Welcome 2017! Making resolutions, setting goals, voicing my intentions!

I have spent time this first week of January reviewing and reflecting upon 2016. Initially I was separating out sewing from the rest of my life. I was looking at everything in separate 'buckets'. Sewing, home life, work, health, friends and so on and I was trying to figure out how I could make changes to each of those area. However, I was getting frustrated and was having a hard time working it all out. Well, I put my thoughts aside and just went about my day and then out of nowhere it hit me! While I can make small goals and direct changes in each of these areas they really can't be separated out. All of these things make up my life and are intricately intertwined!

I decided to take a couple days and really reflect on my life as a whole and how each of these areas work together and how changes to each area really affect each other. I know... sounds like a bunch of mumbo jumbo.

First off- what to actually call this? I'm not hip on the 'New Year's Resolutions' term, sounds so cliche. Yet, isn't that what I am actually doing? What many of us do at this time of the year? So other ways to describe this could be 'setting goals' or 'voicing my intentions'. I'm going with setting goals! I like that the best for some reason. 

Moving on, I was able to pick the most important parts of my life that I want to concentrate on.

• Physical Health
• Mental Health
• Family time
• Friend time
• Sewing andesigning
• Work

Out of these 6 items the only one that I can really pull away and put in a separate bucket is work. Like quite a few of us I work so that I can help support my family and my sewing habit ;) I can't really change my work, I like what I do and that's that. The only way that work really affects the rest of the list is both time and clothing. Since I like to sew my own clothing this influences the items that I design and sew.

The rest of the list, physical and mental health, family and friend time and sewing and designing, are all intertwined. 

For example my goals in Mental Health include:

1. Daily meditation- helps clear my mind and allows me better focus and well being.
2. Daily time to read- these can be fictional novels, biographies, non-fiction, perusing designer books, etc.

Both of these goals affect all areas of my life. Stuck and frustrated with my sewing and design work the benefits of meditation are huge. The reading time also allows me time to read up on designers and get inspiration.

So here are my specific goals in each area.

Physical Health:

1. Maintain my medications and diet and working closely with physicians. everyday
2. Work on strengthening my body with both aerobic and strength exercises. 4 x week.

Mental Health:

1.  Meditation- helps clear my mind and allows me better focus and well being.- daily- minimum of 10 mins
2. Reading time- these can be fictional novels, biographies, nonfiction, perusing designer books, etc- Daily

Family Time:

1. Time spent together with my little family: My husband and I, My daughter, Son-in-law and our granddaughter. Planned family activities Monthly. Plus plenty of non-planned time together. My family is the most important part of my life.

Friend Time:

1. Don't neglect my friends! My pancreas issues have caused me to miss time with my friends this past year. Those activities are the ones that are sacrificed the most when I am not feeling well. My friends have been amazing and supportive and I want to make sure they know that I appreciate them. Ongoing clubs- Sew Chicago ASG Neighborhood group meetings, Book club, Haute Couture Club of Chicago. One on One time :)

Now for the super fun part!

Sewing and Designing: My goals this year are twofold. There are some very specific goals and then some more open goals that are to be reevaluated on an ongoing basis. 7 goals may seem like a lot but in reality it is not. Many of these are just re enforcements of what I have already been doing and some of these cross over into other areas like mental health and time with friends.The hands down hardest one for me to do will be the first one. YIKES!!! I love buying fabric!! 

1. Shop exclusively from my well curated fabric collection! Only purchase fabrics that are needed such as lining materials, interfacing, etc. OR when on a special trip. For example- Sewcial weekend in February includes a trip to Habermans. In this case be VERY selective in purchases.
2. Establish a set of master patterns. Skirts, knit tops, woven tops, jacket, knit and woven pants, knit and woven dresses and outerwear.
3. Do my designing off of my master patterns. Including flat pattern drafting and draping
4. Continue to grow and push myself to become better with both designing and construction via mentorship with Sarah Veblen. Goal is to do 2- Four month mentorship sessions this year.
5. Work on my sketching to help to use this to better solidify my sewing plans. Ongoing process, try for 2-3 good sketching sessions per week.
6. Take inventory of my entire wardrobe to find the 'holes' and fill them. This process takes a couple hours. I have to take all my clothes out, try them on, see what fits, what I still like and then move forward. Try to have this done by end of January.
7. Continue blogging and documenting my journey.  

I plan to 'check in' on myself and how I am doing with my goals every quarter. I don't plan on being judgemental to myself just to see how things are moving along!

Happy Sewing!!