Happy New Year - 2006!

I must say I am glad to see 2005 gone away and am ready to start fresh this year. Unfortunately, I woke up with a horrible cold this morning, so apparently this is my new tradition for bringing in the new year. I remember being sick last year too. We did manage to make it to church this morning though and thankfully, Grace took a 2 1/2 hour nap this afternoon, so I did get to rest.

I've been giving a lot of thought to my goals for the New Year this year. I've got alot I want to accomplish and I like to be organized. I'm a little excited to start with a blank calendar and no screw ups...yet. To help me organize my goals, I got a planner that has month view and weekly view pages and also notes pages for each month and a place on the weekly page for notes. I will be posting my goals for the year here, but I'm going to keep track of weekly/daily goals in my planner and also my monthly goals. Hopefully it will help me stay on track.

So here they are...

Jennifer's Goals for 2006
Health
1. Lose 20 pounds
- 5 pounds by April 1
- 10 pounds by July 1
- 15 pounds by October 1
- 20 pounds by December 31
2. Plan meals weekly (To start I just want to plan meals, I'll be trying to add a "healthy" dinner to the plan each week)
3. Exercise (by March 1, I'd like to be back up to the old BFL exercise plan, assuming I have clearance from my doctor due to my port and surgical issues) - I will be starting to use the treadmill as early as this week
4. Drink 4 to 5 bottle of water daily - At first I'll still allow myself Coke as long as I get all my water in. Then we'll be phasing out those drinks.
5. Update Diet Blog weekly. It helps to be accountable and once a week is doable.
6. Don't get any additional diseases or life-threatening illnesses (not that I have a lot of control, but it's a good goal)

Finances
1. Stay within monthly budget
2. Only eat lunch out once per week
3. Stop using credit cards

Intellectual
1. Take 4 pre-requisite courses for med school
2. Take 2 CPCU courses
3. Read 4 books for fun

Spirituality
1. Do bible study daily
2. Update and pray over prayer list daily
3. Memorize a verse each week
4. Tithe according to committment made to church
5. Get involved in some type of group study

Personal Development
1. Get a new hair style (just joking!)
2. E-mail a friend each week that I don't already communicate with on a weekly basis
3. Send birthday, anniversary and other cards
4. Join Young Survivor Coalition or other breast cancer group
5. Review progress at 6 months

Looking forward the most important goals to me are probably the finance goals. We didn't do a great job at staying within budget this year and with the big plans I have for our future, we've got to get things turned around. Otherwise my next big categories are the spiritual and intellectual ones. With the holidays and everything else, I've been letting my bible study slide and with the whole medical school thing, I don't think I should get too far away from where I God wants me. I want to be sure I'm doing it for His purposes, not mine. The intellectual stuff is important just to stay on task. I've got to take classes to go to med school. The CPCU stuff is for my current job. If I get my 2 classes done this year, I'll only have to take one next year and will have a free trip to Hawaii, so that's a no-brainer.

That's it for now, I think I'm going to try to set up the diet blog for 2006, plus I need to do today's bible study and go get a healthy snack. See, 2006 is looking good already!