It's that time of the year when like many of you I start to look forward to what next year might bring and how I can shape that, even if that's in the smallest way. For the last few years I've chosen a word for the year - last year it was shine, the year before focus and before that active and I've had mixed success with using them as a guide for the year. But as I still think I'm more likely to have success with a single word than a raft of New Year's Resolutions I'm sticking with this approach.
I've learnt for a word to stand the most chance of being successful I have to love it and what it stands for.
So for 2017 the word I've chosen is flourish. Not in the curlicue, decorative way or in the wave about kind of way, I mean in the grow and prosper meaning. Although I'm not sure I can commit to there not being any of the other meanings throughout the year!
I think it works as an all rounder for my home life, work life and blog life. I still want to get things done, and do them well but I also want to grow and prosper as much as I can too. At work that means continuing to shape my role in my new organisation, implement changes and generally make the job my own, and I think that's entirely do-able.
Here on the blog, I've realised over the past year that it's the gardens and gardening posts that I really enjoy and you seem to as well, so I want to grow those (sorry!) this year. For Christmas I received membership to the RHS and I'm looking forward to getting out and exploring all that has to offer. I still plan to write about homes and interiors and the projects underway in our own home but this year I'm also a RIBA Friends of Architecture member and I'm looking forward to making the most of that too.
In real life both MOH and I will be celebrating our fiftieth birthdays, and our tenth wedding anniversary this year so we hope to do that in style and I'm also hoping there'll be a holiday (or two) to celebrate along the way too. I'm off to Munich in January, and very much looking forward to that and sharing all of that here too.
Share your hopes and dreams for 2017
As I said at the start of this post, I'm probably not the only one thinking about what 2017 can bring, so if it's something you've been thinking about I'm keen to know what your hopes, dreams, goals, resolutions, aims or whatever you call them are. You don't have to be a blogger to take part in this, just leave a comment to let me know.
If you're a blogger I'd love to read your post, so add your link below - I'll leave this linky open until mid-January. And if you add the badge to your post and tweet me @Lifeat139a I'll share your post too.