Resolutions.... Sorta

I had a lovely day today.  Hope and I went out this afternoon to do some shopping.  We hit up Target and our crappy local mall.  I bought a water bottle, jammies for Atticus, some clothes for Hope, a recipe journal, and a crocheting book.  Then a quick cup of coffee and a few errands.  This evening the entire family helped pack up the Christmas decorations.  That always makes me depressed; the house looks naked and cheerless when all the festive doodads are gone.  Hope asked "why can't we leave it up all year?" And I told her "because then it wouldn't be special and fun; it would be blah and everyday." 

I have fun and relaxing plans for this evening though; Sam and I have season one of Portlandia to watch, I'm making some homemade pumpkin spice lattes, and I Hope has begged me to crochet her a rainbow cowl for her birthday in February.

Speaking of Hope, look at how much she has grown:

Time has flown by and I can't believe she will be 12 in a few short months.

Speaking of time, I'm bringing back an old challenge I planned on doing several years ago.  In 2007 I had planned on participating in the 101 things in 1001 days challenge.  Essentially, you make a list of 1001 things you want or need to do and you knock 'em out in the course of 1001 days.  This was on my old blog that I deleted when this happened and I only updated it once on my new blog.

What went wrong last time is that my life changed so completely and most of the goals were no longer applicable and I really wanted a fresh start.  When I made the list I had just dumped my douche-bag boyfriend of six years.  Then eight months later Sam and I started dating.  Soon we were engaged, moved in together, married, and had a baby in the space of two years.  My goals radically changed.  Before that having a baby, planning a DIY wedding, and moving to a new home was not in the cards.  I feel more settled in life now.  I don't know everything that's in store for me, but I feel a bit more in control of my path.  I felt like now was the time to set some new goals. 

I don't really care for New Year's resolutions; I have reading goals and I kinda think about what I want to accomplish, but often a year is not enough time and I hate ending a year feeling like a royal failure.  The 1001 days gives me much more time to complete goals and I can aspire to loftier dreams.

Cheers to new goals.  My start date is 01/01/2012 which will put me completing the goals by 09/28/2014.  Here is the catch: I'm not posting my list ahead of time.  I've written it down in a notebook and I will pop-on every month or so and write about what I've completed. EDIT:  I REALIZE I PRETTY MUCH STARTED THIS ON 12/16/2011 WHEN I STARTED MY HOLIDAY VACATION; NEW END DATE IS 09/12/2014!

The reason why I'm doing it this way is because I wrote down around 140 things rather than 101.  See in some situations I have a goal A that cannot be reached (or will be inevitably delayed) if I select goal B.  For example, If I have another baby then I won't move to Indiana right away for Graduate school.  If I do finally get to go to Harry Potter Land then realistically speaking I most likely won't visit Portland, Oregon.

Wish me luck, this will certainly be an adventure!