New Year's Resolutions always makes me think. Do I or don't I? Every year I come down somewhere different on these. The reality is, while I always have a lot of good intentions, I'm not always very good at sticking to them. The relatively silent elliptical machine in our basement is testimony to that. Most of the time, I have to have a meaningful motivator to keep me on track.

So, perhaps, rather than make resolutions, I'll talk about a few things that I would like to accomplish -- or, at least think about more -- and why these things are important to me.

On the fibery side of things...

I would like to knit a pair of socks for each of the family members who was with me during my trip to the hospital. I've got a great stash of sock yarn and there's nothing quite like knowing that something I made is keeping someone special's feet warm. I already have a pair started for John -- which I am going to work on exclusively once I get my first Jaywalker sock finished -- and the most fabulous maize and blue Lorna's Laces Shepherd Sock yarn for my dad, the U of M fan. That should be good to get me started. Then I'll work on figuring out what I am going to do for my mom, brother and sister-in-law. No real time table for this. It's not a race, just something that would make me happy.

I also want to spend more time with my spinning wheel. I have so much lovely fiber now and spinning always makes me feel so peaceful. I was kind of surprised when I discovered how meditative spinning can be. So spinning would be good for the stash and for my peace of mind.

I want to focus on knitting things out of my stash. I think I may be approaching the point where I have too much of a good thing. It all calls to me and I find it hard to stay focused on any one thing for long. I've been good and I've bought relatively little new yarn this year since Maryland. I plan to keep to my stash diet for a bit longer. My next two projects (aside from the abovementioned socks) will be the scarf for my aunt and the double knit scarf for John. And then I need to think about something bigger. I've definitely been getting the urge to do a little felting, lately.

On the personal side of things...

I want to improve my diet and be more careful about what I eat. John and I worked hard to lose a bunch of weight, but I've been getting a little sloppy with my eating habits. We're both beginning to get unhappy about the way some of our favorite clothes fit again! To get started, I want to drink more water and cut out most of the caffeine and alcohol so that the water can do it's work better. And I want to be more reserved about what I eat. My metabolism isn't getting any faster these days...

I want to read more. I used to read all the time and I felt in touch with the world. Lately, there haven't been many books in my life. It's almost like I can feel my vocabulary shrinking...

I'd like to find some volunteer work that I enjoy and that is meaningful for me. I think this means some homework on my part to understand the what's out there and what I might fit best with. There was a time in my life when I would have said that I wanted to do this to get to meet people, but lately I've had this feeling that it would be nice to do something for my community and give something back. I have a lot of blessings and maybe I need to share some.

Finally, I want to stop multitasking all the time. There's nothing fundamentally wrong with multitasking -- it's a survival skill, in fact, but I do it constantly. I just can't go to a movie and not work on a sock, for instance. I'm always trying to do more than one thing at a time. As a result, I think I miss things that I would have enjoyed more if I had given them all of my attention instead of trying to do too much at once.

Well, there you have it... the things that I've been thinking about as the New Year begins in earnest. It will be interesting to see next December how much progress I've made. I kind of figure if I get one out of each category, I'll be doing pretty well.