The Sweet Life: Bonne année et bonne santé !

As you count down the minutes to 2010, I invite you to reflect on the year ahead, but more importantly on the year we are closing.

Many of you I am sure have a fabulous evening planned of celebrating another year in our memories. Maybe you have been planning this for months, maybe it's an annual tradition to get together with the same friends, or maybe if you are like us, its just a quiet night together to reflect upon and celebrate the year you have had together.

Eric and I have decided that in the hustle and bustle of every single big holiday this time of year, Thanksgiving and Christmas, this night is just about us. A meaningful momentous night to reflect back and dream ahead about our life together. It truely is a holiday to celebrate the milestones of the year prior and how that will lead you into the year ahead. This year, has without a doubt, been a year about change for us. The engagement, the home, the wedding, the careers... we have been blessed in many ways. I think about that today and everyday, and I am grateful. It has definately been a year worth toasting tonight!

I remember last year, looking back, Eric and I had a similar night to what we have planned for tonight - quiet reflection and celebration just the two of us and we wrote down all of our New Year's Resolutions. We had just gotten engaged two months prior and were planning a May 2010 wedding. Eric wrote down that one of his resolutions was to be a wonderful loving husband. I giggled and said, "we won't even be married yet this year".

The irony of course is that we were married just 6 months later after winning the Windy Dream Wedding. I use this as an example of just how powerful a New Year's Resolution can be. Anything is possible if you want it bad enough. It often takes hard work and dedication, but I can assure you nothing will happen if you just sit around a wait for it.

It's amazing, year after year resolution lists are made and almost like clock work, we resolve to change the same things in our life year after year. I am as guilty as anyone of this. Each year, I say I am going to get fit, learn French, pay off all of my debt, be a better person, go to Church, and the list continues.

I think it's great to set personal goals for self-acomplishment. I think it's great to shoot for the stars, but to first make sure that you realitically have a means to get there. If the idea of New Year's resolution exhaust you I would like to offer the following advice:

1. Set yourself goals that are on a large scale but can be broken down into short term goals: i.e. "I want to loose 50 pounds in 6 months" seems much more obtainable if you say "I want to loose 2 pounds a week for the next 25 weeks"

2. Share your goals with someone else to make yourself accountable to someone. For me this person is Eric. Believe me, he has no problem calling me out! :)

3. And finally, if all else fails, reflect upon the past year and where your life is now. What makes you happy about where you are right now? How can you make more of that happiness in your life and bring that happiness into the areas of your life you are not as thrilled about?

I heard an inspiring quote I would like to share if you wish to apply it to your year ahead:

To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe. - Anatole France

We wish you all a year where we will open the book. Its pages are blank. We are going to put words on them ourselves. The book is called "Opportunity" and its first chapter is New Year's Day.