School starts up again next week. This year, for the first time, I’m going to have all 3 children in school in Zürich, so heading off for the train at the crack of dawn. Our slightly idiosyncratc school system means that I will still however have someone home for lunch and the afternoon on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays! My son is thrilled to know that he will have both Wednesday and Friday afternoons free – I guess the hours are absorbed by the short lunch breaks in his new school. He will only have about 45 minutes to go to the canteen – as compared to a whole hour and 40 minutes in his old school. (There all the children came home for a cooked lunch – thus making it well-nigh impossible for moms to work other than part-time!).

I always find that the start of the school year marks more of a new start for me than New Year. My schedule changes to fit with the children’s schedules and this is when all the big changes in our lives take place. It seems like the right time to make resolutions and to decide what I want to achieve in my life this year.

So, how does it look? What am I dreaming of doing?

Here’s my list:

1) Write every day. I’ve proved that I can blog pretty much every day and have fun. Now is the time to stop whittering on about writing a novel and actually get down to it. So I’m going to make it a priority and really go for it. I’m hoping that writing this down and committing to it in front of other people will make me actually do it. I think I’m also going to look into creative writing courses – although because I live here I guess it will have to be by distance learning.

2) Play my piano every day and actually dutifully do the homework my teacher gives me. I love playing the piano, even more so when I practice a lot and see progress. I just need a kick up the behind every now and then and a good dose of self-discipline.

3) Stop shopping. I’m pretty good at not hitting the shops here, but the internet is a major temptation – particularly late at night and when I’ve had a bad day. You know how big my fabric stash is, but I also have a major reading backlog. All these books are waiting to be read – a few years’ worth wouldn’t you say? So I’m ONLY going to read from my backlog and sew from my stash. And I’m going to be strong….I really am….honestly….(but I may have to make exceptions for reading group books 😉 )

4) Simplify my life. This is an ongoing theme with me, but I am going to keep going at decluttering and going back to basics. I’ve found it a really positive step recently as I’ve tried to stop multitasking. I focus more on what I’m doing and feel like I actually do more in a less fraught manner. So I’ll be doing that more and trying to just live in the present and enjoy the little things around me.

5) Take time to smell the roses and not feel guilty about it.

6) Take time to spend with friends.

There isn’t anything radically new in my list, but there are lots of things which tend to get a bit submerged when life is busy and which I think I need to make priorities. I’ve done a pretty good job in the last year of extricating myself from things that I didn’t want to be doing anymore (PTA, Football Club Board, Church flowers), so I think I can now tick the box from last year that said ‘learn to say ‘no’ and don’t feel guilty about it‘. That feels good.

So, I guess that’s my life sorted out for the next year!

Helen

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 19th, 2010 at 9:21 am and is filed under Running. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.