Year in Review: 2011

Happy Holidays! Boy, the years just fly by, don't they? We feel like we've been very busy but we have little to report.

We're still in Our City, still in the house we said we'd live in for 5 years before moving. We're heading into our 12th year here, so you can see how that prediction panned out.

Ben earned his yellow belt in Tae Kwon Do, and then promptly quit.

A. graduated Montessori and switched to a new school, St. J's. Unfortunately, he says he doesn't like it much and wishes he were back at Montessori, so, you know, that's fun. We're all still waiting for a growth spurt, too.

Both A. and Ben started Boy Scouts, and while the activities are fun, the uniforms cost an arm and a leg and the badges are ridiculously hard to sew on.

Lunasea is still in private practice, and hates insurance companies more than ever. Her goal in 2012 is to not have to deal with them anymore. She also is not crazy about sewing Scouting badges and is actively sabotaging her sons' efforts to earn more badges for her to sew onto the shirts.

G. is still at Kaiser and in private practice. He was hit by an appliance truck and totaled the car. We're still driving it, though, because it turns out the driver was the appliance guy's uninsured nephew. Oops!

The unfinished wood around the doorways of our house are still unfinished. After 3 years, we (read: Greg) finally chose a stain color only to find it had been discontinued. Isn't that always the way?

A. is trying out CYO basketball, and his team finally won a game. We couldn't say that at all last year with soccer, so things are looking up.

Dear friends died and we miss them, so that sucked.

So.....how was your year?

A. Takes a Stand

A. has come out firmly against tiger extinction, in a letter to National Geographic.

Dear National Giograpic,

We should keep lions and other big cats alive because they want to live a big life. Think about it, if we were a big cat we wouldn't want to die (and of course not go extinct). We want to live a good happy life. Big cats going extinct would make a big difrence. Many contry in southern asia and  Africa would have to change state animal and zoos would lose a lot of anamals. Little kids would get relly sad, if there was no more "King of the Jungle." It would be a big loss if the big cats when to ecstinction.

Sincerely, A.

Please, let the countries keep their national symbols. Save the big cats.

Another Auld Lang Syne

I've written before about how much I love New Year's. I'm in the self-improvement business, after all, and although I realize there's nothing magical about January 1st that instantly makes all goals attainable, it's a pretty handy marker for starting something.

Every year my resolutions are similar - they focus around health, organization and finance (like 98% of the population). I don't see this as a failure. These areas are my cutting edges - they are what I will always be working on, and that's fine. Every year gets a bit better. This year I implemented a new bookkeeping system in my practice, which helped track payments A LOT. Next year will be even better as I moved my accounting online.

I've recently been reading about brain plasticity and am really interested in how it applies to positive psychology. I've been really interested in cognitive work on resilience, and how some clients manage to pull themselves past enormous roadblocks and trauma, and why other clients see their lives as a tragedy and have such a hard time motivating themselves to change, even though they express the desire to do so. After 20 years of doing therapy, the actual traumas and stresses the two types experience don't seem that qualitatively different, and I don't think the first group is just in denial. I think the growing field of research into positive psychology is fascinating, and I want to learn more about the practical application of these ideas.

Last year I ran a 5K. This year, depending on how my joints hold out, I will run a 10K. I will also eat less and move more. I'm going to start a binder of healthy, vegetable-heavy recipes since I need vegetables disguised if I'm going to eat more of them.

Last year I learned many ways to cut back on grocery costs. I'll keep that up, and started a separate savings account at ING Direct to save money each month so I'm not struggling at Christmas. This year we sold one of our cars right after Thanksgiving and that saved this Christmas, along with the bevy of frugal shopping sites out there that saved me tremendous amounts of money by alerting me to sales I wouldn't have found otherwise...but I'm not going to be caught wondering how not to go into debt next Christmas. I don't think we'll have another spare car to sell, so....I need to make sure I have enough cash set aside.

And, hey, here it is 11:11 on 1/1/11. Happy New Year!