Goals and Adventures

It took a little while but Mark and I finally got around to setting our goals for the year... Well, I set goals for the year, Mark took a little different approach and set goals for a longer term life. We needed to compromise a little bit to figure out what we wanted, but we finally got it set down and on paper! It was such a relief to me to have set items that we, as a couple and as a family will be working on for the year 2014.

• Regular dates; whether they are family dates, couple dates or even Parent/Child dates. It is important for us to remember that even though we are a growing family, there are individual people and individual relationships that also need nurturing.
• Regular Family Home Evening; our children are beginning to understand the importance of church and why we need to go every Sunday, but it is important to us to give them as many spiritual experiences as we can. In the world we are living in, non-spiritual experiences FAR outnumber the spiritual experiences and we need to keep Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ in our daily lives as much as we possibly can. This goal will include lessons, prayer and hopefully increased spiritual music in our household.
• Build up our savings; Some of you may know 2013 was rough on us in more ways than one and that included financially. It is important to us to build back up our savings so we can be stable again and feel secure in times of crisis.
• Read the Book of Mormon as a family; our Ward at church has actually been reading the BoM together and they have a goal to finish it by Easter. I have liked this idea since I heard about it and personally I am actually ahead of the goal, but as a family we are not even close to on track. With that said, I feel we can start and make it a goal of our own to read it. My goal is not so much on finishing by a certain time but being able to include the kids and show them the importance of scripture reading as well as the awesomeness of the stories.
• Better communication; though this is at the bottom of this list, it is far from the bottom of our priorities. On the contrary, actually. Better communication is crucial to accomplishing any of the rest of our goals. We need better communication between Mark and I, better communication between the girls and I, and possibly even better communication between our family and those around us. It will be a good experience all the way around.

In other news, I was sustained and set apart in a new calling today! I have been called as the 1st Counselor in the Young Women organization! I am super excited! I was kind of hoping that I would be called into the Relief Society but this is great too. I was in the Young Women organization in Casper right before we left and I thoroughly enjoyed it and being with the girls. I am excited to spend time and get to know the girls of this ward! Sometimes I feel like I should still be in the youth programs with them, but have to remind myself I am actually old enough at this point to be a leader for them! I feel this is a blessing since I am at an age where I am old enough to have had some experiences that they haven't yet, but still young enough to really remember what they are going through and help them make sense of it all. But, maybe that is tooting my own horn a little. Regardless, I am excited about it and ready to get to work with them! I hope I can fill the shoes of the previous presidency because they are truly great women and I know they were great for those girls! Now, I get my chance to help them grow and be closer to Heavenly Father. We start officially on Wednesday night with them and I can't wait! I feel this is a great time to bring in a new Presidency seeing as it is the beginning of the year and we are all looking forward to a new start. Mark has been informed that his calling is coming, it just isn't quite ready for him. I am excited to see what is in store for us in the next little while!

Just another set of adventure for the Zollinger clan! Here is to a great 2014 full of adventure and new experiences. Anyone else have any great news for 2014? I'd love to hear about it all! Let me know! Have a great week everyone!

Re-Update!

For those of you who were following our previous blog, I apologize for making you come to a new one! I am not sure what happened to it. :( Sad day!

Anywho, It is a new year and a time for making those near-dreaded resolutions again. This year is going to be an exciting and crazy one for our little family. Carylon started sunbeams at church and will turn four in April, Madison just turned two last weekend and is growing like crazy, and in May we will be adding our first boy into the mix! Mr. Traydon will make his arrival mid-May sometime. We are excited. Mark's unit is starting their rotation for deployment this year so that will be a new and interesting bridge for us to cross when we get there. Luckily, it isn't until towards the end of the year so we have some time to prepare for that.

Today we had Madison's birthday party and I went to blog about it and share the pictures and I couldn't find my previous blog, so I figured, what a better way to start a new year that to just start a new blog. Okay, not really, I was pretty upset but what can you do? I am hoping to have our FHE go over our family goals for the year will let you know how that goes, in the meantime, I will cover some of my personal goals.

• Write more regularly in my personal journal and in the girls' childhood journals.
• Read and STUDY the scriptures to find more personal opportunity for revelations and answers to prayers.
• Spend more quality time with the girls (and boy) and not let myself get caught up in the "life crazies".
• Learn to stress less... Yes. I know the seriousness of this, as well as the near impossibility of it... It will be a work in progress I am sure!

Those are my big goals. I have more little goals that return year after year that WILL be accomplished eventually.

As far as an update on our family... for those that haven't been able to follow us for the past year, it has been a crazy one to say the least. We moved from Casper to Gillette, Mark attended Basic Combat Training, or Boot Camp, in Fort Sill, OK, we moved from Gillette to Newcastle, and then finally from Newcastle to Wright. Laci returned to school, then had to take more time off again due to Mark being gone and found it was a very good choice as this past six months on 2013 we WAY to crazy to have been successful in school. Carylon started pre-school and will return in September at a new school. Madison has grown and progressed much faster than Mom and Dad would like, but such is life, and now she has the opportunity to be a big sister too! We have had our ups, we have had our downs, and now we are more than ready to see what 2014 has in store for us. I am personally hoping for a little less adventure, but will take whatever comes our way. Hopefully I will even be able to do so with a smile on my face!

Here is to a brand new year, with much better job updating friends and family near and far as well as working on being a better version of me, and bringing our family even closer together!

I would LOVE to hear your goals for the year! Feel free to leave them in the comments. Let's all share ideas and maybe find some new goals we hadn't thought of! :)