Happy 2010

Happy New Year people, I have returned... briefly, as I will be heading off for a week at the beach very soon, but for now I am here.

I am not generally a resolution maker, I always feel a bit sqirmy inside at having to commit to a resolution, knowing full well that by the end of the year the guilt will set in due to having failed to stick to it. Having said that I do like at the beginning of each year to think about what may lie ahead, and what I may want to do (in a very general sense) in that coming time.

Since 2007 I have selected a word for each year, inspired by Ali Edwards. For the past week or so I have been narrowing down what my word will be this year. It started off as organise, as it seems to me there is always so much stuff around here that needs to be organised, and I can never find anything when I really need it, but, that felt a little sterile to me. Then a few nights ago while searching for something I had lost I found myself saying "why are things always so complicated?" and I found my word.

SIMPLIFY

My plan for the year is to simplify things. Go back to a simpler way of living. I am hoping that this will allow me to spend more time living in the moment, not stressing about the details of the things that I am forgetting to do.

A big factor in this equation applies to my scrapping. The last 12 months I was nearly paralysed by the continuous feeling that my scrapping pages were not good enough, they needed more techniques, more fancy shmancy (expensive sometimes too) stuff. So as a result I hardly finished a project. And let me tell you I have many projects on the go. This year I am changing that. I am not going to download every free product around, only the ones that I absolutely love and couldnt live without ;-), I am putting myself on a self imposed bann from purchasing anything that is not on sale, and I am going to finish tagging my digi stash, and purge the things I know I just will never use.

I am attempting Project 365 again. There I said it, I haven't been game to even say this out loud yet given my spectacular failure last year. I am using my simplified method for this too. As per the name of this blog I will focus on the Words and Pictures. The end result of this project will look fairly simple - plain pages, with just the pictures and the words to describe them (where necessary).

I also have a short list of things I want to do this year:

I want to bake more - I like baking, my kids like to eat what I bake, it makes me feel good. My mother gave me Nigella Lawson's "How to be a Domestic Goddess" for Christmas, and I plan to work my way through it, one recipe a week (or fortnight if things get too busy) either on my own, or sometimes with my kids who all love to bake too.

I want to exercise more.

I want to spend more quality time with my kids and my husband.

I want to read more books.

I want to finish my course and get my Bookkeeping Certification.

I want to take more photos.

I want to scrap more pages.

I want to write here more often.

I want to declutter my house, and simply things around my home.

I want to keep in better contact with family and friends.

That's 10 things I want to focus on this year. 10 things in 2010.