What’s up on 3/6/2010

Outside my window…it’s now dark.  It was an amazing day today.  Cloudy this morning, but sunny and warm this afternoon!

I am listening to…30 Rock.  Trying to multi-task and watch TV with my honey while blogging.

I am wearing…jammies.  It’s early to bed for me tonight after only 5 hours of sleep last night!  SKYROCKET! is always a party and so worth the lack of sleep but the next day has to be a low-key one for me.  Am I getting old? Never!

I am thankful for…an amazingly supportive husband who lets me have my fun times without him.  Last night I got to dance my booty off to 70s and 80s music while he is home having some quiet time.  What a great marriage, built on give and take, trust, and unselfishness.  Thank you, God for bringing Mark into my life.

I am reading…Real Simple, Fort Bend Star newspaper and Parade Magazine this weekend.

From the kitchen…still can smell Italian food from dinner.  Homemade pizza, whole wheat pasta with artichoke and garlic sauce and caesar salad.  Delicious!  Yummy Malbec and Lacey cookie (dark chocolate and almond), too.  Good stuff.

I am praying…for my friend Bryan, Jon Bailey’s dad, my sister Jacque and many more.

I am creating…nothing today.  Have some picture frames to spray paint tomorrow.  Seems to be the project of the week as I already did three earlier this week.

Around the house…all is quiet upstairs.  We wore the kids out today!  We let them play in the hot tub (warmed up) for 2 hours this afternoon.  It was sunny outside and the water was warm and toasty.  They had a blast splashing, swimming, floating and being silly.  Lily fell asleep watching a movie before dinner she was so tired.  Too cute!

One of my favorite things…shopping for eyeglasses.  Seriously, I do like it!  I love my glasses but my lens is cracked and I need a new pair.  I’m waiting on some frames to come in for me to try on.  Evidently I have a smaller face that is “hard to fit”.  So, our wonderful new eye doctor’s office ordered a bunch for me to try on before I buy them.  Love them.  Tried some on Thursday and should get more on Monday. I am just ready to get the new glasses!

A few plans for the rest of the weekend...crazy busy day tomorrow where I need to be in 3 places at one time.  But, I will make it work somehow.  Looking forward to dinner with the Kutzes tomorrow night as we plan our Spring Break vacation with them.  Woo-hoo, just one more week until we head out for Fentress, Texas on the San Marcos River.

A picture thought I am sharing…lots over the past few days but none that have warmed my heart more than this letter that Ty wrote me out of the blue on Wednesday.  He had a fever on Tuesday so he stayed home from school on Wednesday so we got lots of quality time together.  He was SUCH a sweet boy and gave this to me and said “I KNEW it would make you smile!” when I wrapped my arms around him and smothered him with hugs and kisses.

"I LOVE YOU WITH ALL MY HEART"

Do you make New Year’s Resolutions?

Seriously? 2 months since my last post?  Ok, it’s a new year and I am letting go of the fact that I committed to being more committed to this blog thing.  So, here I am again. I will not give up on this thing, even if no one is reading it but my family. I enjoy writing and although it is sometimes it is tough to bare your soul to the world, I am going to keep at it.  I may even finish and post some of those half-written posts I started last fall.

So, do YOU make New Year’s resolutions?  We don’t make resolutions, per se, but we do set yearly goals as a family.  Financial, Professional, Church, Marriage, Children, Personal, Health are all categories and we have 4-5 specific things under each.  It’s pretty easy to do now that we have done it for several years. We pull up the old ones discuss how last year went, what we want to improve and end up recycling many of them. Do we really ever stop trying to eat healthy, save money, workout more, be good parents?

What we have realized after a time of setting goals and not reading them again until the next year is that the only way we are able to achieve any of our goals is that you have to look at them on a regular basis.  So, we set aside a time once a quarter to review and adjust as necessary.  Yes, adjust.  We certainly don’t achieve all of our goals and we realize that some of them are TOTALLY unrealistic. I have also had to accept that fact that we won’t check off every item every year.  That kills me sometimes as I do passionately love the feeling of “checking off” things on my list!

The other thing we have learned, is that we have to DO something with the list. Sticking it in a file is not really going to help us to make any progress.  I am a dork and I still make monthly goal lists…much of these are based on our yearly plans.  Mark and I have “staff meetings” on a regular basis where he and I sit down and discuss calendar, goals and life in general.  Without kids, without TV, without interruptions, we just focus on what “Gribble, Inc.” is doing.  And, it seems to work for us, so I guess we will stick with it.

My question above was prompted by a dear friend who asked me how we run things in the Gribble house.  She and I were friends from when I lived in Chicago in middle school.  Although I moved to Texas when I was 16, we have always stayed in touch (even before we had e-mail and cell phones!) and now 20 years later, our lives are amazing similar.  Her asking specifically how we make our family goals made me ponder.  Do we just react to what life throws at us or are we intentional at setting goals and achieving them?

I want to be intentional.