There’s something wonderful about our girl’s birthday lining up fairly neatly with a new year – it’s allowing me to think about not only what I want my 2016 to look like, but what I want her first year of life, and our first year as a family of three, to look like.

Longtime readers will know that I am not big on setting yearly goals. I love to set monthly goals, and have used a daily goal system in the past. In 2015 I focused on cultivating the fruits of the spirit. Other than that, I tend to work with a longer time horizon, as with my ongoing 60 Before 30 project.

But 2016 seemed to call for a year-long structure. And though I didn’t necessarily want to set goals, per se (my long-term goal focus will still be squarely on 60 Before 30!), I loved the idea of having something to measure myself against throughout the next twelve months – a touchstone to refer back to in this year that has the potential to be tumultuous.

Because you know, the one thing people love to tell you about kids is that they will change your life in ways you could never imagine. And while I welcome that, I also don’t want to start at zero on January 15. I want to protect and preserve the best parts of the life John and I have built together over the last ten years while welcoming the changes that will inevitably come. So, knowing that this Big Change has the potential to throw us off track and derail the progress we’ve made, I wanted to establish guideposts that I could look to to remind myself of what matters most to us as we integrate our girl into our life over the next year.

So what are these guideposts? I’ve listed them below, along with a few thoughts on how I might know whether I’ve been successful for each!

1. Stay healthy in mind and body. Continue weekly meal planning, pick back up with running and biking, play tennis with John, go on lots of hikes, recover from pregnancy and get back to a place where I feel great about my body, spend lots of time reading (I’m joining in Nancy’s book club!)
2. Stay adventurous. Go berry picking, plant our garden, introduce our girl to our favorite outdoor concerts and movies, explore the Triangle, take day trips, embrace the whirlwind of bigger vacations and road trips (Maine and Michigan) with grace
3. Stay faithful. Attend our church when we’re in town, continue visiting new churches when we’re traveling, listen to Adam’s sermons weekly, fill idle time by listening to other favorite sermons, lean on our family group, continue to make progress as stewardship chairs, adjust prayer and Bible rhythm as necessary, sing hymns and listen to worship music throughout the day
4. Stay financially free. Stay on track with our 2016 budget (it will probably be the hardest year we’ve ever faced!), stay on track with our plan for paying down our mortgage early, open a college fund, make wise decisions on baby purchases, continue to give generously
5. Stay in relationship. Be intentional about involving our far-away families in our girl’s life, make new friends in our neighborhood, continue Articles Club, go camping, host another adventure dinner party, keep up our monthly tennis dates, have a Southern meet-up with Kim
6. Stay strong in love. Hug every day, go on nightly neighborhood walks, prioritize conversation together, cultivate patience, kindness, and peace, laugh a lot, read The Meaning of Marriage

A peaceful home, family singalongs, simple time together, reading good books, camping and time outside, trips to Michigan, Maine, and Bald Head Island, laughter, a new backyard, and lots of love. See all my 2016 inspiration board sources here.

To wrap things up, here are my goals for January!
— Organize coat closet and install hook for Ergo
— Read “How to Win Friends and Influence People” for NR book club
— Research landscaping companies for our backyard project
— Pack our hospital bag
— Re-read first chapters of Babywise and The Nursing Mother’s Companion
— Order favorite Instagram prints from 2015
— Prep several EFM posts for after our girl’s arrival

If you’ve posted your monthly (or yearly!) goals somewhere, I’d love to take a look – leave a link in the comments! :)

Quote from designlovefest

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I loved our five Christmas card finalists so much that I would have been thrilled to send out any of them, but in the end, we went with the design that y’all loved best, and that was so undeniably perfect for our upcoming year:

It’s the Wonder Filled design by Baumbirdy from the geniuses at Minted. Our photo was taken by the talented Perry Vaile!

Since our card design was simple and black and white, we didn’t add any color to the newsletter, either. It’s crazy to think of all the milestones we’ll have to squeeze onto the 2016 version!!

I love that many of our news items aren’t news to y’all, like our dativersary, Articles Club, pumpkin and soup night, and of course, our trip to France! It really is a joy to share with and learn from you all, and, in turn, to be invited into your lives! Which brings me to your very own handwritten note, because no Thomas Christmas card would be complete without one:

Thomas Christmas cards are also not complete without recognition of why we send cards at Christmas in the first place. Though sometimes it seems unavoidable, we don’t want our cards to be all about us. We send them out at Christmas to share our joy at the birth of our Savior with the people we love the most, and we want to remind people of that in a personal way. So, we’ve taken to including a few thoughts on what Christmas means to us, and a favorite piece of scripture. We went with a classic this year :)

I’m not sure if I’ll be back between now and my annual year in review, as we have lots of family arriving shortly for an extended visit (YAY!). But, I’m already so excited to share a look back and a look forward to what should be a very interesting year… I’ve been working on my goals with the PowerSheets, and I can’t wait to discuss!

P.S. Our cards from 2014, 2013, and 2012!

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I am 33 weeks pregnant, which means this will presumably be the last month I’m writing goals before our girl joins the family.

Holy moly.

It’s easy to feel overwhelmed, especially coming off the busy busy month we just finished up. Feeling overwhelmed is a choice, though, and this month my biggest goal is to keep breaking the seemingly insurmountable to dos down into little steps, to keep taking those steps, and to otherwise enjoy the season of Christmas.

This weekend definitely helped. I’d been hoarding planned purchases like a fevered squirrel and finally acted on them all in a torrent of Black Friday/Cyber Monday deals. To make so many purchases in such a short amount of time was a bit of a shock to the system for this infrequent spender, but they were all carefully considered and make me excited. And let this be a reminder to you: if you’re not using EBates for your online shopping, you’re missing out!! I bought a pair of boots I’ve been eyeing for a year for 20% off, then got an additional $10 back by shopping through EBates! We also were able to purchase several things for our girl, including a monitor, bedding, and a cover.

But the reason it was a good weekend was not only because of the money saved, but because of the amazing weather, the hikes we took, the early evening spent decorating our porch for Christmas, the projects finished and started in the nursery — and, of course, our actual Thanksgiving dinner, which was spent with dear friends and their parents. I think December will look similar, which makes me very excited.

Revisiting my goals for November:
Take rings in to be cleaned
Take knives in to be sharpened
Frame and hang our NC BBQ print (explored options but couldn’t find the supplies I needed… yet)
Make a pelmet for little lady’s room (this was basically THE WORST project ever, but we finished!)
Choose and order twin bed bedding
Choose and order Minted Christmas cards
Design and print Christmas card newsletter
Vote!
Host the first Articles Club
Purchase half of our Christmas gifts for friends and family (I think I checked off a third or so)
Start filling out our girl’s baby book

December goals:
— Make and freeze four soups for after our girl arrives
— Deliver homemade toffee to my favorite post office peeps
— Send out our Christmas cards with a personal note on each
— Plan well for Christmas at our home with John’s family
— Give away as much as we spend on Christmas gifts in our church’s Christmas Eve offering (this year going to Imagine No Malaria and local missions)
— Start Life Handbooks for the cousins and our girl when John’s family is here
— Finish shower thank you notes
— Go out to dinner with John for our 2015 review + celebration!

I could add so many more things to this list, mostly related to our newest family member, but I’ll leave it there for now. If you’ve posted your goals somewhere, I’d love to see – or just drop them in the comments!

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I hope you all had wonderful Thanksgivings!! Between our birth class, visitors, travel, big work events, Articles Club, birthday parties, our church family group, and showers, November has been an exceptionally busy month. I am so grateful for a few days off work and without activities to relax a bit — and tackle a few things that have been on my to do list for weeks!

One thing I did accomplish this month, though: finally pulling the trigger on new chairs for our dining table!! It should be well known around these parts that I tend to agonize over home decor purchases, especially ones that come with a large price tag. (For proof, see here, here, and here.) Though I think I have a strong design sense, I can’t help researching every possible option, and then second guessing everything a few times just for good measure. I’ve been researching and debating options for this space for about a year now, so it definitely felt good to finally make a decision!

You can see where we started thanks to our most recent home tour:

Our former chairs were given to us for free (yay!) from a friend’s parents when we moved to North Carolina, more than six years ago. Though I liked the general shape, they were lightly dusted in glitter and fluff (the chairs had been in their craft room!) and they didn’t work super well with our wood floors. Here are a few of the things I considered as I looked for replacements:

— Between the teal upholstered bar stools close on one side and the tan sofa close on the other, there were a lot of surfaces with which to coordinate.
— I loved the idea of at least some upholstered options, but was having a really hard time getting over the idea of keeping them clean.
— I couldn’t decide whether to go with a color (probably blue or green) or something more neutral, like white. Would white chairs with a white table be too much white? Or maybe I should go with black, but would they be too dark with our floors? What if we added a rug under the table down the line?
— I loved the look of bistro chairs and thought they’d be durable and practical, but worried about their trendiness and whether I’d like them long term.
— If not a bistro style, should I go with an Eames style, a Windsor, a industrial type metal (too cold?), or a cafe chair? And should I get different accent chairs for the ends???

These thoughts and more looped through my mind for months, accompanied by some of this inspiration:

From top to bottom: Design Sponge, i suwannee, Style Me Pretty, Alice Lane Home, Scandinavian Apartment Ideas, Style at Home, La Dolce Vita, Design Sponge

When I just couldn’t seem to come to a decision after months of deliberating, I finally sent pretty much all of the above in a big messy email to my sister-in-law, pleading for help. Even just the act of writing down all of my options was helpful, and once I had her opinion, too, I felt ready to make a decision: we were going with white Windsor chairs. I did consider a few Wayfair options, many that were 50% of the price of our final decision, but in the end the reviews made me a bit nervous, as I want these chairs to last for a long, long time.

So, what did we decide on? We went with the Willa chairs in white from Crate & Barrel. I snagged them at 20% off during a dining sale (yippee!), and bought them in two installments to soften the budget blow a bit. I also had them shipped to the store, so there was no shipping cost.

We have been super happy with them so far! I think they play nicely with our antique table, and they definitely brighten the space. I also like that the set is a neutral base so that seasonal decor can be layered on top. We’re still considering adding upholstered chairs to the ends (maybe these?), but for now, I’m calling it a day.

…except, of course, that now I have my sights on a bed for our master bedroom. I currently have about 20 different styles and options pinned. Maybe you’ll hear from me in two years :)

Anyone else in my same boat with home decisions?? What do you think of this one?

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