Not exactly living it up by the world's standards...

I've been celebrating the new year full-force these past few days. But in my own little way...

Spring cleaning has hit hard, well before January even! Yesterday I cleaned out the fridge and pantry of all our expired foods and condiments. (While you're thinking about it, go now and check the date on your cooking sprays. My Crisco flour-based spray had expired in 2006, and I had no idea!! Gross! And our Pam had expired at least a year ago.)

We celebrated New Year's Eve by taking the girls to Mama Landa's to spend the night. We went to a Chevy dealer and checked out the Traverse. Not sure I'm sold on it, but we'll see. (We'll also go check out the GMC Acadia at some point.) In May, our precious Turbo Diesel's just not going to cut it with three car seats we'll be toting!

We ate at Pei-Wei and then tried to do some shopping. What we didn't account for was stores closing early for the holiday! So we rented a movie instead. We watched Burn After Reading at home. It was hilarious! And I was asleep way before midnight!

Our tradition has been to see the FW Symphony on New Year's Eve and then stay at the Renaissance overnight. Then the next day we eat at Pizzeria Uno in Sundance Square. But this year the symphony was detouring from their traditional NYE program for some Caribbean-themed music instead. Not our cup of tea, so we decided against it this year.

My man doesn't make resolutions, which I think is wise. Then he can't disappoint himself later! :0) Me, on the other hand...I say each year that I'm not going to make them, then I end up with three pages' worth of them. I did the same in 2008, and I probably came closer to meeting them all than in any other previous year, but this year I decided to save myself the disappointment, too. I'm still making resolutions; don't get me wrong. But I'm limiting myself to 2 very attainable ones:

1) I want to always have a book in progress.

Last year I was terrible about reading anything. I started a lot of books, but I'd get exasperated at how long it was taking me to read them, so I bagged them. But this year I want to take more time to read. I'll cut myself some slack and allow myself the pleasure of reading in the evenings instead of feeling like I need to be cleaning something while the girls are asleep.

The love of reading is so ingrained in me, and neglecting it really took a toll last year.

2) I want to take the girls to play outside more.

For one thing, M loves to play outside. And for another, I need to get accustomed to it since we're having a boy in May and my guess is that he'll not be content to play inside all day! :0) So whether it's going to our local park or just playing ball in our driveway, I want to make a point to get the girls outside more often.

I'm not an outdoor girl, so this will be hard for me! But I know it's better for my children in the long run. I want them to love to camp, hunt, etc. with their daddy, so this will be a good start in seeing that come to fruition!

Happy New Year to you!