5 Goals for 2011: How I Did

One important thing I learned through setting goals for this past year was that goals need to be measurable. I can't just say I want to "improve" something. How will I really know if I've improved enough? What will prove that? After setting my initial goals for the year, I revised them in September. Did I achieve them? Well...sort of...some of the time. My goal setting clearly still needs work.


1. Exercise for 30 minutes 3 times a week. 

In October, we started Couch to 5K, and I loved it. Had we stuck with the program consistently, we would have finished December 9. However, we didn't make it to week 9 of the plan until December 15, and we haven't tun since then. The trip to California, Christmas, sick husband, and moving kind of threw me off. I really am serious about becoming a runner though, and I hope to finish out the program and continue to run 30 minutes at a time. I had never run more than a mile prior to last year, so I'm still really happy with my progress.

2. Go to bed at 10:00 each night and wake up at 6:00 each morning.

I kind of revised this one to 10:30 and 6:30 after I gave up on running in the morning. Sometimes I achieved this, sometimes I didn't. Sometimes we went to bed on time but talked for a half hour or more. This year Nathan's the one with the long commute, so I'm not sure what bedtime is anymore.

3. Complete my daily chores and leave no dishes in the sink at the end of the day. 

I did terrible on this one for December with all we had going on. I just didn't care about my apartment anymore since I knew we'd be moving. But for the most part, I did develop good habits in this area. Thanks to my new shorter commute and the six-quart programmable crockpot Nathan got me for Christmas, I should have much more time in the evenings to focus on cleaning this year.

4. Spend less than $200 a budget period on food (groceries and eating out). 

We actually achieved this one in December, but of course we also spent money on vacation and Christmas. This isn't a goal I plan on keeping in 2012, but it's good to know that we can cut back when necessary.

5. Write at least 2 blog posts a week.

Had I achieved this one, I would have published 104 blog posts. I only made it to 88, or about 1.7 posts a week. At least there weren't any huge gaps between posts. Blogging is a funny thing. I thought maybe I was spending too much time on each post and that I should try just writing without a lot of editing. When I wrote a post that way, it became my first post in months with no comments. I guess I still have a lot too learn.

I'm still trying to figure out what I want to achieve in 2012. We moved everything into our new rental house on January 2, so I'm just taking it one goal at a time for now

How did you do with your goals for 2011?