The new year is always such an interesting mixture of emotions for me! I’m a sucker for the holidays and I love that the end of the year it’s like one thing from the next from Halloween to Christmas. It’s such a fun time and it ends the year on such a high note for me. It makes me a little sad for each year to come to a close, but it also means that it is time to look at what happened in the previous year and look ahead to the new year. Everyone sets goals and resolutions and I’m all about that!!! I seriously LOVE goal setting, writing them down, and putting them somewhere you can see them every day.

This past year on one of our frequent drives to Utah, Logan and I decided we wanted to set 10 2 year big goals to help stretch us and help us reach for things we would like in our lives. Because of these big 2 year goals, we have based our goals for this year partly based off of those and trying to find ways to help us get to those 2-year goals as we go along this year. That doesn’t mean that each goal we set for ourselves this year has to do with the big goals, but quite a few of them do!  I’m telling you, I love goals!!! When it comes to the actual goal setting, Logan and I think about our personal goals separately, but we always come together to go over what we are thinking will be good for us and ask the opinion of each other. We write all of our goals down and then we start talking about what kind of goals we want to make as a couple. This helps us really be on the same page with everything and the direction we want to go for the year! And after we finish up those goals, we write them down too!! I first write them down in a notebook and then I put them up on a posterboard for us to see everyday.

As Logan and I have spent time chatting about goals and ideas for this upcoming year, we also watched a video of this little girl with the cutest voice that said something about how yes, it is important to set goals but not to give up if it doesn’t work right away. We might not be able to get all of our goals going right at once or we might fail at first or after a few weeks. That does not mean it is time to give up!! Just like this is a new year to move forward and keep progressing, that is what each day is for!! Each day is a new day that we can and should use to be a little bit better than the last. Heck for me, I’m just trying to consistently drink 64 oz of water each day but when I can’t, I know that the next day I can try again. I don’t give up on drinking more water just because I couldn’t do it yesterday. What I’m trying to say is make some goals, maybe even make some goals that stretch you a little farther than you think you can go. You will surprise yourself if you set your sights on those things and really go for them. But if you can’t make all of your goals happen or you fail at some of them, DON’T GIVE UP!!

Along with our goals, we also like to come up with a word that will be our “motto” or guide for how we live our lives this year. We pick a word for ourselves and a word as a couple. As a couple, we chose the word happiness. That’s our word because we want to be people who lift others. We want to spread a little more sunshine where we go and we want to raise our baby in a home that is filled with happiness and teaches them to be happy. I’m really excited for some things we have planned to keep us focused on being happy this year.

We challenge you to sit down and come up with 5-10 goals as an individual and as a family/couple. After you have come up with those and written them down somewhere you can see them every day, pick a word for the year and write that on the goal sheet too! And let’s just see how much you can do in 2017!!

4 of Michelle’s personal goals

• Make 1 new meal each month
• Read 20 books
• Quiet morning and bedtime routines with no phone
• Memorize 12 scriptures
  

4 of Logan’s personal goals

• Read 10 books
• Eat more fruit
• Make at least 1 investment
• 100% home teacher

4 of our business goals

• 3 styled shoots just for me/us
• 5 “for photographers” blog posts
• 8 personal videos
• 1 networking lunch a month