for us than I could ever imagine. We are watching, waiting, listening for what those might be.
In the meantime, Brad and I decided to set some goals as most people do during the new year. Instead of making yearly goals though we decided to make them quarterly. At the end of the first quarter we will evaluate where we are at! We have broken them down into categories (we are kind of nerdy that way) and written them down. The categories are Financial, Physical, Spiritual and Relational. Under financial we have things like finishing a giving commitment we started and renegotiating some of our monthly bills to see where we can save money. For physical Brad has committed to running every day for the first quarter (inspired by my step mom) and I am going to get back on track with cooking and eating more "real" foods and less processed junk. In spiritual we are going to get back to reading the 1 year Bible and also get back to doing morning devotions with our kids. We really got off track when Mason was born! Then in our relational category we are going to focus on our marriage by having weekly date night (even if they are at home) and our family relationship by having weekly family nights. I also want to be more of a "yes" mom. This does not mean I'll be saying yes to everything my children want and ask for. It does mean that I'll be looking at the situation. I often find myself saying no to things with my kids because it's inconvenient for me. No to play doh because I don't want to clean up the mess. No to having friends over because I don't think my home is good enough. No to playing games or toys because I want to check emails or Facebook. These are the kinds of things I want to say yes to more often.
So here's to making positive changes. Here's to hoping for big things to come but learning to be content with the blessings already given to us. Here's to holding on to the hope of a prophetic encouragement from our pastor. Welcome 2014!
Now I'm looking ahead to January. January is a month I usually dislike. I never liked it when I was young because it meant Christmas was over and we had to go back to school! It also always feels so long and like winter will never end. To add to my dislike of January my mom died during the month 6 years ago. Again, not much good comes from January. I usually just can't wait until it's over.
I am trying to find some positives this year though. In 2013 we added to our family but other than that I don't feel like much happened. I know that alone should seem pretty big but maybe since he was our 3rd it didn't seem like it! Of course, it definitely changed things for us. These past 3 months since Mason was born have been eventful as we adjusted to life as a family of 5. I feel like things are just now mellowing out. I'm hoping for something big this year. I don't even know what but God knows. I have often felt like the past few years we have been stuck in our place in life. I'm hoping that this is the year that changes in some way. I have some ideas of the changes I'd like to see but I think God has bigger ideas for us than I could ever imagine. We are watching, waiting, listening for what those might be.
In the meantime, Brad and I decided to set some goals as most people do during the new year. Instead of making yearly goals though we decided to make them quarterly. At the end of the first quarter we will evaluate where we are at! We have broken them down into categories (we are kind of nerdy that way) and written them down. The categories are Financial, Physical, Spiritual and Relational. Under financial we have things like finishing a giving commitment we started and renegotiating some of our monthly bills to see where we can save money. For physical Brad has committed to running every day for the first quarter (inspired by my step mom) and I am going to get back on track with cooking and eating more "real" foods and less processed junk. In spiritual we are going to get back to reading the 1 year Bible and also get back to doing morning devotions with our kids. We really got off track when Mason was born! Then in our relational category we are going to focus on our marriage by having weekly date night (even if they are at home) and our family relationship by having weekly family nights. I also want to be more of a "yes" mom. This does not mean I'll be saying yes to everything my children want and ask for. It does mean that I'll be looking at the situation. I often find myself saying no to things with my kids because it's inconvenient for me. No to play doh because I don't want to clean up the mess. No to having friends over because I don't think my home is good enough. No to playing games or toys because I want to check emails or Facebook. These are the kinds of things I want to say yes to more often.
So here's to making positive changes. Here's to hoping for big things to come but learning to be content with the blessings already given to us. Here's to holding on to the hope of a prophetic encouragement from our pastor. Welcome 2014!
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