Happy New Year!

Well this is a little belated - but here is to another Happy Year!

I like to do a little reflection at the start of a new year. There have been so many projects; mostly personal that I have started this past year and things I will be finishing up this coming year.

I would have to say that this past year I struggled with some personal issue with homeschooling. I really feel that to successfully unschool, one needs to be completely available to do all the fun things that your kids want to do. I feel like I wasn't up to my usual perky self for many reasons, and some days I was just glad to get through the day. With that said, I have worried on those bad days that perhaps my kids would get more in school. Knowing that this is not true - and would be dependant on many factors I just really want to try harder to be more present, to make the time available to each one individually and help them accomplish some of the many things that they want to do. I have been feeling restless and bored. What is amazing is that I really do not have time to be bored - but what it is, is I am tired of the same old routine. I feel like I lack the emotional energy to pursue my own interests. I realize that I will get by this and that a lot has happened this year.

Starting the New Year off, I mailed a manuscript of a children's book that I had written and tweaked over the year. It has sat here on my computer, with my thoughts telling me, that really I am just going to get a rejection letter, so why bother. In reality, nothing can ever get published, if I don't put it out there. Even, if I get that subsequent rejection letter, well at least I actually sent it. Who knows - I visualize seeing it in Borders - or being able to have a booth at my CSA with the book there.

I have met some really creative people over the past year. I hope that I can just learn to let my own creativity through and be an example to my kids, that it doesn’t have to be perfect. There is so much that is artistic that appeals to one person and not another.

I will be completing my graduate degree this year. Somehow this does not feel like a major accomplishment - but I have really enjoyed the process of continuing to learn new things, interact with others in the class and have access to that really great on-line library from the college. I suppose if I was going to run out and get a job it might be more climatic, but I think I am going to miss going and will have to find ways to get my intellect going.

Someone asked me if being home, homeschooling my children wasn't mental stimulation enough - and I felt embarrassed almost at this assumption that if I am not content to just be with them that something is wrong with me. On the other hand, I feel like going to school has always been my way of having "something else". Something of my own interests. But I have seen it almost as a weakness that I need to have 500 things going on all at once to feel fulfilled.

This year I want to actually buy a camper and be brave enough to learn to drive it all the way to Canada for our annual camping trip.

This year I hope John's business continues to flourish so that I can pay off debt and I can save for that farm type property where I can have animals - and my neighbors won't complain!

Wouldn't it be really cool to have enough money to plan a really neat trip for our 15th anniversary - or take the kids somewhere really cool - like Mexico or Spain- to practice the Spanish we are learning? Ok, in reality Brianna would be the only one able to speak - as she is the one who seems to remember everything!

We are going to do another play. Hopefully, I will be able to have a role in one this year. I know Brianna and Lexi are planning for some of the auditions - but I need to go ahead and fit this in somehow.

Oh - and exercise...I really want to be more active. I know this is a cliché resolution - but I find I have been putting it off in a big way. I am going to be swapping babysitting for yoga classes so that is a start.

The kids don't really have "goals" for the New Year. To them, I think it is just another day. Which in reality it is. I just hope to have a really good year as a family. To get to do all those fun things that the kids want to do. To get the monkey off my back of insecurity or lack - or whatever it is and move forward. To be a more mindful parent, to listen more than I speak, to help my children grow into who they are as individuals and not who I think they should be. To be thankful for my many blessings, to embrace abundance and not be afraid of it, to make my marriage stronger, to allow for greater trust and intimacy with others, to not be such a chicken when putting my feelings out there, to figure out exactly what things I want to do and work toward them.

I welcome the New Year, full of things that have never been!