Alright, so last year’s resolutions didn’t end up going so well. I only sort of completed half of them- I did run the Marine Corps Marathon again, but I didn’t do it in less than 4 hours, 30 minutes. I MOSTLY blogged five days a week, but there were a few times during the year when I took a day off here and there. There’s no way I spent less time on Facebook, no way at all. But I DID knock #6 out of the park- it was my secret resolution that I couldn’t exactly put on my blog because it involved quitting my day job, and I’m so blessed to have been able to check that one off! I think this year’s resolutions need to be a bit more measurable, so let’s try this again:

1) Continue to blog five days a week, but allow myself grace once a month if I feel like I need a break.

2) Implement a weekly schedule- instead of my “edit til I’m done and/or dead” mantra I’ve been living by, I’ll be allocating certain days for editing, certain days for blogging, etc. etc. I think that’ll help break up the monotony of a three day editing spree!

3) Let’s try the whole “healthy, home cooked meal once a week” thing over again. But let’s make it more attainable by striving to create a menu for the week each Sunday night. Matt and I did that once and it worked out fabulously! We just… haven’t gotten around to doing it again. Lol

4) Spend less money on impulse buys at Wegmans and Target. YEESH. Those kill my credit card bill every month!

5) Shoot more personal work. Just for the sheer love of it. Let’s make that more quantifiable: shoot at least one roll of film a month, full of nothing but photos of non-business-related things. I have a twine + clothespins set-up that I’ve been using to display my favorite proofs over the past few months, so I want to be able to refresh it every few weeks with all-new prints.

6) I really want to shoot in New York City. I REALLY REALLY want to. After our anniversary shoot with J&M in November, I’m itching to go back up there and photograph. And then after seeing this shoot from my sweet friend Rebekah, I now know I NEED to shoot in New York at Christmas time. It’s going to happen.

7) Be more intentional about scheduling time off. This past Christmas, I completely neglected to account for time off to spend with family. I just assumed I’d work straight through the weeks of Christmas & New Year’s. This resulted in two things: a) I felt guilty for taking days off when I hadn’t planned for it, even though it was COMPLETELY reasonable not to want to work on Christmas Ever. I took time off for the holidays at my corporate job, right? So why is that any different now that I’m working for myself? and 2) I missed deadlines I’d set for myself with my brides because I failed to account for missing work, meaning I let them down. No bueno.

8) Follow through on the dreaming I did at J&M’s The Big Next. It’s no good to spend three days with some of the brightest minds in the industry, only to let those dreams reside in your notebook when you get home. It’s time to put these into action!

So there we have it, folks. I know some of these are going to require more broken-down plans to make them works, but we can make this happe! And look! A preview of what’s to come tomorrow from Mike & Anna’s wedding :).