The end
of another year is here and just as I've done for the last few years,
I'm taking a few moments to look back at my progress on the goals I
set for 2012. These goals are really mostly guidelines for me to
keep moving forward through the year rather than hard and fast rules
about what I need to do. They probably aren't that much interest to
my readers but I do it because I find that setting out broad goals
each year helps me to keep things on track and gives much needed
structure to my year. Blogging about it makes me more motivated
to work on the goals and holds me more accountable for my time.
Last
year, I structured my goals into several categories: Spiritual,
Health & Lifestyle, Family, Financial, Hobbies and Home.
SPIRITUAL
Use
a good study guide for bible study
Support
one person in reaching their goals
Make
one loan to a female entrepreneur in a Kenyan village
Cultivate
and nurture Christian friendships
Implement
an appointment time for writing & gifts to my sponsored children
in Kenya
Continue
to keep in touch with childhood spiritual leaders
I
made good headway in all of these goals though there is some room for
improvement. I managed to meet all of my spiritual goals but need to
improve on consistency of appointment time for prayer and study. One
thing I added to these goals over the year was reading my Bible
chronologically and I will continue with that goal in 2013. One thing
I found helpful was reading at night rather than in the morning.
I
supported 2 people in moving forward with their post-secondary goals
this year and helped two women with their business goals. I had been
saving pennies as a way of raising funds for Kenyan women. I will no
longer be saving pennies because the Canadian Government has
abolished the one cent coin and it will no longer exist as of February 2013. I will miss the penny coin for many reasons.
I've
made a decision not to continue providing post secondary or business
assistance to Kenyans in the foreseeable future. My hope is that the assistance I was able to provide will be enough to encourage the receivers on their respective
journeys. I will continue to provide help to Kenyan villagers in various ways as the Lord leads and enables.
HEALTH
& LIFESTYLE
Continue
to learn about diet for diabetics & incorporate pulses, grains,
dark green veggies into cooking.
Learn
to make artisan bread
Make
more multigrain bread
Get
more Omega 3 EFAs, vitamins, fiber & antioxidants
Implement
an appointment for stretching
Ride
my stationary bike for 30 minutes 3x per week, increasing to every
day
Resume
weight training
Continue
with my swimming lessons
Take
a water aerobics class
Laugh
more
Learn
new computer skills
Upgrade
my skills on smart phone/tablets, etc.
Clear
up computer files and photo files
Continue
to broaden my base of friendships & participate in my various
group meetings & get togethers
I was not successful with several of my health and lifestyle goals; mainly those goals which required physical activity. I did continue
to learn more about incorporating healthy eating habits, and getting more
Omega 3 EFAs, vitamins, fiber and antioxidants in the diet but this did not help me achieve weight loss or better blood sugar levels.
Looking back over 2012, I see that I was hampered more often than not by long periods of constant pain and inability or limited ability to walk or exercise. This again made weight issues very challenging,
In 2013, I hope I can make more progress in a fitness
regime and find some way around my pain issues. I am not on pain
killers or anti-inflammatories. Over the year I tried several different approaches to naturally combat inflammation but it didn't seem to make much difference to my pain levels. I simply have to keep trying in 2013. I did undertake some steps to radically reduce some stress
in my life and that can only help my overall health (and blood sugar
levels).
I was also able to
upgrade my skills on my smart phone and my computer tablet, though I
didn't make much progress in learning new computer skills like Photoshop. I did
make a new website/blog for Missions of Hope, Kenya. However this is
no longer published as the volunteer heading the missions is in a
life transition right now. Perhaps it will be revived in future and so the work is not for nothing.
Sometime during the year, I killed my
computer hard drive, about the 4th time in 5 years that I've completely lost my hard drive. It is always a
headache when that happens as it means lost money, lost time
and lost files. I spent a fair bit of time trying to recover as much
as I could. There wasn't much time or interest left in the year to learn new
computer skills.
Locally, I made
several new friends and participated in a number of group gatherings
as well as organized a few of my own gatherings, outside of my home
and inside my home.
New things added to
my list of things to accomplish in 2012 included: undergo eye examinations, find a new dentist (and get a
treatment plan in place), do all the paperwork to get a new CPAP machine,
schedule a course of massage and foot reflexology.
FAMILY
Continue
regular schedule of communications & attend to needs
Implement
a regular schedule to write spiritual memoirs
Conduct
necessary research for spiritual memoirs
Plan
a vacation for my niece
Continue
to make contact with relatives who are shut-ins
Plan
a trip to visit extended family, for missions or personal trip
|
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Saving
pennies for Kenyan women~May 22/12 - $89.55
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It was important
to really focus on my family this year due to ageing relatives and
their various health needs. In May, I was able to visit my last
living uncle before he passed due to complications of surgery
related to colon cancer. The trip to see him with my brother pleased
him greatly. (At the same time, we were able to meet several other
relatives and see how they are doing). Our comfort is in knowing we
will see my uncle again some day but understandably his daughter who saw
and spoke to him every day, misses him a lot. She paid a visit to
my own mother in October and that was a wonderful surprise for my
mom.
I made a good
start on writing my spiritual memoirs but have a lot of work yet to
do to research some of it with my mother. Due to mom's health this
cannot be done at my own convenience and I pray that I will be able
to get what I need soon. Also the
progress on actual writing was hindered
by mobility issues since I was unable to get to my writing group in the latter part of the year.
One of my goals
was to keep contact with elderly relatives and childhood spiritual
leaders. I tried with limited success to keep in touch with two
older lady relatives. Mostly when I called them they were not at
home but I did try. More recently I made contact with one and let
her know that I would like to visit her when the weather warms. She
is very excited. I'm excited too as I will see some new to me
countryside.
I also wrote
several times in recent years to my former Sunday School teacher. I
hadn't heard from her in a long while and recently her daughter
wrote to let me know that she found my address when packing her
mother's belongings. She is moving her mother in with her own family
due to the memory loss. It was touching to hear.
Finally,
I planned a vacation for my niece to come and visit me over the
summer and to spend her birthday with me. She was thrilled when we went to see the theatre production, "Mary Poppins" and also enjoyed our picnic and our travels on the small ferry boats around Granville Island. I had initially
planned for a one week visit with my niece but she ended up staying
for two weeks. We had a nice time together despite my mobility
issues.
FINANCIAL
Continue
to pay down debt
Budget
"to zero"
Live
below income
Save
more
Continue
saving in the snowflake jar fund for miscellaneous projects
Think
two or three times before spending
Continue
to implement strategic charitable giving
Review
insurance coverage & investment matters
Investigate
& buy silver
I
managed at long last to purchase some silver coins for my long term
needs. I also implemented budgetting to zero on a monthly basis.
This made it difficult to meet the on-going missions needs in Kenya. Consequently, this
type of budgeting didn't work if I wanted to help the Kenyans with
some immediate and pressing needs. These needs also made it
impossible to pay down debt despite living well below my income.
I
managed to continue to save some modest retirement funds but
couldn't manage to save anything in a bank account for other needs. Fortunately I received some tax refunds to help me with some household needs. In 2013, I will
be implementing a more stringent regime of charitable giving so that
I am able to meet my own obligations as well as continue giving to the mission
field.
HOBBIES
-
Read
one or two books per month
Create
an edible garden
Crochet
a doily or a baby outfit
Knit
slippers (1-2 pair), possibly learn to knit sweaters or socks
Finish
the knitted baby blanket
Make
dishcloths for gifts
Learn
to machine quilt
Consider
sales to raise funds for charitable giving
Use
up stash of materials before buying more
I
was able to complete a number of creative works though I did not
stick to my list of intended projects. Instead, I made many dishcloths,
hats, scarves and blankets; all of which went into my Etsy shop. I
had hoped to raise funds for charitable giving but haven't sold
anything.
I
learned that buying all the supplies (some second hand but most of it new) even on discount, and careful shopping, is rather expensive. I bought a lot more
fabric than I intended as it seemed I never had exactly what I
needed. I learned a lot by trial and error about how to go about
future projects and purchasing what I need.
It
is probably not the best use of my time to make things unless I want
to take them with me to Kenya on a missions trip since I was not
very successful in sales. Either that or I need to figure out how
to market my products or simply let my product development and sales develop more organically. I am not the kind of person that will
set up shop in a temporary stall to sell things.
However, I am happy to have learned how to make new things and have already
given some of my crafted items away.
I
surpassed my modest reading goal of one or two books per month and
started reading the Bible from front to back after I completed 25
books for the year.
I was able to put in an edible garden and a lot of container flowers. My edible garden had tomatoes, corn and peppers. The peppers and the tomatoes did very well but the corn wasn't
edible. For some reason the corn did not mature this summer unlike other summers. I will reconsider what to plant next summer.
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