Abraham, Rachel, Soren and Liam. Our life together in Smalltown, Idaho.

Sunday, January 02, 2011

2011 New Year's Resolutions

This year I've decided I want to focus on two things: my spirituality and my homemaking skills.

I'm super private and protective of my spiritual life, so I think I'll keep the details of that one to myself.

The homemaking skills, on the other hand, I think I'll share with you.

So I'm the office manager at a mental health agency. I love, love, love my job. One of my favorite parts of the position is Quality Assurance. This basically means assessing the way that things are being done, identifying things that need to improve, and finding ways to improve them. Each quarter I gather data from the preceding three months and assess it, looking for ways that we can make everything work better in order to ensure that we're delivering the best services possible to our clients. I also record Quality Improvement Activities (QIAs) that have occurred during that time period.

That's sort of the process I would like to implement with the running of my household. I'm going to periodically assess problems that need to be addressed and find ways to address them. This will be in everything from improving the eating habits of the family to reorganizing the way we do something to implementing a new family tradition to finding solutions to the boys' behavior problems.

And I'll report my activities here. First, I'll report the problem. Then I'll identify possible solutions and implement them. I'll follow-up periodically to let ya'll know how it's going.

(So I kind of cheated and jumped ahead on this one and have already completed a homemaking QIA, which I will post in just a minute. The problem is that my closets and kitchen areas were super cluttered and it was driving me nuts on both a functional and an aesthetic level.)

3 comments:

Pamela said...

Rachel, I so love reading your blog... It really puts a happy smile on my face... I know I am not the best at organizing, but if you have some tips for me that would be great... I run in chaos most of the time... Also, I know you stated you want to keep your spirituality to yourself, but if you have a few pointers there as well I could greatly use them! You are such a wonderful and sweet person! I am so proud to call you my friend! Hugs!

Natalya said...

This post was full of hope. It made me proud of the human species. I wish you well in the homemaking resolutions!It sounds like you have the background for attacking such problems.
I've got to go handle some quality problems in my home--see ya.

Collette Smith said...

My only resolution for the last three years was "Watch more TV."

I'm sorry to report that I failed miserably and repeatedly at this simple task. There was always something else I want to do MORE than watch TV!

Once I quit bludgeoning myself over my shortcomings, it magically became easier to watch a little TV now and then. Sure, I could never quite finish a show, but progress was being made!

Sometime later, during a period of deep introspection, I realized some reverse psychology might be in order. So I commanded myself to watch LESS TV instead of more. Talk about effective--my screen time doubled almost overnight!

So set your sights high, I always say, and NEVER GIVE UP until you find a way to TRICK yourself into falling in line with your highest aspirations!

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