Goals and Accomplishments

Since we met, back in 2004, Marty and I have had a tradition of writing out our past year's worth of accomplishments and coming year's goals on or around January 1st.  I think this came from something his parents used to do and we adopted it and adapted it to fit our needs.  It is quite amazing to look back at the past 13 years of our lives together and see where we were at each stage.  Marty is very organized and we have them all together, all handwritten with a description of where we physically are at (usually Starbucks at Alki) and where the kids are (once they came into the picture) What was a big deal then is not a big deal now.  Even so, what was a big deal when we wrote our goals just 12 months before were no longer a big deal after the year had past. 
This past year was BIG for us in so many ways.  We had lofty goals and in nearly every area we met them.  We have never had so many accomplishments as we had for this past year. We also have never had so many challenges. 
As per usual, we find a quiet coffee shop and make a date with each other and sit and talk through our past year together and individually.  What did we do?  What did we accomplish?  We look at what we set as goals and see if we met those.  Inevitably there are accomplishments that we didn't even know were on the horizon.   As well as missed goals or not even half way met goals.
We found a quiet little cafe close to our new apartment.  We had a nice little German breakfast and talked through our BIG 2017. What a year it was.  It had many ups and downs but through it all we weathered it together.  Even though sometimes it feels like work to do sit down and write out our goals and accomplishments I'm always thankful afterward and even more so when we look back on it 12 months later.  Not to mention 13 years later. 
It was a year for the books!  Our goals/accomplishments book.  And I'm so very thankful to have this in written form to look back on.