I can't believe this is the last post! Thank you all for your amazing inspiration and for sharing your lives here. I still have to follow the tutorial (thanks for including that one Nora!), but I am getting better.  I really liked having a goal in mind every month.  I really do better when I have something specific to work toward.  This goal was no exception.  This last goal took me the whole year!  It was one I started January 1 and finished the afternoon of December 31.

 I flounder around a little when it comes to things that aren't laid out.  Budgets, menus, schedules; I like a plan.  Scripture reading is no exception.  If I don't have a plan/goal/schedule in mind or on paper, it just doesn't happen well.  I had finished the Book of Mormon with my relief society at the end of 2013 and was looking for a new scripture reading chart when I came across this one:

Hmm, Nora, how do I make this blog insert a pdf???

Here are some links instead:

http://www.cityapplications.com/scripture_schedule_fullpage-4.pdf   (the one I first saw)

and

http://www.motivatedmamas.net/2011/12/scripture-reading-schedule.html  (which is probably even better because it has the chart and some nice visual explanation.

And a picture, just because I know how :)

The premise that caught my attention was this:  If I were to read 4 pages of the Bible and 2 pages of the other standard works each day, then I could finish the entire thing, the whole tamale, the complete standard works in one year.  No kidding!  I know!! 6 pages a day (like 10 minutes?) and I could read it all.

Of course it wasn't complete smooth sailing.  I got behind in June when I had a wedding and a graveyard job and it took me the rest of the summer to catch up.  In the fall, I liked Paul's books so much that I finished the New Testament early but got a little behind in the D&C.  But I finished the last of JSH on new year's eve and that was a pretty good sense of accomplishment.  Reading that amount and kind of just plowing through gave me a big picture idea of the scriptures as well as a better sense of where things fit historically (esp. for the Old Testament).  This year I changed tactics.  I use Gospel library on my phone and am going through the institute course on the New Testament.  It is great!  Depth, quotes, links to all of the scriptures, pictures, maps, etc.  I am only in Matthew 6, but it good for me to have something orderly to follow.

Christine Bennee, October, Little things add up, right?!

I have 3 small goals that I have been working on.  I can't believe the year is wrapping up already!

First, being a full-time student while still being the mom, housekeeper, maid, laundress, church lady, neighbor, etc. has been tough.  This semester is one of the last of my science requirements before I head into the learning-how-to-teach part of my degree, so it has been one of the toughest yet.  I was so frustrated at the beginning of my anatomy class because I am usually at the top of my classes and I was barely hanging in the middle.  I was relieved to discover that well over half of my classmates were repeating the course and this was their second time through.  I still wanted good grades so this last month I set a goal to study enough to get an A on my 2 big tests in bio-organic chemistry and anatomy.

Check it out! I had the high score for anatomy and the second highest in chem--both 96%

The second thing I've been working on is running again.  I have been running off and on for about 10 years now.  I have been "off" for the last year or so and really wanted to pick it up again.  I mean, for heaven's sake, I've run a half-marathon and a full triathalon and several 5K and 10Ks plus a relay.  Yet I found myself unable to jog even a mile without stopping. I have used a couch-to-5K before, but I had to memorized a printout and time myself.   I had upgraded to my first smart phone this summer so I wanted an app that would help me.  I remembered Nora telling me about one that tells you when to run and when to walk WHILE you listen to music.  I found this one and I LOVE it!  It even tells me when to turn around and gives little pep talk about 3/4 of the way.  It keeps track of how far I went and what my pace was.  I can now easily run over 3 miles without stopping and am considering continuing with the app that will train me to run a 10K.

The last thing I have been working on is not a very fun one, but had to be done.  I have survived without a budget for years, but it was starting to slip out of hand.  Expenses seemed to be popping up everywhere and I was simply spending too much.  An app again came to the rescue...this one is called Monefy.  I actually tried out a few, but most were much more complicated than what I wanted.  I just wanted to see how much I had spent and how much was left and where my $ was going.
These are from off the internet but show how it works...I wish I had $5000 a month for my spending :)

I just tap that red button whenever I buy something

then enter an amount and hit the "choose category" button at the bottom

then choose the category

It is that easy.  And just like eating and counting calories, the simple act of keeping track of my spending has disciplined me enough that it is well under control now.

Christine Bennee, August, home improvement

August was a month of hurry-and-try-to-get-everything-done-around-the-house-before-school-starts kind of a month.  It was  a good plan, because I am in school as well as the kiddos, and anatomy, physics, and bio-organic chemistry are taking all of my time now!

I had this wall in my garage that looked like a perfect place to put a shelf to hold the big pile of boxes full of junk cherished holiday decorations that had  been sitting on the garage floor for the year and a half since we moved here.

So I researched on pinterest and found some instructions, went to Lowe's and started measuring.

My teenage girls had to hold those frames in place while I drilled them in.  I determined that they need to do more upper body workouts based on the cries of "Hurry, my arms are burning!!!!"

But hooray, all that stuff is off the ground and out of the way.

The other big project I did was disassemble a shed with my dad.  He decided to upgrade from the wooden shed he built a few years ago to a ginormous one that will be a workshop/rv parking. He offered the old shed to anyone that would come take it away.  We've been thinking about getting a shed (our last house had one, and I loved not having the lawn mower, yard equipment, and tools crammed between cars in the garage).  So I took it apart.  

before we started

everything was labeled so it could be reassembled later

almost done!

The shingles and one or two base pieces were a loss, but we were able to salvage almost everything else.  Taking it apart and loading it was a big 2-day job, but transporting it to my house was the biggest pain.  Now the pieces are sitting on my recently cleared garage floor awaiting a cement pad to be poured in the backyard.

Next month I'll tell about budgeting and starting to run again.  :)

Christine Bennee, July, Summer Memory Books

Sometime around the end of May I was eating lunch on the couch while watching "Studio 5" or "Good Things Utah" or some show like that and I saw a segment with an idea for a kid's summer memory book.  I watch maybe 2 hours of TV a month so it's weird that I even saw it, but I thought it was a great idea so I changed my July goal so I could do it.

Here's what I did.  Every day of the summer I took a picture of whatever fun thing we did that day, even if it was playing video games with a friend or jumping on the trampoline.  OK, I didn't really take a picture every day.  The 3 weeks before my oldest daughter's wedding I have maybe 8 pictures.  But I did take a lot more pictures than I normally would have of our family doing everyday fun summer things. Then I bought some little notebooks like these:

I printed off the pictures (just on plain white paper on the color printer) (and often the same pic printed 4 times for all of the kids to use) every few days and had the kids write down a description or a journal entry about the photo.

Nathan (11) is a man of few words

Melanie (14) apparently likes writing even less

Shaylee (8) is willing to write a little more

This camping trip must have been extra FUN! Maybe because of the rodent eating off her shoe?

One Sunday afternoon, we taught the 2 youngest how to play Monopoly.  It must have been fun too.  I forgot to take a picture, but a cut and paste gameboard was enough to jog the memory.


The downside was this.  Usually in the summer I have the kids do a summer school bridge workbook or at least some worksheets I print out.  Although I tried to sneak summer school writing in this way, they  knew.  None of my kiddos like to write...I think they get it from me.  This format is fine, but I dread writing anything else.  I digress.  Because they knew they would have to write about any picture I took, they stopped being willing to be in pictures.  I would point my phone at one of them and get something like "NOOOO! Don't take a picture! I don't want this to be in my journal" or "I don't want to have to write about this!" while they ran away from me. My oldest girls would sometimes make me wait while they put on makeup or did hair.

Still, I think the goal was overall a great success. These are by no means beautiful, expensive, perfectly laid out books with acid and lignin free glue.  They are treasures though, and the kids love them almost as much as I do.  :)

Christine Bennee, June, Wedding!!

June was a whole lot of crazy for me.  First of all, I got a new job...just for the summer.  What happened is this.  My shy, never had close friends, never put herself  "out there" 14 year old tried out for the color guard with a friend and made it. I learned that school sports/activities can be very demanding and intense and very expensive.  The fees for her costumes, parade shoes, flags, bus fees, 3 WEEKS of color guard camp, etc. were close to $800.  Also, Westlake High School marching band is going to HAWAII in December as the Utah representative for the annual Pearl Harbor Parade.  Another $869 plus the cost of the flight.  The trip is optional, but how cool for her to go!  Anyway, my husband (the one who generally takes care of the money) reminded/informed me that since we just had to buy 2 new (to us) cars and put in a fence (HOA rule) and pay for a wedding (more about that in a minute) that there was no way we could afford for her to participate.  However, there was no way I was going to tell her that she couldn't do the one thing she actually wanted to try based on money.  Where there's a will, there's a way, right?  So the night of said money conversation I filled out an application for Walmart and was hired the next morning.  I've been working 4 graveyard shifts a week stocking shelves and organizing.  It is work, but the organizing (or "zoning" as they call in in WalMart speak) is quite relaxing...I get paid to put things away and straighten up :)  And I've been brushing up on some rusty Spanish skills by speaking with several of the employees.  The deal I made with Melanie is that while I sleep in the day, she needs to do the things I would normally do (clean, make sure her 2 younger siblings are fed and accounted for, laundry, etc).  Initially she wanted to quit.  I think she felt bad that I was working and to be honest, color guard is hard work.  She has had to be at the high school at 7:30 AM so many mornings this summer I've lost track and marched in more parades than I can remember.  She is in her 2nd of 3 weeks straight of color guard/band camp so they can be ready for football field shows and competition.  But it has been completely worth it.  It is incredible how much she has matured with all of her new responsibility and grown in confidence. And although I like my job, I put in my notice this morning and am pretty happy about it.

It's a big group--and this pic doesn't even have the band kids

I think this is from the Saratoga Springs parade..they go on for a loooong time-it takes a while for the whole band to march past!

That's Melanie right in front

My other kids have not complained once about going to a dozen or so parades this summer.  Maybe it's something about the bags of candy they bring home?!?

Which brings me to my actual goal for June.  My oldest got engaged in April and they struggled setting a wedding date.  Finally they decided on a day in September.  Then the day after my very first day at work, my daughter informed me that September was too far away and they were going to get married on June 21. That was less than 3 weeks away!
So the rest of June is pretty much a blur to me.  I didn't get much sleep and I stressed alot but the wedding turned out very nice.  

These are from the bridal shower...awesome Nora even came and let me hold that cutie baby of hers (but I don't have a pic! :(  )

These are the "bridals".  It had been raining all day and they were going to Butterfield canyon with the photographer.  I suggested that they reschedule so her dress wouldn't get muddy.  Not only did she disregard my wise motherly advise,but she did this:

Oh, yes she did. And fell in a muddy stream and ripped her dress.  I made her clean/fix it herself.  Honestly, I don't know where she gets it from.  It must be her father's side of the family ;)

 They had a reception in West Jordan on Friday night, then got married Saturday afternoon in Ogden followed by a dinner then another reception in North Ogden.  I have told the rest of my children that I never want to do that again and they are all forbidden from getting married.  Unless of course I get more than 3 weeks to completely plan the wedding.

A last note about what I have learned from having my first child get married.  First of all, getting a son-in-law is the best.  He came all grown up and mature and returned missionary and wonderful.  People have asked if we like him and our tongue-in-cheek response is that we think we like him more than we like our daughter.  That's because we didn't have to raise him; we got him when he was finished. And his name is Jared Bunn so we have lots of fun with "now you are the brother of Jared" jokes and "are you going to name your first child Cinna or Honey?"  get it?  :)  The best part is the slight change from parent to peer.  Of course I will always be her mom, but the responsibility to guide, teach, advise, help, support, etc. is mostly gone.  She is so much easier to talk to and be friends with now and our relationship has never been better.

Christine Bennee, April, spring cleaning & painting bedrooms

For spring break this year, I gave my kids a choice.  We could go on a mini-vacation (maybe Moab for hiking or Vernal for the dinosaurs) or we could stay home and paint all of their bedrooms.  They have all been begging to have their rooms done for a while, so I wasn't tooooo surprised when they voted to paint.

It ended up being a crazy week!  We did 4 rooms in 4 days.  My stipulation was that before we could start painting, they had to completely clean their rooms.  We also cleaned the light fixtures, blinds, windows, etc.  We also painted the ceilings white (they used to be blue!...everything is blue in this 17 month old house).

Yes, I really let them "help" with the painting!

Shaylee chose purple, Nathan's room is now green, Melanie's is aqua and Janice chose an indescribable purple/pink/brownish color.  They were all thrilled with the results. 

The other part of my April goal was spring cleaning.  It was easy to do the kid's rooms since they were motivated because of paint.  For the rest of the house I made a giant list of everything I wanted cleaned in each room (baseboards, closets, windows, blinds, etc.) and worked on it a little each day.  It is the end of May and I still need to do the garage and the last part of the living room, but it feels great to have a (mostly!) clean house.

Next month I'll put up pics of some sewing projects I've been working on including a quilt :)

Christine Bennee, March, cupboard shelves

I'm not quite sure how it happens that I have a whole week to write my post and then boom! I'm 2 days late.  I think my goal for next month will be something like "write my post one week early" or some such.

Anyway, my goal for March was pretty simple.  I have big cupboards in my house that have no shelves, just the big space. I think that is great for the cupboard under the kitchen sink, but several others were really hard to keep organized.

I decided on 5 cupboards that needed a shelf (here are pictures from 2 of them).  It was a little bit complicated since the holes that had been pre-drilled into the sides were bigger than standard so I had to special order the shelf pins.  All of the cupboards had a drain pipe (under bathroom sinks) or a gas line (under the cooktop in the kitchen) so I had to cut the shelf to accommodate for that as well as cut each piece down to fit the cupboard.  

Once the pins arrived it was really only a matter of a day to do the actual work. Ta da!

I know this was a really simple project, but having a deadline made me finally get around to it and honestly, for several days after I was done I would peek into those cabinets just because it made me so happy!  

Next month I'll tell you about painting/spring cleaning all of the kids bedrooms :) 

Christine Bennee, February, New school!

My life plan was always to go back to school when my youngest child started school.  I married young and put my husband though college and then went straight to having babies so I never finished my degree.  I've never regretted doing it in that order, but I have always wanted to get that degree under my belt.  So when Shaylee started kindergarten I signed up for a couple of classes at Salt Lake Community College during the afternoon while she was at school.  I LOVED going to school again and I did well, so my confidence shot up.  After years of being a stay at home mom (which I also loved) it was wonderful to receive recognition for my efforts in the form of grades and teacher praise.

On a field trip at the nanotech lab at the U. (I'm second from the right)

Shaylee is in second grade now, so being a student has been a big part of my identity for the past almost 3 years.  However, the first week of classes in January of this year found me really rethinking what I was doing.  I have a teenager that has had major struggles the last few months.  She was really falling behind in her online high school courses and I didn't know how I could possibly be available to get her to seminary or work or weekly therapy appointments.  I went to the first couple of days of class and then dropped all of them.  I gave up my scholarship (no deferrals-bummer) and returned all of my books.  It was hard, but I knew it was the right thing to do.

I have this book but haven't taken the class yet.  I keep telling myself I should get ahead and study now but the info inside is serious craziness!

Happily, my teenage daughter is doing fantastic now, and I was ready to start applying to new schools.  I decided to go directly into the program I wanted, rather than reapply to SLCC and then have to apply to the other schools in a few months.  Depending on funding and scholarships I may start again this fall or as late as the next summer  (I'm still waiting on a meeting with my adviser).

Drumroll please!!  I am now a future student of Utah Valley University :)  It was a little bit bigger ordeal than I had hoped and involved tracking down transcripts from over 20 years ago and filling out forms geared to high school seniors.  I was grateful for the accountability and deadline this project gave me because frankly it was great to watch tv with my family or play tetherball in the backyard instead of studying all of the time. 

I know that pretty much anyone that pays the fee and fills out the correct stuff is accepted, but I'm still pretty happy about this stuff.  This paper version just got here today!

Here are a few family pics since I didn't have any available for my first post. (Nora, this is just for you! I love pictures too, but everyone doesn't need to feel obligated to keep reading/looking)  :)

Janice at prom last week

Yep, my oldest is engaged!  This was the same day as prom last week.  We adore our soon-to-be-son-in-law!

In Zions-everyone but me. Someone needs to take the pictures!

My only boy

Here is one of me (on the left) and my sister in Seattle with her (heavy!) twins

Hiking to the G in Pleasant Grove for FHE this week

Christine Bennee, January, Adding Shelves

Hi! My name is Christine Bennee.  I currently live in Eagle Mountain with my husband and 4 of my 5 kids.  Pics next month...I'm posting from Seattle and didn't bring the right memory card!  My oldest is at college (I may have to change my goals schedule and change the summer ones to "plan a wedding").

 I know Nora because she moved into my West Jordan neighborhood.  The first time I met Nora was at a mom's lunch at Joe's Crab Shack and  she became my instant friend when she let me hold baby "Stewie".  Since then, we've had some good times including being in a young women's presidency (girl's camp!!), co-op preschool, and an occasional jog.  I think Nora is a soul sister, but the way she thinks is so unique and inspiring that I love listening to whatever she has to say!  :)

I have LOVED reading all of your amazing accomplishments and can't wait to see what the rest of the year has in store.

For my January goal, I wanted to put some shelving in my master closet.  We moved into our house just over a year ago and it still needs a few things to make it a little more functional.  The master closet had one shelf along the wall but there was lots of wasted space at the top and I wanted to add one more shelf for all the stuff that was sitting on the closet floor (trek clothes, kimonos, etc.).  You don't need all the details of drilling, marking, cutting down shelving, etc....but since I am not the greatest handyman let me just say it was a pain, but I did it.

Hmm, I thought my closet was pretty organized, but this picture makes me want to fold everything!  Anyway, you get the idea. :)

While I had the level and drill out I put up this shelf in my 8 year old daughter's room.  I cringe a little to show you, but I let her put whatever she wanted on it and I just had to let go and let her decorate it herself. She loves it!

Christine Bennee's Goals & Projects for 2014

January- shelves in 3 closets. This new house came with the basics, but I want to get 3 more shelves/half shelves put up.

February- apply to new school and fill out mounds of scholarship applications 

March- shelves in cupboards. The big, giant cupboards under 4 bathroom sinks and under the cook top. I like a nice big space under the kitchen sink, but it is hard to store piles of bathroom necessities and all of my pots and pans in one big cube. It will require ordering shelf clips, cutting the shelves, and installing.

April-organize those recipes that fill an entire shelf with loose papers, scraps of napkins I've scribbled yummy ingredients on.

May- make a jeans quilt. I have a huge pile of old jeans that have been in a box for a couple of years!

June- plant a garden. This is not unusual for me, but I will have to prepare the soil this year. (Again, new house). Maybe even put the whole backyard in.

July- Plan an extended family camping trip

August- Back to school for me and the kiddos. Find or make some kind of homework station so I can keep track of the paper avalanche that attacks our house. Figure out how to keep track of those reading sheets and book report forms.

September- learn a song on the ukelele

October-get up in the mountains at least twice. I love to hike in the fall, and last year we didn't go once. Family pictures on one of the outings.

November-Host a neighborhood party. I'm thinking a pie night the week before? Thanksgiving.

December-finish my scripture reading chart I've been working on all year. I have a schedule I've been doing that says if I read 4 pages from the bible and 2 from the other books I can read all of the standard works in one year!