I'm not a failure

(I bet that title made you click, huh? I'm not a failure at my non-resolutions that is!)

My New Years goal to Simplify my life is going pretty well. Am I an expert at it yet? Not even close. Here's a few things I have done so far to help me get the process going...

I cleaned out a few kitchen cabinets that were literally overflowing. I purged a bunch of food that was expired or that I realized we will never eat and reorganized to make things easier to find. Now I don't dread opening up my cabinets. Win!

I set up a second checking account with automatic transfers from our regular checking account. A small amount is transferred each Friday (Seth's payday).  This money will be used on household projects such  re-roofing and re-siding our house. Which will help avoid the, "oh shoot, that's a lot of money to come up with" Yay!

I have continued to write my to do lists in my planner and then try to get through the items on my list each day. If I don't complete the item I move it to the next day. Re-writing the same thing over and over from day to day seems stupid to me so I just get the item done so I can check it off. I love checking off lists!


It might only be the second week of January but hopefully I will be able to stick with it. Wish me luck!

How have your resolutions or non-resolutions been going so far?? Any tips or tricks?

A New Year Without Resolutions!

It's already the 5th of January and until I started writing this post I was feeling slightly overwhelmed and like I already failed at the New Year. I decided to not make formal New Years Resolutions this year and I was a little worried about it because who doesn't like starting a new year with a long list of to-do's? 

I think it's my indecisiveness and moderate ADD that make resolutions overwhelming to me in general. I have so many ideas, hopes, dreams, that just thinking about them all makes my head spin. And then writing them down scares the crap out of me. 

Instead of year long resolutions, that usually end up forgotten by February, I have decided to try and have a general focus for the year. 

This year my focus is going to be:

SIMPLIFY

To me, Simplify, can mean a lot of different things but I think it can be pretty well summed up by saying: 

Figure out what's important to you, and get rid of everything else.

Can you tell I'm currently loving gold and polka dots?

Here's my plan of action:

1. Clean out my closets and cabinets and get rid of things that I don't need or use.

2. Plan ahead for things like birthdays, meals, bills, etc. using my planner.

3. Set up automatic banking transfers to save money for home improvements

4. Spend less time looking at screens which will create extra time

5. Fix problems instead of creating work arounds

6. Clean out unneeded digital data (photos, files, emails, etc.)

7. Buy less and use what I have

8. Add in extra time to avoid being late

9. Spend 15 minutes a day cleaning (laundry, dusting, sweeping) to avoid a weekend of cleaning

10. Focus any extra time on relationships. 

I realize this may look like a long list of resolutions but I would like to argue that it is different. This list is by no means all inclusive but it does help to give me a starting point and a direction for where I want to go this year. I'm hoping that by keeping it simple (aka: Simplifying) all I have to do is ask myself, "Will ________ help to simplify my life?"  The answer to that one little question should help me to focus on what really matters. 

January is filling up!

Do you have New Years Resolutions? Do you stick to them? I want to know what you think!