a new year's resolution post that kinda sorta isn't

The new year is really creeping up on me. I mean, where did December go? Or November for that matter? Wasn't Halloween just yesterday? Seriously. And here we are coming upon the possible final new year ever since the world will be ending in 2012. It probably won't. But still. It totally could. That doesn't sit well with me because there is just SO MUCH I want to do. So much I need to do. I realize in the grand scheme of things, if the world is ending it won't matter much because no one will be around to remember anything I do here. But hey, let's just make the most of the time we are given, shall we!

So here is (a small portion of) my list of things I must do before the world ends:

1. Organize photos into albums. If our world ends, there is a possibility of a new civilization being created, or even alien lifeforms landing. Even if I don't make it through, my photo albums might. My family and our photographs could be immortalized in the annals of history (hehe annals). This is a big deal, people! So it is my top priority for 2012. For a photogramom, I am pretty bad about printing pictures and keeping albums. My parents just had baby books for my sisters and I. Just one book each with mementos, letters from our mom, and photos of us from birth to maybe about 4. Since I have that whole perfectionist problem, I think the idea of just throwing all of my pictures in an album in such a disorderly fashion gave me a panic attack, so I'd rather not touch them. Then one day I had a genius idea that I don't know why I never thought of before: an album for each year. Duh, right?! And I will need lots of pictures to fill future albums, which brings me to world end goal #2...
   
   
   
2. Document EV-ER-Y-THING (but mostly just the good stuff). I'm so very bad about keeping my camera around. I like to blame my camera bag. It's kind of bulky, and adding that to the baby bag and 3 kids I also tote around, is just not ideal. But why don't you just put your camera in your baby bag? Because, I just don't. I will be investing in one of these beauties though
   
   
   I love Kelly Moore camera bags! They have separate compartments for your camera body and lenses, and are also big enough to hold diapers and wipes. Plus they are just gorgeous. I haven't decided on a style yet, but that one is pretty high on my list! So I'll be carrying around my equipment in a fashionable bag and won't allow myself any excuse to not have that camera around.
   
   
   
3. Make more time for hobbies. I love taking pictures. I want to learn the piano. I need to learn how to sew. Practice makes perfect. I want to set aside time to enjoy all the hobbies I love and all the hobbies I want to be good at. Someday one of those little aliens might be looking at my pictures and reading one of my yet-to-be-published novels while watching a video of me playing the piano, and he will be wearing some kind of drapery I've sewn that he has fashioned into a cape (assuming, of course, that my draperies and videos make it through the end of the world with my photo albums).
   
   
   
4. Focus more on family. Sometimes it's just hard to do. I get caught up in all the cleaning and the cooking, and by the end of the day I just need a moment to myself. I get incredibly annoyed when that moment is interrupted. I don't want to stress so much over everything else that I forget to just enjoy my husband and kids. In the end, I doubt I will say "man, I wish I spent more time cleaning!"
   
   
   
5. But still, I also want to keep a tidier home. I just need to utilize my time management skills better and know when to put down the broom and pick up my babies.
   
   
   
6. Cultivate strong friendships. I have my good friends, but for the most part I keep to myself and my little family. Sometimes it's a relief because when I catch wind of the latest gossip that happens to be untrue, I'm glad I'm not friends with the crazies spreading rumors (and in Okinawa, there happen to be A LOT of crazies). But then sometimes it's very lonely and pretty boring. It is hard having all of these kids and no babysitter for a girls night out, but that's an easy excuse to use. A lot of the time I'm too tired, and a lot of the time I just don't try. I want to be a reliable friend. If the crap hits the fan, I want to leave this world with many good friends by my side.
   
   
   
7. Finish the Bible. I've read bits and pieces of the bible throughout my life. I jump around from book to book and verse to verse. I have never read the entire Bible all the way through from beginning to end. In times of crisis, it is so important to have your faith to fall back on. Before the world ends, I want to have read the whole thing from Genesis to Revelations.
   
   
   
8. Continue working towards my degree as I have been, just in case the world doesn't end.
   
   
   
9. Avoid the negative people, because I do not want to spend my last days with anyone who can't find the humor and joy in the day to day more often than not.
   
   
   
10. Keep up with the laundry. End of the world or not, I don't want to keep letting this happen
    
    
    
    

The greatest of these is love

I have been keeping up with my daily Bible readings on marriage and parenting, however life has gotten in the way. I was hoping to keep a daily posting of these passages along with a few words on what I got from reading them. I'm not finding the time to get to the computer long enough to write every day. I planned on just posting the verses, but even that turned out to be a tedious process. So instead I want to write about a verse that has really touched me the most, and that was coincidentally in both reading plans.

1 CORINTHIANS 13:1-13

"1 If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.3 If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away.9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part,10 but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears.11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me.12 For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.


13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love."

I have no idea how many times I have read this passage. From the Bible, it has been turned into artwork

http://www.etsy.com/listing/71576836/love-is-1corinthians-13-wall-art-8x10?ref=pr_shop

It is the most popular verse read at weddings

Photo Credit

Stacie Orrico set it to music and made it one of my favorite songs.

It is everywhere! But admittedly, until yesterday I have only read 1 Corinthians 13 from a selfish view: how someone should love me. It was only when I read this chapter during the Parenting reading plan that God showed me this is how I am supposed to love my children, that this is how I do try to love my children (Love is patient), and that I need to show love to others the same as I do with my children.

When I got to the Marriage reading plan and saw the same verse for the same day, it was like someone smacked me in the head with the biggest Bible they could find. How many times have I read articles saying you should see your husband the way you see your children? I thought of the times Brian and I got into an argument. As I would sit there silently stewing in my anger I said that verse over and over to myself, wondering why he wasn't being patient, why he wasn't being kind, why he didn't love. There I was keeping every record of his every wrong. Yesterday I realized that I had been nothing.

"but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears." My understanding of this chapter is complete, seeing from the side of the selfish and now the selfless. I do deserve to be loved as it is described in 1 Corinthians 13. But even more so do I deserve to open myself to love others in such a complete and wholly Christlike way. I pray that God keeps reminding me of this in my day to day interactions with others!

To Do: 2009

This year I am going to make superficial resolutions. But I think I deserve it. This year, along with my resolutions to finish the laundry, lose the final few ounces of baby fat and eat salad for every meal; no dessert, and to clean the random junk out of my nightstand so it can hold my Jack Kerouac novels and my favorite issues of Glamour magazine, I plan on indulging in my guilty pleasures and NOT feeling guilty about it.

I will force myself to buy myself at least two or three expensive items that will last me a while and make me feel like an adult, whether it be designer jeans, a new handbag, sunglasses, or shoes, or an overpriced makeup brush.

I will embrace my love for really bad reality tv and cheesy chick flicks.

I will shake it to Beyonce songs.

I will have a spa day with a full massage, and get pedicures regularly (or at least take really long bubble baths).

I will learn Japanese because I want to, not because I have to.

I will remember to use my Crest White Strips, tweeze my eyebrows, and color my roots. I will get my sexy back this year.

Of course this is all subject to change.