Happy New Year!

I remember in 1999 many people approached December 31 with fear because of "Y2K" and the worries of what chaos might ensue. I think that more people are eagerly anticipating turning the calendar over to a new year THIS year than any other year of my life. Sometimes individuals have reflected that a certain year was hard for them, but this is the first time in my lifetime when I think MOST people have thought this has been a rough year. I realize what we've experienced is so trivial compared to what others have endured at other times and places. As eager have people have been to enter 2021, I have to say that my attitude for months has been that I didn't think things were going to be drastically better in January 2021. Hopefully sometime this year life will begin to take more steps back toward normal. Time will tell. Last night I let Oliver stay up until 9:30. I've never let the kids stay up until midnight on New Year's Eve before, but given how many things the kids could not experience this month (such as spending time with grandparents or cousins), I decided to let Nadia and Ian stay up until midnight last night.

We haven't established traditions for celebrating New Year's Eve or New Year's Day. In our area many people eat pork and sauerkraut on New Year's Day. We aren't interested in adopting that tradition. I typically make monkey bread for breakfast on Christmas Day, which is why I didn't make panettone on Christmas Day. This was originally an Italian bread typically enjoyed on Christmas Day, but this bread is now eaten in several different countries on either Christmas or New Year's Day.  Yesterday I baked 5 dozen white chocolate macadamia nut cookies in preparation for Paul's birthday (January 3) and also baked a panettone for us to eat for breakfast today. We got pizza for dinner last night which means the kids can have leftover pizza for lunch today. I making Milanesas de carne for dinner tonight, which is a treat as I rarely purchase steak. Usually Paul works on New Year's Day. He'll go to work tomorrow as usual, but he's staying home with us today which is a treat. 

Since I was a child, I've set goals for myself at the start of each year. I don't label them resolutions. When I looked at the goals I set for last year, some ended up being impossible to accomplish due to COVID-19.  Here are 21 goals where I'm hoping we can see improvement and/or accomplish this year:

1. Continue to earn more Junior Ranger badges. I'm not going to strive for a certain quantity of them due to uncertainty related to COVID.

2. Paul and I didn't go on any dates in 2019 or 2020. Hopefully we'll go on at least one date in 2021 as we'll be celebrating our 20th anniversary in August. Also, we're starting a new tradition this year in which each child will get at least one date per year with each parent.

3. Continue to make progress toward using more Spanish and less English throughout the day.

4. Memorize Matthew chapters 6-7 this spring. In August I'm planning to have us start memorizing the book of James together as Nadia and Ian will be studying Hebrews and James for Bible quizzing starting in September. I haven't decided yet whether I'll have Oliver resume attending AWANA next fall. Ian's tenure in AWANA was cut short due to COVID. 

5. Continue to help Ian and Nadia each learn to cook some meals independently. 

6. This summer (or fall) I'd like to enroll Ian in a coding class.

7. Hopefully visit some states the kids have never been to before. This will depend on what happens with COVID this year. I'd like to take the kids out west in October if life has returned to what it was like in February 2020.

8. Continue to try many new recipes and follow the meal rotation plan I've recently typed up, which will mean we'll generally go at least five months before I cook the same meal twice. I have 84 new recipes picked out so far to try in 2021.

9. Ian stays seated during meals.

10. Oliver transitions to reading chapter books independently and finish learning how to write all the uppercase and lowercase letters in cursive.

11. Milo learns to obey commands, only go to the bathroom outside, only chew his toys, not bite us, not beg during meals, and not terrorize the guinea pigs. 

12. Kids improve in their manners such as holding the door for other people, looking people in the eye when talking to them, and answering questions with a descriptive sentence.

13. If life is a lot closer to normal in December, I'd like to take the kids to NYC in December for the first time to see the Christmas lights and the show at Radio City Music Hall.

14. Take the kids to see a Blue Angels airshow for the first time if possible.

15. Take the kids white water rafting for the first time. 

16. I would like to exercise at least three times a week - on the elliptical when it's cold outside and taking walks with Milo when the weather is nicer. I'd also like to drink more water. I don't drink anything else, but I know I don't drink as much water as I should.

17. The kids complete at least 21 more art projects on Creating a Masterpiece over the next 4 months.

18. At some point this year I want to start Oliver on a musical instrument - probably either the piano or recorder.

19. The kids and I started reading through the Old Testament at the end of August. I'm thinking we won't fully accomplish the goal until the spring of 2022, but we'll read a good chunk of it in 2021. This fall we read Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Ruth, 90% of Numbers, and about 1/3 of Psalms.  For our family devotions we're going to use the books from the Inductive Bible Studies for Kids series by Kay Arthur and Janna Arndt. From January through May I'd like us to study the books of Daniel and Revelation because the kids know almost nothing about eschatology at this point. I haven't determined the entire list of studies we'll complete this year yet, but I do plan on studying James in the fall. This fall we completed three of the studies from that series; they focused on the names of God, prayer, and Jonah.

20. Have at least one photo taken this year that includes all five of us (or all six of us if we include Milo).

21. Over the next four months Nadia and Ian need to learn the location and capital of all of the countries in Europe, Asia, Africa, and Australia/Oceania. They worked on North and South America this fall.

Towfighi kids on 12/25/2020