My View from the Porch

It’s time to make her New Year’s resolutions, and so she starts by checking on last year’s

By CARLA OFFENBURGER
January 5, 2009
COOPER, IOWA

Last year, I wrote my New Year’s resolutions column for 2009. You can read that again by clicking here, and so I think it’s only fair that before I make my 2010 New Year’s resolutions, I take a close look to see how I did in the past year. http://www.offenburger.com/porch.asp?link=20081230

As I told you last year, I like New Year’s resolutions. And it seems as I get older, I take them a little more seriously. I write them down, check the list occasionally to keep myself on track and then move forward. This process served me well in 2009.

Here are my 2009 resolutions and how I did:

Tell people about God’s grace and the gift of Jesus Christ in my life. I certainly didn’t shy away from sharing the gift of Jesus Christ in my life. I think the best I can do is keep this one at the top of my list. It’s certainly the most important part of my life.

Get the paperwork in our house more organized. Not so good here. We still have plenty of paper around the house. Even though I know I cleared out files upon files.

Use the Public Library more for my reading material. Done! And if I could just return the books on time, I’d be really happy with this one. I enjoy going to the library in our county seat town of Jefferson, and I’m thrilled that I’ve now mastered the on-line catalog and reservation process.

Read more! I read 50 books in 2009. My goal was 52 – a book a week. While there were weeks where I read more than one book, obviously there were others that didn’t see me open a book. I’m shooting for 52 or more again this year.

Say “no” more often to things I’m not really interested in doing – and “yes” to the things I really want to do. I’m calling this a success – especially since the other day my friend Nancy Teusch asked me what I was doing with all my time now that I was finishing up projects and saying “no”! It must be obvious that I’m doing this if others are noticing.

Go to Des Moines more often and visit my mom and my sisters. And get them to come up here more often, too. Not bad. I feel like I made a few more spur of the moment trips this year, when in the past I would easily talk myself out of weekday evening trips. But when family is concerned, there’s always room for improvement.

Travel more. We logged thousands of miles on our vehicle with driving trips to Scottsdale, Arizona; Nashville, Tennessee; Savannah, Georgia, and New Haven, Connecticut. I also flew to Port Orchard, Washington, and we did a biking trip in South Dakota. I’m still exhausted from all our travel – and broke. That makes this resolution a success.

Quit worrying whether my house is clean enough for guests and simply invite them over – maybe I can get them to help me dust. I didn’t get anyone to help me dust, but no one mentioned the dust either. It sure was fun to have folks over more often. Sometimes the invitation prompted some housekeeping. So maybe that’s the key – extend the invitation and then motivate myself to do some cleaning.

Finally, burn the “burn piles” in our yard! Yikes – I’m still looking at two of the three burn piles we had at the end of 2008. But I did get Jefferson Fire Chief Eldon Cunningham out here to look at them, and then hear him tell us our piles are too big to burn safely. So, I’m keeping this on my list and working on dividing the piles up and burning several smaller piles this year.

So, for 2010, I’m going to keep all of the above in mind and continue to strengthen some and get a few others done.

And I’m going to add the following four:

Lose weight. I’d like to say goodbye to 20 pounds, but I’ll be happy with 10 – and keeping them off. If my husband didn’t like pie so much this would be much easier, trust me.

Increase our savings. Darn, this is a hard one. I have no grand plans of doing as well on this as the experts say I should, but I’d sure like to breathe easier when something unexpected comes up.

Give “more” away. The “more” could be time, talent or treasure. Recently in church, our call to worship focused on “our desire to live in ways that reflect a sincere turning towards God…” and we were asked, “What then should we do?” The answer was clear, “Whoever has an abundance must share with anyone who is in need.” I realize I live in abundance, so these will be good words to live by in 2010.

Be more green! We already do a lot of living green. But we are going to do more in 2010. I’m hoping not to bring a plastic grocery sack into the house this year. I’d like to give up using paper towels (we gave up paper plates in 2009); and we need to continue to recycle, recycle, recycle. And then, we just aren’t going to buy things that aren’t absolutely necessary – we are going to use up all we’ve got and do without. (And that will help make increasing our savings more of a success.)

A year ago, after I stated my resolutions for 2009, I wrote, “I really believe my life is as blessed as it is, with loving friends and family, good health, and enough of all I need plus a little extra – I have Jesus Christ in my life. The grace of God is often all I need to know that life is indeed good, day after day.”

I feel the same way here at the beginning of 2010. Even moreso. So, as I said last year, “If he isn’t already in your life, I hope this is the year you let Jesus Christ in and find God’s grace.”

Happy New Year!


You can write the columnist at carla@Offenburger.com.