Sunday, January 22, 2006

New Year Resolutions: Progress Report 2

Continuing my effort to keep myself accountable, here is my progress report for the last two weeks:

Faith: Week 1 - morning prayer 2 out of 7, evening prayer 7 out of 7; Week 2 - morning prayer 6 out of 7, evening prayer 6 out of 7. I'm feeling smugly self satisfied about last week's improvement in the mornings, though as it was achieved largely by mentally rearranging my day it is rather misplaced pride. Pre-pregnancy we usually aimed to start schoolwork by 9 in the morning. Since October our morning routine has fallen apart totally. I had hoped to get started more promptly after Christmas, but it wasn't happening and I felt constantly behind my non-existent schedule - therefore I was mostly running too "late" to have time for morning prayer. Last week I simply decided that for now our start time is 10 o'clock, so mentally giving myself an extra hour in the morning. Success! (And a sad reflection on the weakness of my approach to time management.)

Family: Mixed. I haven't done well with making time for one on one read-alouds. Partly because we are supposed to do this in the afternoon and I'm just plain tired after working with the girls in the morning, and partly because we are in a reading doldrums after a run of books that for one reason or another haven't engaged their attention. On the other hand, I have been very much more aware of spending time talking, playing games or just generally being "with" the girls. It doesn't look as though Tevye and I will manage a night out this month, but our weekend away in February will be a big enough treat to make up for that.

Fitness: Coughing less, but still have not started back into any regular exercise. Not sure how much the coughing and puffing is becoming an excuse. Determined that next week I will restart the gym / pool membership I suspended back in October, even if all I manage is some gentle swimming. Mercifully the bright spark who set fire to the sauna by leaving a towel over the heater managed not to burn down the entire leisure centre, though my informant (Tevye) tells me it still smells of smoke ten days later. Now, that won't exactly help the coughing and puffing!

Formation: Doing well so far. I finished my science book, The Fly in the Cathedral, so next week I'm going to concentrate on some gentle spiritual reading.

Fun: I spent last Saturday before last at a scrapbooking crop a friend runs once a month and managed to do four pages (in five and a half hours - I'm not a speedy scrapbooker). I didn't manage any last week, so I'm counting the day as sufficient for two weeks (OK, I admit that is cheating!). I need to get into some sort of routine here, as I know I won't make the crop again until at least April.

At least I can see progress, and I haven't given up on any of my resolutions yet, even though I still have a way to go.

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