Progress report

First of all, here's a big shout out to my baby brother who finally started a blog, and who is being very responsible as he makes big decisions about his future. I'm so proud of you!

Next, I would like to report on a few of my goals. I am proud to say that I worked out more in January than I think I did in all of 2008. I'm still not quite to my goal, I've missed a few times, but I'm making progress. I've also made some changes to my diet and have noticed a difference. I might have taken a step backwards by going out to pizza buffet for lunch today, but oh well. Everyone has a slip-up every now and then, right?

I have been spending some time researching volunteer organizations in my community, and I think I have found some promising prospects. I am looking into BirthRight, CASA and the Women's Y in Leavenworth, as well as Big Brother Big Sister. I also found out that you can do volunteer genealogical indexing from home (http://www.familysearchindexing.org/), so I am checking into that as well. I also plan to attend the family history library at my ward building at least once this month and get back into my family history work.

Despite the economic situation, I am feeling better about my own finances. I'm counting on my tax refund to replenish my savings to start off the year, and I visited http://www.providentliving.org/ and used the debt calculator to make a plan to pay off my credit card debt in 3 years or less. And if I can get a decent job this summer, I might be able to cut that time in half. Hooray!

I'm attending Institute regularly this semester, and we are studying the second half of the New Testament. Of course this is not the first time I have had this class, but I am determined to study and ponder to learn more this time around. I am thankful that they started a class at the Leavenworth building, so that it is not so far for me to drive. I also am glad that we have a decent teacher, and a small class, which allows for much more participation and discussion. I've gone back and forth with the whole institute thing, seeing as how I graduated from BYU with all the religion credits that I needed, and then continued to attend institute because I am still single, even though it is technically for college-aged young adults, which I am not anymore. And I might stop going after this semester, but for now I really think I can use the spiritual uplift.

With my busy work and church schedule, it's taking me a little bit longer to get started on some of my goals, but I feel like I am making good progress so far. But I'm anticipating some changes in the next month or so that will hopefully free up some time for me to work on the rest of my goals. I'm finally leaving the singles branch, and moving on to a family ward. This is a decision that has been a long time coming, and I feel really good about it. I will still attend the occasional activity with the younger singles, but I am going to focus most of my time with my family ward and midsingles group from now on. I'm excited to see what is ahead... I'll keep you posted!