Happy Tuesday! Now that January is about halfway over, I finally want to talk about my goals for the year LOL

Before I share my 2025 goals, let’s look back at last year’s goals and see how I did! You’ll notice that I made very low stakes goals because I knew that having 2 babies at once would be much harder.

2024 Goals Update

1. Have a baby.

Check! Merritt came a few days after her due date, and I had a great labor! Thankful that I got to experience my water breaking and going into labor on my own. Hindsight is always 20/20 and looking back, I kind of wish I didn’t get the epidural. I didn’t get it until I was 7cm dilated and ended up having to start pushing at 9cm (so I didn’t really get much relief), but then I think about how uncomfortable it was for them to move my cervix out of the way each time I pushed and the epidural probably helped mitigate some of that pain.

2. Work out again.

That did not happen like I thought it would. Life is just a little harder with 3 small children and I don’t get as much free time as I used to. But that’s okay! We’re now in a new year!

3. Find a natural deodorant to start using.

YES!!! I had heard or read all of the horror stories about swapping to a natural deodorant and how it required your armpits to basically detox from the aluminum. I’ve read where people would even break out in a rash until their armpits got used to the baking soda in natural deodorants. Well, I did my research and decided on this deodorant. It’s been the BEST!! There’s been no detox at all and I’ve used both the Blue Tansy scent and Lavender scent.

4. Read 15 books this year.

I read 25!!!!! And this was probably why I didn’t work out any last year too haha!!! I will add my favorites in to Friday’s post because I have a couple of favorites from last year.

5. Try making sourdough bread.

Nope. Way too ambitious of a goal for last year.

Now let’s go over my goals for 2025!!!

1. Go to Disney World!!

We’ve booked a trip for our family to go this fall and we are so excited! Banks will be the same age that Harrison was when we took Harrison, and it was such a fun age for DW. Merritt will be about a year and a half, and I think that will be really fun, too.

2. Cut down on seed oils in our home.

Have you read all of the things about seed oils and how they were even created? (We can thank Rockefeller for them.). Toward the end of 2024, a study came out linking seed oils with colon cancer since those who are getting colon cancer are getting younger and younger. After that, I’ve decided to really make sure that I’m buying better-for-us food that doesn’t include seed oils. I’ve noticed seed oils in some of our “healthier” processed foods that has really shocked me!

3. Read 20 books this year.

I set my Goodreads goal for 20 books this year. It’s a low bar, but I’m one of those people who can’t stand to not hit a goal like that so I don’t want to spend the end of this year stressed and trying to read constantly in order to meet my reading goal. I’ve already read one book and am in the middle of another, so I feel like next year I will set my goal much higher.

4. Start running again.

I miss running!!!! It used to be like therapy to me. Last year I sold my Peloton since I never used it and really was over the whole spinning workout, and my MIL gave me her old treadmill. Dustin set it all up in the garage, and now when I get a chance to work out at night, I’ll get on the treadmill and walk on an incline. Once I find a good high impact sports bra, I’m going to start adding in running to my workouts.

5. Work on spending quality one-on-one time with the kids.

Back in November, Harrison’s school had a night where you visited and learned how to play a game with your child that was supposed to help their brain development. Dustin stayed home with the babies because we knew it would be crowded, so I told Harrison we were going on a date and asked him where he wanted to take me to eat (Chick-fil-a was his choice haha). He had the best time and talked forever about our date and when we were going to go on another. Because of that, I want to make sure this year (and forever) that I make sure to spend quality one-on-one time with each of my children. Merritt won’t really know any better right now but go ahead and normalize it to where my children expect it and look forward to it. This is also a goal I have for Dustin, too.

Those are my goals for the year. I’d love to hear your goals for the year below!!

Happy COLD Tuesday, friends! It’s currently 11 degrees outside right now, but instead of a beautiful snow day….we’re dealing with ice…yuck. I told Dustin this reminded me of what happened to us almost a year ago with Banks when we were stuck in Dallas a few extra days because of their crazy ice storm.

Anyway, today I wanted to revisit my 2023 goals (which I actually did complete some!) and make new goals for this year.

2023 Goals

1. Finish BBG 1.0

I actually made it to week 10 out of 12 and then I got sick and had to take a couple of days off. I realized how much I did NOT enjoy BBG, so I decided not to go back and finish it once I was over my sickness. I sweat a ton when I do a heavy workout, which requires a hair washing, and I was tired of doing that 3x a week at least. I didn’t quit working out but just moved onto something different!

2. Swap to a clean deodorant and body lotion.

Shortly after this post, I reached out on social media about clean body lotion since that’s a topic I never hear people talk about. So many people recommended Beautycounter’s body lotion. They just so happen to be having a huge sale on their lotion, so I bought a bottle (I think it was on sale for $10 from $28). It came in the mail and was SO MUCH SMALLER THAN I EXPECTED. For a bottle that’s typically $28, it was insane. I ended up using the entire bottle and really really liked it, but I could not justify the price for lotion that I would be using frequently and a lot of.

As for deodorant, I kept putting it off and then just never tried one last year. I think the stories of detox and what that was like just kept me from pursuing it. I especially didn’t want to deal with it with a new baby, either.

3. Get rid of plastic food containers and move to all glass.

YES!!! I can happily say we did this in our home in 2023 and are very happy about it. I have heard on podcasts and read so much about the endocrine disruptors found in plastic containers. We threw all of our plastic away and bought multiple sets of the glass storage containers from Costco. We have enjoyed the glass so much better. The boys even take their breakfast and lunch leftovers in the glass containers and we’ve never had a complaint.

4. Eat gluten free more often.

LOLOLOLOL. This one makes me laugh because I started cutting out gluten as soon as school was out last May, but I would still have one thing a day that had gluten in it. I totally cut it out mid-June after having a cycle that I felt like about killed me, and well, we all know how that ended. Because of that, I’m a huge advocate for the harmful affects food can have on your body….but also the positive affects! Gluten is extremely inflammatory (I just listened to another podcast on it that I’m going to share on Friday), and there are so many health issues you may have that going gluten free might clear up.

5. Mail 3 notes a month

I did this for January, but then we left for Dallas to meet Banks and bring him home and I just ran out of steam. A new baby will do that to you 🙂

Okay, now onto my very realistic 2024 goals….

2024 Goals

1. Have a baby.

Merritt is due in March, and so my goal is to literally just have a baby. While I prefer a vaginal birth, I will do whatever it takes to get her here safely. Dustin and I have laughed this entire pregnancy that we know what to do once we have a newborn, but it’s the whole getting to that newborn part that we’re clueless on LOL since we’ve never done that part before!

2. Work out again.

I cannot wait to do some sort of physical activity again. I know I could be working out right now, but the fatigue is real….especially now that I’m also taking iron because I’m anemic. Where I would usually head to the gym after Dustin gets home from work, now I’m struggling to keep my eyes open. I’m giving myself lots of grace right now and will resume working out when I can.

3. Find a natural deodorant to start using.

I’m keeping this on here because I really do what to make the swap, so maybe this summer I can finally do that. I know I want to try Primally Pure first before I try anything else.

4. Read 15 books this year.

I started actually keeping up with my Goodreads account last January when I saw everyone start posting their 2022 year in review with reading. I set my goal low (12 books) because we were in the adoption process and I was very hopeful we would be adopting a baby in 2023. I didn’t realize I would read more books at home on my maternity leave with Banks than I did the rest of the year haha!!! So I’ve upped it this year to 15 in hopes that I can exceed that like I did last year’s goal! I’m already done with 1 book….just 14 more to go!

5. Try making sourdough bread.

This one I’m not holding myself to, but it’s something I really want to try out maybe this summer when I have a little more flexibility in my schedule. I know people started making sourdough in 2020 when everyone was forced home from the pandemic, but I’ve read how homemade sourdough is better for people with gluten intolerances because of the way it’s made? Anyway, there’s even a particular flour I want to order and try it with simply because it’s so much lower in gluten.

Okay, I think that’s it! I’m keeping this year easy and realistic and even making that last goal a maybe :). If you make goals for yourself for the year, I’d like to hear what those are!