I guess the first New Year’s resolution should be to not procrastinate, since I'm posting this six days after January 1st, but I'm trying not to overwhelm myself with life changes. A lot changed for me in 2007. Sapphira has grown from a little lump of sleeping clay into a happy, smiling, delightful little girl. Here's her one-year-old picture I took of her today:

If you want to see more pictures of her on her first birthday, I've added a gallery of my favorite pictures from our shoot.

I changed something else pretty drastically in 2007: I started working out and getting in shape again. The last time I worked out consistently was in 1995 (in high school) so needless to say, I had slipped pretty far down the fitness/health continuum. I've learned a few things about myself since working out consistently since March of 2007. Namely, that exercise is the best cure for anxiety, depression, lack of self-control, ennui, insomnia and back pain that I have ever found. I thought I had back problems until I started working out. Turns out I just had a weak back. I feel much calmer and can go to sleep much more easily than I could before I started exercising.

I will be reporting my workouts here, so that I can track my progress and so that I have a record of my progress.

So, New Year's resolutions:

1. Exercise three days, rest one day. No matter what.
2. Write in a journal every day. No matter what.

That's it. Well, that's it for January. I am going to try these resolutions out for thirty days and decide if I want to keep them. From what I've read, that's enough to form a habit, so if I want to keep these habits, they'll be mine to keep or discard. Also, only taking them thirty days at a time makes them easier to keep, instead of feeling overwhelmed by the idea of trying to do something for a whole year. At the beginning of February I'll let you know my new habits for that month. For now, it's exercise three days on, one day rest, and journal writing.

Happy New Year!