How about some goals?
It's been a little while since we had one of these, so here are 10 things I'd like to get accomplished (I'll probably give myself 1.5 weeks to get these done.)
1. Write up a master account/password financial list.
Not to be all morbid and whatnot, but if something bad ever happens to me, I want Mr. FG to be able to access all of our accounts. I'm the one that takes care of bill-paying right now, so I need to compile all that information in one place.
2. Sell my broken camera lens on Ebay.
My beloved 50mm 1.4 lens gave up the ghost, and repair was going to be slow and expensive (it wasn't going to be back from the shop in time for Miss Callie's birth, and I really, really, REALLY wanted it for that! Taking pictures in dark hospital rooms is nigh onto impossible with my one other lens.)
I had some money that I was saving up for a new lens (I wanted a 35mm or 85mm), but I decided to just use that money to buy a new 50mm (this time I purchased a Canon Lens Hood
to help protect the focus mechanism, since it seems to be a fairly common problem with this lens.) The good news is that even broken 50mm lenses do sell on Ebay (sometimes for a surprising amount!), so I'm going to list mine to recoup some of the cost of the new one.
3. Update Quicken.
Yeah. Still don't trust myself to do that without a list!
4. Start on our tax return.
As I shared with you, I use Turbo Tax for this (love it!), and even though we don't have all of our tax papers yet, I can at least start on my small business taxes, since I own all of those records.
5. Combine two credit card accounts for easier online access.
See that first goal up there? As a part of that project, I've been trying to simplify my financial work (it's not going to hurt me to have simpler tasks either!). Anyway, there are two credit cards I want to keep, but one is under Mr. FG's name and one is under mine (though we both have access to both accounts). This means there are separate logins for each card. I want to simplify and end up with just one log-in, but that means we both need to get on the phone to make this happen.
6. Finish editing a photo session, burn the CD, and deliver it.
They're first birthday pictures for this little one. Isn't she adorable??
7. Plan and schedule music and musicians for February
Organizing all of that is my job at church, and I want to get it done soon.
8. Launch Lisey's secret project (which will then not be a secret)
We just need to do a few other things, and then we'll be ready to share it with you!
9. Plan my 14 Days of Valentines for this year.
I've shared about this tradition of mine before. It's really fun if you've got a spouse who likes to get gifts, but it does require some advance planning. And since I've only got a week before February hits, I need to get on this!
10. Exercise 4 days a week.
I had a weird cold/flu thing recently and that sort of got me off of my routine.
Ok! I'll be back in a week and a half to report on how I did.
_________________________
Today's 365 post: Check out what I found in a kitchen cabinet!
Joshua's 365 post: Wanna guess??
Amazon links are my affiliate links.
Love the count down to Valentines Day, our 15th wedding anniversary is Feb 15th, so we always give on Valentines Day and then the day after for our anniversary, I think I will do a countown to Valentines and Anniversary for this year. Making his favorite meal, letting him have some me time, making him something special etc. , thanks so much for this idea.
Would you mind sharing the link to your broken lens?
A goals list like this is a great idea. I second you on the first one! I decided to set monthly goals instead of resolutions for the year. So far, I am planning to tackle:
before the end of January: set up a GRE study schedule and timeline
February: develop a workout routine I can do at home and stick to it
March: complete a Whole30 (30 days of super clean eating)
And then we'll see what happens after that! Thanks for inspiring me to hold myself accountable--reading your published goals reminds me to check back in with myself and make sure I am following up on what I say I will do.
OOh I love a list. I get such satisfaction from crossing things off.
Good luck
Your #1 and #10 are both on my personal list.
I also realized that when I do make a master password list, that I also want to change each and every password (letter/number combinations of course LOL). I tend to keep my passwords in a Rolodex on my desk, mixed in with the addresses and phone numbers so its not real obvious. That way I have access to everything at my fingertips (and no one touches it, ever - because Rolodexs aren't really that cool). Notebooks tend to get covered up and grabbed by other family members from time to time, so they aren't very safe to me.
And the exercise more part really hits home. I myself wanted to start out this year getting back into shape. I took December off because it was just hopeless with all the activities going on all month long, and my business had a lot of end of the year stuff going on that needed attention. Sadly for me, the New Year just brought more work (running my business) and then a cold that really knocked me off my feet for about a week. I do a lot of activity on my job, but I enjoyed doing the treadmill thing and seeing the results.
Good luck to you on your goals! Also I really enjoyed the Callie pictures from the other day - they literally brought tears to my eyes. I'm so happy everything went well there!
The "master password list" is an awesome idea; I too pay the bills in my household. Thanks for the idea, I will have to get on this 🙂
Great list - inspiring! I read somewhere, though, that if you make a master password list, you have to be careful where you put it. The idea was never to save it to your desktop in case it was hacked or stolen and also to put the paper copy someplace that isn't terribly obvious if your house was robbed. Probably overkill but I guess people have really regretted having it in easy-to-access places. Good luck with your list!
I found out the hard way that both partners need to be able to access the bill-paying info. My husband needed emergency surgery last year, and ended up in intensive care, sedated, for 13 days. It was another couple of weeks before he was really able to work on a computer to pay bills, and of course, bills were due in the meantime. He also tends to forget his own passwords, and although he has a file with them, they tend to be on little post-it notes and scraps of paper, which are a real pain to try to find. To top it off, he kept our bill paying money in a separate account that my name wasn't on. Sheesh. Fortunately, I had our trust documents which we had had done earlier that year, which included a power of attorney, and the bank allowed me access to that money so I could get the bills paid. We have done some adjusting since then to make sure if it happened again, we can both access everything we own, and make sure the bills get paid.
#1 is a must for me as well! This past year we had several family deaths and now it's just my mom and I - literally! We both agreed we need to get a matter list for both if us if something should happen to the other.
Would you mind sharing, when you complete #1, how you did it? Excel spreadsheet? Another program? Important details you included that others might not have thought about? This would be VERY helpful to me!
You've totally got me beat, I only do one week for Valentine's 🙂
Would you share how you'll make that master password list and where you'll keep it? Please?
Hope it's not too late. My friend gave me this link to get 20% off on Turbotax: http://turbotax.intuit.com/affiliate/intuitrefer
Wow - your husband is lucky. 14 days? I'd love to get 14 presents! But I really think you're on to something, that small repeated gestures of love make a bigger impact than one big one.
Yes! And the nice thing is that if you're doing 14 days worth of things, there's no pressure for them to be spectacular.