The Journey of Parenthood…

Year End Review: 2019

Year End Review: 2019

Every year for as long as I can remember I’ve written out my goals for the year and then, at the end of the year, I go back over those goals and give myself a review.

It’s important to set goals…but what’s the point in setting them if you never go back over them? If you don’t hold yourself accountable?

I’ve had this practice since at least middle school age, maybe even younger.

I look back over my goals throughout the year and do my best to achieve them.

Now when we make goals we have no way of knowing what the year ahead may hold and life throws curves our way that can often make goal achievement impossible in certain areas.

I know in going over my 2019 that a lot of goals didn’t get accomplished, and that’s okay.

I did not know in the start of the year that I’d go on a huge personal journey to some pretty hardcore healing work that really monopolized my entire year across the board – in my time, emotional energy, physical energy, and focus.

And I’m PROUD of that growth and proud of the person I am today because I have been putting in that hard work.

So. I’m not going to be hard on myself that a lot of my 2019 plans didn’t come to fruition! And in setting 2020 goals I’m going to keep in mind that I’m not done yet with that hard healing work!

Here were my goals for 2019:

  • Continue waking up early and having my journal time, Bible time, prayer time and productive time! : This didn’t happen and is THE biggest thing I regret from 2019. I really, really loved my morning routine in 2018 and wish I could go back to it. I am readjusting things for 2020 in hopes of making this a priority again.
  • Pour into our marriage. Date nights often (at least monthly if not more) and communicate clearly.  We had a LOT more focus on our marriage this year. My hard work on ME has resulted in a lot of HUGE growth for US too.
  • Completely purge our entire house and have things well organized – and KEEP them organized! We did a TON of purging and organizing and it felt amazing and we’ve continued a lot of that too!
  • Visit a Disney Park once a month for the year (just myself, not entire family). DONE! Whoop whoop! I made it happen!
  • Get 7 hours of sleep every single night.  I really stick to this pretty well! It has meant that my morning routine is more rushed but I have found the sleep is more crucial for me.
  • Keep drinking my water – finish three bottles a day (at least 80 oz!).  Water drinking is my norm now and a goal I didn’t even have to really focus on in order to achieve!
  • Focus on speaking in kindness and love, no matter the circumstances.  This is one that is always a work in progress but I think I’ve done very well on this. I’ve been more patient with the kids and better at speaking in love with Zach even during moments of arguing. Not perfect, but big growth!
  • Be back in a routine of regular family game nights and family walks. We had a LOT more game nights and as Spear gets older those get easier too – although I will say having older kids involved in sports and such means there are less nights for a truly normal evening routine!
  • Meet my children and husband where they need me most and show them love in the ways they best receive it. Zach is actually teaching a class at church about love languages so we have had TONS of talks about this and it’s been a huge focus for us and our family throughout the year.
  • Have all blog books printed up to the year 2019 (need to print 2016, 2017 and 2018): I DID get 2016 printed. But that was it. Gotta get on the rest!
  • Continue to build a deeper connection with the Lord through my morning time but also throughout the day! Turn to PRAYER! Another work in progress but I’m getting there and looking to the Lord more and more naturally and frequently.
  • Get a full handle on emotional/stress eating. Be at a place where it’s no longer an issue by the end of 2019. Have that self-control to avoid that self-loathing icky feeling! PAUSE. Some of my goals are BIG and some are small. 2019 was a year that focused on the BIG ONES and this one is HUGE. I got this under control which is SO major for me.
  • Host more events in our home and have more friends over more often. : We did host more and I’d like to keep stepping this up too!
  • Have at least 4 solo dates with each child.  I didn’t write down and keep track but I’m positive I had at least four solo times with each kid!
  • Blog Goals: Meet prior goal income as an average across every month and have 3 months where I double it. Stay caught up to current time in personal posts. Focus more on SEO – have a full understanding of it to the point where I can explain it to others. Optimize as much old content as possible. Make pins for as much old content as possible. Have a reach of over 3 million on Pinterest. Hit 20k on IG. Produce more video content. I mean talk about big goals and CRUSHING THEM. Again, this year I focused on the big ticket items and my blog was one of those hyper focused things. I achieved ALL of these. I actually doubled my earnings for the entire year from the year prior. I stayed caught up on personal stuff. Learned a TON about SEO. Pinned like crazy and did not hit the 3 mil marker but learned that that number means nothing anyway so I had gains where it counts – traffic. I hit 20,000 followers on IG and had a ton of earnings from collabs. I also made a ton more videos for the blog as well as YouTube! Whoop whoop!
  • House Goals: Exterior painted, Interior trim painted, Replace light fixtures, New kitchen counters and sink, Begin work on finishing upstairs room for Tess and making our bedroom into a space WE LOVE. The kitchen counters took a LOT longer than we’d anticipated and that alone was basically a full year project. Zach did get some of the exterior painted and we are waiting for all the floors to be finished (decided to redo the bathrooms too) before hiring interior painters. We did start on Tess’s new room but that’s the big goal for 2020 as well as our bedroom and the bathrooms!
  • Rental House Goals: Pay for itself from property management rentals as well as cover mortgage payment every month. Another big goal – ACHIEVED! Rental house paid for itself completely in 2019 with just enough left over that should cover the cost of replacing all the carpet!
  • Continue to learn and grow and heal those deeper wounds. I want to feel SO GOOD about ME (who I am and where I’m at) when I turn 35! My healing growth has been phenomenal this year. SO hard. SO worth it. And I truly don’t think I have much further to go either. I feel SO great about where I’m at in my life and in my world view and 35 feels good 🙂
  • Make time for ME once a week. Meeting with friends or even just time alone. Make sure I’m pouring into myself.  I didn’t do as great with this. Working through the tougher wounds was a LOT and it has required sacrificing for me but also for Zach and the kids too at times. I often struggled with feeling selfish about it and tended not to make other times for ME. Hoping for a better balance in 2020.
  • Work on the kids birthday slideshows and Shutterfly books in advance so I’m not stressing over them at the last minute.  Did way better with this!!!
  • Slow down at night when tucking kids in and make sure I really sit and give them that quality time to share their hearts. Also crushed this one. I have been much more intentional with my time with my kids. I make sure I start the day off with them very calm, greet them after school every afternoon with hugs and warmth and use bedtime as a chance to really connect too.
  • Wear tank tops. Work on my arms so for the first time in my LIFE I can be confident about them! Continue with my solid work out routine. This went be the wayside with the personal growth work but it’s coming back around in 2020.
  • Focus on POSITIVITY. The blessings. The joys. All the GOOD!  Another great area where I grew and will continue to grow and focus on.
  • Time management: be productive with my time each day. Balance the to-do list with quality time with my family as well as self-care. This is a struggle with the blog growth and is a big ticket focus in 2020 for me. I want to continue working on the blog but at a lower level to allow for me to better ENJOY my days with my family!
  • Truly cut back on Christmas and find that best balance of gift-giving. YES. I’m so super proud of how Christmas went this year. I cut the amount of gifts we gave the kids in HALF and it felt good and was such a magical Christmas!
  • Fully organize all the kids school work/cards and other mementos in storage.  Didn’t get done. They are all totally just tossed in a big box behind my chair haha.
  • Be mindful of my mood. We control our moods – keep reminding self “same you new mood!” Again, did better but those deeper wounds to heal often left me exhausted emotionally and it was sometimes a struggle to just “snap out of it”
  • Do better with having structured time for the kids, especially independent playtime with Spear. Our summer flowed SUPER smoothly and I def think more structure is so much better for our family!
  • Have a balance of going and doing but also relaxing at home on the weekends, be mindful of not overloading my plate!  We def did SO great with this and were mindful in organizing our travel plans to have plenty of hang at home weekends too.
  • Don’t live in a rejection mindset. LIVE LOVED. Work in progress but MAN I am WAY further along on that path than I was in 2018 for sure!

I have honestly been too hard on myself about 2019. I feel like I didn’t achieve much but man I really did kill the bigger goals and I feel SO much better.

I know the bigger wounds were the main focus but I still crushed all the huge goals too!

I started 2019 really on FIRE and I felt like it was going to be a big year for me and it WAS. I didn’t know at all where 2019 would lead and I’m so proud and happy of where it took me and where 2020 will continue to grow on the huge progresses made in 2019.

As a family the kids set goals for 2019 as well and here’s how they did:

Kye: Make three free throws with basketball and work out before bedtime (not sure what kinda workouts he’s doing!) Kye was disappointed with how he did with these and has revamped ready for the new year!

Britt: Eat cleaner (no more messes), play with Levi more, reach advance level with gymnastics and master a pullover, learn to tie her shoes. Britt learned to tie her shoes, made advanced level gymnastics, mastered her pullover and is doing great with eating without making much mess. Sadly Levi died so that goal didn’t happen but otherwise she did awesome!

Tess: No tee-tee in panties, make more good choices, no crying before bedtime, and learn to unbuckle seatbelt.  Crying at bedtime is often still a struggle as she had a tough time adjusting to the transition to kindergarten. Everything else she did really well with! The tee tee issue isn’t an issue and she’s done great unbuckling her car seat now too.

We had a big family goal of focusing on gratitude for 2019 and I think it was a great focus that we prioritized well. We often talked at dinner about the good things in our days and tried to help the kids see the positive in ALL things!

2019 was a year I’ll always look back on as the year of GROWTH and I’m eager for 2020 to see the fruits of those labors!

Emily Parker
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