2016 Recap and 2017 Goals

Okay, this post is coming a bit late, but -  the plague, remember?

2016 went by in a total blur. The first four months were a jumbled mix of being in a lot of pain and feeling SUPER pregnant, and being insanely excited to meet my little dude. April was spent on bed rest, due to pregnancy-induced high blood pressure. Then, at the end of that miserable month, our little man was born - and the world stopped. Suddenly, everything was new and wonderful, but at the same time, we could hardly remember what life was like before there were three of us. As happy as Cody and I were for the first eleven years of our life together, this tiny person brought our joy (and, let's be honest - sometimes frustration and exhaustion) to a whole new level. We became parents, and so far, it's been everything I'd ever hoped and so much more.

Here are a few bullet points for the year.
THE GOOD:
* Baby - enough said. He's amazing.
* Our family as a whole. I never expected how watching someone love your child could make you love them even more.
* School - I completed another 15 credits towards my Accounting degree (this was substantially less than planned, but I ended up taking a bit of a break towards the end of my pregnancy). Progress is progress, so I'm totally counting this in the "win" column.
* Settling in - I feel like we've found a pretty good groove with S. We've found a good routine and made adjustments where we can to reduce the physical impact on Cody (if you're a new reader, you can read about Cody's situation here). We're starting to feel like real parents. :O)


THE BAD THE CHALLENGING:
* Things in the realm of personal finances have been pretty stressful.
* Cody's VA rating was reduced from 10% (which was ridiculous to begin with) to 0%. It's taken me a while to process the anger I felt over this, but we're moving forward.
* Lingering post-pregnancy issues. As I've mentioned quite a bit, I'm still struggling with my back and pelvis still causing pain after the pregnancy, but this has been SLOWLY and steadily getting better.
* My weight. I had grand plans to lose a fantastic amount of weight this year and that hasn't happened. I've decided that's ok. This year had a lot going on and there were struggles to be dealt with. I'm looking forward to working on healthy habits in 2017.

This girl...

Misses being this girl (the person, not the dog). 2013 two months before my first half marathon.

I try to see things in the light that our challenges make us grow and I've definitely had to remind myself of that this year. I really struggled with feelings of bitterness over Cody's medical situation and all of the injustices associated with that. I feel like I've finally settled in a zen place (this involved a LOT of praying). I keep finding this place, only to be booted out by some new misfortune. It is my hope that I learn to find it faster each time.

GOALS FOR 2017
I've never been one for New Year's resolutions, mostly because when I hear "New Year's resolution" I think, "failed by February." That's probably not fair, but it's what comes to mind. I do believe in the power of setting goals. I went to a workplace seminar once [forgive me if I've mentioned this before] that talked about the fact that you rarely achieve a goal you've never set. People who are goal-oriented are more perceptive about things that will help them achieve those goals. What I took away from this is that you need to know what you hope to achieve before you can actually achieve it.

I wrote here about a list of goals I made years ago of things I wanted to do/achieve, even though many of the items I never thought would actually happen.

So, that being said - what am I hoping to accomplish this year? Well, the full list can be found on my Goals tab, so I'll just keep things general.

1. Build healthier habits so I can be active with S and set a good example.
2. Get down to a healthy weight. This is pretty vague, which is kind of a sin in goal-making, but I have far enough to go that I don't expect to hit my goal weight this year. I want to make steady progress towards my goal and hit 250 by the end of June (71 pounds from my current weight).
3. Run a marathon. This is bold considering running a single mile nonstop is a big deal right now, but I think it can be done if all goes well.
4. Strength train regularly. This is something that I wasn't really doing at my running peak and I think building strength will really help my back issues as well as build a strong foundation to prevent the same issues when it's time for S to get a younger sibling.  
5. Enjoy every minute with S. He's growing up so fast, I don't want to miss a minute.
6. Pay off the credit card.
 

Even blurry photos make good memories.

You'll notice my full list is quite a bit longer, but the main gist is: building healthy habits, lose weight, run. I want to be the best version of me so that I can be the best mom and wife I can be. My full list also has a lot of little things that I'm always thinking of doing and just forget or get busy. Now that we have S, Cody and I really want to make sure we are more deliberate in our actions and don't miss out on things we want to do.