From Ordinary to Extraordinary

I love the beginning of the year.

It always seems like everybody is into setting their goals or resolutions or life changes. January gives us the idea that we are starting out with a fresh slate. With this new season we have ideas in mind of how we want to live their life the next year. Things we want to change, and keep the same from the previous year.

Not sure what it is about January 1st that makes us think NOW we can change, but it seems to be consistent with every year. I make my list of goals for the year and start trying to achieve them.

And then in what seems to be the case every single year, by the time March rolls around I have abandoned all my goals and settled for the fact that the way I did things worked before and I don't need to change.

Then like clock-work I find myself on January 1st wanting to change habits that I desired to change previously. And the cycle starts over.

I've been thinking more about my goals for 2013 and how I can actually stick to them this year. I don't want them to be flippant goals that are easy to quit in the middle of my process, but instead I want them to be meaningful, to be goals of intention.

My life is different this January than it was last January. I am now staying home with Eli full time. He is older, a little bit smarter, a little bit more ornery, and a lot more active. When thinking about my life now I realize how much of it revolves around this little 1 1/2 year old.

We spend almost every minute together. And each minute I'm growing as a mom a little bit more. It seems like every day I'm faced with a new opportunity that I haven't been in before. Today it was Eli throwing his trains at me while I was cooking. I had never in my life had anybody throw trains at me while I cooked.

AND I HAD NO IDEA WHAT TO DO.  How do moms know what to do?

First I tried "tapping" his hand each time he threw a train at me. Throw train, tap hand, throw another train, tap the hand again. This went on for 5 trains, when he started throwing the tracks I realized that my plan wasn't working.

It's moments like this that I face every day. I wouldn't trade these moments for anything in the world but they are challenging and they now make up pretty much my whole life.

This is my day to day - but not matter what your day to day is it is SO easy to get caught up in the routine of it all. Eli and I have a routine that we do everyday and if I'm not careful I can get lost in the day to day humdrum of life.

So I want to make 2013 intentional. I don't want to put together a list of unachievable or vague goals but instead I want to put together action-oriented goals, things to DO.

Sometimes I feel so ordinary, I'm just an ordinary girl, with ordinary clothes, ordinary hair, and now I could be considered just another ordinary stay at home mom who complains about being stressed and her kid throwing trains at her when really her life seems easy, but I know that God can take my ordinary and make something extraordinary from it.

I don't want to go through the motions everyday as a wife, mother, friend, etc, but I want to be an extraordinary wife, extraordinary mom, extraordinary friend and extraordinary child of God. Letting Him use me this year.

It can seem ordinary doing the same ole everyday, but I know that God is using me in all these areas. As Eli's mom, as Luke's wife, a friend, family member and just a random stranger on the street. Here's to turning the ordinary into extraordinary!