How are you doing on your goals for 2012? I’m excited about the progress I made in April…
Personal
Read through the Bible in a year. {I’ve been keeping up with this faithfully.}
Read through the 24 books on my 2012 booklist. {I’m almost finished with April’s books and have read quite a few other books!}
Listen to 12 audiobooks. {I just finished April’s audiobook and am starting on May’s!}
Run in at least one 5K race. {Finished the Couch to 5K program and am now working on getting my time down. Hoping to sign up for a race soon.}
Complete the Couch to 10K program.
Tackle 12 Do-It-Yourself Projects. {I made homemade poptarts last week!}
Focus on one habit per month. {I made some good headway on my morning and evening routines in April?!}
Learn to use my new DSLR camera (huge surprise Christmas present from Jesse!!) & improve my photography skills.
Take at least one photo a day and put together a page every week for my Project Life album. {I’m behind on putting my album together, but I’ve been doing good about taking lots of pictures!}
Memorize Colossians using the plan and free download here. {I’m almost caught up with this.}Marriage
Go on the Love Like You Mean It Cruise. {Done–read my recap here.}
Go on two Marriage Retreats (Went to Cincinnati together in April).
Have monthly date nights. {We had one date in April.}
Read four books together. {Jesse read Rekindling the Romance in April and we talked about it since I had just read it in March. We also read parts of One of Us Must Be Crazy… And I’m Pretty Sure It’s You together!}
Read at least 3 books on marriage. {I’ve read two so far this year.}Children/Homeschooling
Continue regular dates/outings with each of the children individually. {I went on at least one outing with each child individually in April.}
Continue Grace and Truth memory book. {The children finished memorizing the Lord’s Prayer plus two other verses and one verse of a hymn this month.}
Ice-skating lessons for all three children. {The children finished up their second round of classes and we enrolled them in a third round since they are enjoying it so much!}
Swimming lessons for all three children.
Finish second grade, begin third grade with Kathrynne. {We should finish this in May!}
Finish kindergarten, begin first grade with Kaitlynn. {We should finish this in May!}
Start preschool with Silas. {Started this in April.}
Go on at least one field trip every month. {We went on one field trip in April.}
Go on at least one family vacation.
Finish at least 15 read-aloud books. {We’ve finished nine read-alouds so far this year.}Ministry/Friendships/Extended Family
Write at least two handwritten notes every month to encourage someone. {I wrote & mailed two handwritten notes this month.}
Continue being involved in our local church, homeschool group, young couple’s group, and blogging accountability group. {Ongoing}
Continue with weekly get-togethers with both sides of our extended family. {Ongoing}Business/Blogging
Continue to take Sundays off from blogging/business work. {Ongoing}
Continue keeping strict Office Hours for the business/blogging time each day. {Still plugging away on this!}
Switch to a paperless planning system. {This is going well for me, though I’ve decided I’m probably never going to be 100% paperless for all things.}
Follow my weekly blogging plan. {I didn’t do this perfectly in April, but I did pretty well most days.}
Plan blog posts out at least a month in advance. {I made some great progress in this area in April!}
Write and schedule blog posts at least a week in advance. {Making some headway with this, though I’m far from where I want to be!}Financial
Continue to tithe 10% of our income. {Ongoing}
Give generously to needs in our community and around the world, as God prompts us. {Ongoing}
Pay cash for a new-to-us vehicle to replace our family’s van. {We’re still looking and haven’t found anything we love in our price range yet!}
Finish saving for and purchase a rental property with cash. {Thanks to finding out we set aside too much for taxes this year in our tax savings account (we got burned last year when we had to pay more than we expected, so we set aside quite a bit more than we thought we’d have to pay this year), we ended up with a lot of extra money in our tax savings account after paying our taxes. So we’ve almost fully funded our rental property savings goal amount and are beginning our search for rental property — woot! We’re still investigating our options right now and we’ve not completely settled on what we want to invest in, so we may decide we need to save quite a bit more depending upon what we find now that we’re starting to look. I’ll keep you posted!}
How Are You Doing on Your Goals for 2012?
If you’ve posted goals for 2012, I’d love for you to post an update on how things are going and share your link in the comments. If you don’t have a blog, feel free to just leave your update as a comment. Let’s encourage one another to live lives of intention and purpose!
Tammy Skipper (@Tammy_Skipper) says
Not a very successful month on paper, very successful in my heart http://skipperclan.com/2012/05/01/3-in-30-week-17-update/
Lisa says
You amaze and inspire me! I really love your goal about taking Sunday off. I’ve grown up doing this and it has always been such a huge blessing and a spiritually refreshing way to start my week!
Meredith says
I didn’t realize how well I was doing with my goals until I went back and checked! I need to increase my exercising, but I’m really happy with the progress I’ve made. Thanks!
Becky says
We’ve just begun a search for a most likely used mini van too. It’s overwhelming to know where to start since the last time we looked was almost 10 years ago. Crystal, what tools are you using to look? They’re so dang expensive, & I have concerns over buying someone else’s problem vehicle.
Crystal says
We have a guy looking for us who goes to auctions, etc. He found our last car for us and we were really happy with the experience, so we’re using him again this time around. He’s able to get us a much better deal than we could get if we bought from a car lot.
April says
here are mine
http://ithinkicansquared.blogspot.com/2012/05/2012-goals-update.html
Beth says
Working on goals a week at a time! Need to maybe start thinking about making some monthly goals as well, though, and thinking bigger picture. But here’s my post with my goals for the week!
http://structureinanunstructuredlife.com/2012/04/30/10-goals-for-the-week/
Mama Jenn says
Just posted my “Monthly Mission” and while I didn’t get EVERYTHING done last month, I made good progress! I am excited to do even better this month! http://www.mamajennblogs.com/2012/04/mission-of-month-may-2012-and-april.html
Shelly @ Frugal Family Home says
I make weekly goals but I didn’t make a year plan. My daughter and myself memorized Romans 12 this year. We are learning sign language so we learned to sign it too.
Betsy @ Romance on a Dime says
I didn’t really set goals for the month of April – just did weekly goals. I’m excited to start the month of May with goals!! I just posted about it. Thanks so much for encouraging me in this!! I love to read about what you are up to!!
Carolynn @ mylittlebitoflife.com says
Hasn’t been a good couple of months, hoping to get back in gear very soon!! 😉
http://mylittlebitoflife.com/?p=3595
Sabrina says
I’d love to know in more detail what you’re doing with Silas…my daughters are the same age as he is, and I really wanted to start preschool with them but am having trouble getting my act together with a new baby…I’ve looked at your recommended resources and have many already, I’d just like to see how your typical preschool day/week goes with him.
Thanks for all you do – you’re truly an inspiration!
Jody Susan says
Crystal, That’s exciting how much you have been able to save. It just goes to show you that your savings can really add up when you aren’t paying interest.
In the vending machine business, we are always amazed at how much more our competitors pay for machines and product, when we pay cash in full and buy things at a discount. Even when their gross income is insanely higher than ours, we are usually much better off in the end.
The newsboys song “Be Still” has been on my heart a lot in the midst of my goals:
Be still and know He
Know He is holy
Be still and know He is God
Love Him more dearly
See Him more clearly
Be still and know He is God
We have filled our lives with inventions
That have hurried us nowhere fast
Now we need to turn our attentions to what will last
We’ve been runnin’ without a direction
We’re afraid to get there late
What we need is strength just to kneel down and wait
Be still and know He
Know He is holy
Be still and know He is God
Love Him more dearly
See Him more clearly
Be still and know He is God
Denise says
Crystal do you homeschool year round? Just curious.
Shelli says
Totally fell of the bandwagon with ALL of my goals 🙁 Need to start over!
Brandy says
We accomplished a huge goal- I’m officially a stay at home mom! This has been a huge parenting/financial/spiritual goal of ours for a long time, and we are so excited!
Crystal says
WOOHOO!!!! I’m so excited for you in reaching this big goal!
Brandy says
Thanks!
Jen says
Wow, you really are supermom!! I pray I can have your motivation one day!! You should be so proud of yourself :))
Diana says
Can you make a few posts on your homeschooling with Silas? I’m really interested to see how preschool curriculum, activities, and lessons are set up when you homeschool your child. (I’m really interested in the process of how you teach children to read without any assistance from a teacher, etc.!)
Crystal says
You can see some of our favorite preschool resources here:
https://moneysavingmom.com/2012/04/15-recommended-preschool-and-kindergarten-resources.html
Crystal's Ramblings says
I will include the link but basically, I am doing well with starting my crafting business and I am so thankful that I decided one of my goals was to go on a date once a month with my husband. We had a wonderful date night this month!
http://ncsufrog.blogspot.com/2012/04/2012-goal-update-for-april.html
Lilianne says
Still plugging away at my monthy reading goals. I have a goal of reading two books per month this year which I have done so far….plus two books on top of that! That is a total of 10 books read so far which is really exciting (to me anyway) 🙂
http://www.wannabebookworms.blogspot.com
I’m considering making some “summer goals” as well….we’ll see how that turns out.
Emily @ Our Frugal Happy Life says
I’m doing very well with my goals!
http://ourfrugalhappylife.blogspot.com/2012/04/goals-update-yearly-goals-april-goals.html
Thanks for the encouragement. 🙂
Laura @ Frugal Follies says
We’re paying off our home equity line of credit this year – our goal is to have it gone by the end of the year! Last month we paid off over 10% of the amount as of last December 31. In April, we paid off 4% more. Still gotta really get moving in order to reach our end-of-year goal!
Delve into Your Finances in 2012 April Update
Shirley@motivatedmommyoftwo says
I just started doing the weekly goals half way through the month but here is my post for today
http://motivatedmommyoftwo.blogspot.com/2012/04/10-weekly-goals_29.html
I have to admit doing the weekly goals has really helped me stay on track
Crystal says
Yay! I’m so glad weekly goals has been helpful for you. It’s amazing how helpful it’s been for me!
angel says
Congrats on almost fully funding your rental property envelope! What a fantastic surprise.
Swimming lessons are going to be so fun!
Is Silas enjoying preschool? He must feel like a big kid now that he’s doing what his sisters do.
I’m still on track with my drawing and fitness goals.
I posted my sewing and refurbishing goal progress this morning…
http://daydreamingnightowl.blogspot.com/2012/04/goal-progress-april-results-may-goals.html?spref=fb
Crystal says
He think he’s hot stuff! Cracks me up how excited he is about preschool — but I love to see his enthusiasm!
Kristy Meyer says
Way to go. I almost completely fell off the bandwagon this month, but have been steadily working on my goals as I can. Quite frankly, I’m quite disappointed in myself and am more than a little discouraged over all, but tomorrow starts a new month and the opportunity to begin again with a clean slate. : ) Thanks for your encouragement. Also, even though I fell off the bandwagon in my personal goals, I did pretty well with keeping up with your challenges this month. So, I’ll take it! My much emptier closets and neat cubbies around the house thank you!
Blessings, ~Kristy~
Crystal says
Hey, something is better than nothing. Be encouraged — even if you’re making a tiny bit of traction, that’s still progress. Here’s to a better month in May!
Stacy @ A Delightful Home says
Wow, you are doing great! You’ve motivated me to reboot some of my goals 🙂
Mackenzie says
Making progress on my 2012 goals, but not at the pace that I would like. 7 months to go!
Crystal says
Just remember that moving forward — even at a microscopic rate — is still moving forward! And it’s always better than standing still.