In December of 2003 my husband Ron sent me a postcard from Florida. On it he said, "It is cliche not make New Year's because they're cliche, so think of something good." That has pretty much been my view on the subject ever since. Here are mine for this year:
1. Brush Afton's teeth twice a day EVERYDAY.
2. Do the dinner dishes at night instead of the next morning.
3. Have friends over for dinner once a week.
I am sharing these here because I hear publicizing your goals is a good way to keep you from quitting on them. I am totally embarrassed by one and two because having them as goals is like saying to the world "Hey, I don't brush my daughter's teeth and I leave my dishes sitting out all night!" But I posted them anyway. Judge me if you must. I don't blame you.
For the record I do brush Afton's teeth, just not nearly as regularly as I should. She squirms so much that it seems pointless, so it never gets high priority. Now that I have outed myself on the Internet though, hopefully those cute little teeth will get the attention they deserve.
As for the "I leave my dishes sitting out all night" part, well, I have no for the record statement for that. I do it. Pretty much every night. I know, I know! I am stopping though. That is what this humbling (humiliating) post is about.
As for the last one, I know it sounds very ambitious. It is meant to be. It is designed to be a boot camp of sorts, on the reasoning that if you do something a whole bunch of times in a row it stops being scary. Time for embarrassing confession number three. I am terrified of having people over for dinner. Every time we do have company we have a great time. We always talk about how fun it was and wonder why we don't do it more often. I know why though. It is because I get totally nervous about the prospect of cooking for other people. It is quite silly, really. It comes down the fact that I only know how to cook really normal things. I always feel like I need to be able to pull something fancy out of my hat and I know that I have nothing fancy in there. Nothing. Just stuff like spaghetti. Anyway, I always tell myself it is not about fancy food it is about fun and fellowship. I can tell myself that until I am blue in the face, but until I overcome my nervousness I am going to let fretting over fancy food keep me (and my family) from lots of occasions of fellowship and fun. (How is that for alliteration?) That is where resolution number three comes in. If I force myself to cook for friends fifty times this year I think I will beat back the majority of my nerves and I know we will have a lot of fun in the process.
So, there you have it. Wish me Godspeed! Happy New Year!
7 comments:
You are just too cute!!
And Paw Paw's solution for easy entertaining..........HAMBURGERS!!!!
ANYTIME, ANYWHERE!!
Someone (can't remember who, unfortunately)once made a distinction for me between "entertaining" and "hospitality" that forever made it easier for me to relax and welcome people for meals, whatever it is we're having. "Entertaining" is pulling out all the stops, the fancy dishes, extravagant menu and creating a really impressive "experience" for your guest. Um, yeah. No wonder I didn't want to do it more often!
Hospitality is simply welcoming someone as a friend and inviting them to share that bit of life with you. Even if it's peanut butter and jelly on paper plates. I can do that. After reminding myself of that difference many, many times, I can now say that I've served very, very weirdly combined left-overs to last minute guests and had way more fun because there wasn't time to stress about it.
And Paw Paw says hamburgers are good ANY time!
i truly appreciate your vulnerability in this post...interesting one of my other friends new years resolution post on her blog was to be more vulnerable.
i have trouble remembering/taking the time to brush my little one's teeth too...aubin says that it gets better when they get older and want to do it and can remember and then the younger ones want to do it just like them. as for the dishes...i do that too, i think of it as the joy of being a stay at home mom to be able to choose when i do my dinner dishes:) and the having people over, we have people over all the time and i have a bunch of great recipes that are super easy but taste GREAT and seem more difficult than they are. i sell them for my business too so i know people like them if you are interested i can pass them along!
I would love to have those recipes, Aimee! They sound awesome!
my email is in my profile...shoot me a line and i will reply with some recipes.
I leave my dishes every night, too. It's always been habit, since we used to eat dinner between 10 & midnight.
Also, all the times we've been over to people's for dinner - I honestly don't remember what we ate there - just the good fellowship. You're from the mid-westish part of the country. You're not supposed to have amazing meals in your head - just good, sensible, comfort-foods!
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