Hogmanay and Resolutions

As a Scot, even though I have lived in England for the majority of my life, Hogmanay is almost as important a date as Christmas in the calendar.

This year we’re spending it simply, with my mum and dad (Moo’s Nanny and Papa), bringing in the New Year with those we love and having a delicious steak pie for dinner on New Year’s Day – oh, I love a tradition like that!

I’ve not been around on the blog or on Twitter much over the holidays.  It’s all been too much.  And whilst I’m really keen to join in the community, it has to be to add something to my family life, not to make me feel stressed about not posting enough.  So I’ll assume that those of you that are kind enough to read are happy to read as and when I manage to post, and am not going to put any pressure on myself.  Building my blog is really important to me, and it will form one of my new year resolutions, but I’ve decided to take it slow!

Resolutions often fail because we take too much on and want to achieve it all far too quickly.  Bad habits take a while to settle in, and good habits take even longer!  They say it takes at least 30 days for a habit to form, and that’s the only way you’ll keep a resolution.  So this year, despite the fact that I have lots I want to change and I want it to happen now now now – I want it to stick.  So I’m taking the advice of 6 Changes and am going to set 6 resolutions, but take them one at a time.  One of my changes will be to work on my blog, but that won’t be until later in the year, so it may be a little while before you see the changes on my blog, apart from my blogs about my other changes!

6 Changes recommends that you choose 6 changes you want to make over the next year, and introduce each one in a series of steps over 8 weeks.  There is all sorts of other advice over on their blog, but that’s the main one I’m taking.

My first change is to get more organised at home so that life is a little less stressful.  I’m going to start this resolution, as is traditional, tomorrow.

My first “mini step” towards organising my home is to “Shine my sink” every night, as FlyLady would recommend.  I’ve often tried Flylady’s techniques, and they do work, even if they are a bit cheesy!  I’ve just never quite been able to get the habit to stick.

So every night after dinner, I’m going to go into the kitchen, put the dishes away, and shine my sink, so that it’s clean and shiny for me in the morning.  Hopefully that will inspire me to keep it like that all day 😉

Please check in with me and keep me on track.  If I don’t post before, in a week’s time I’ll let you know how I’ve done and also what my second “mini step” is for my second week.  8 weeks in and hopefully running my house like clockwork will be second nature, leaving much more time for blogging and twittering!!

And Happy Hogmanay to you all!