Switching It Up

We had our phone call last night, so it is time for another missions update! The big question was, do we want to do a short term mission trip first? The answer is, YES!

This changes the look of our year by so much it would be scary if we didn't have complete faith in God. The short term process is much shorter and there is less funding to raise. So here is what our new outlook looks like:

Our rep will be getting with some other reps and supervisors to get a set idea of what we will be doing, where, and for how long (we are hoping to do 23 months). Till this is done, there is nothing for us to do but continue slimming down our house. 

Then we get our application package. Our rep said we could get it done in 2 weeks if we hunker down and focus on it. Then we send it in and it is reviewed and accepted based on our new reps work load. that could be 2 months or more.  

Next budgets and job descriptions are finalized and we go into the training/support raising phase.  

Then we leave. 

If it only takes 6 months to raise the funds, there is a good chance we will be saying Merry Christmas form The Netherlands this year. This is a huge change from the 1.5-3 years till we leave that we were anticipating with the long term trip timeline. There is a very possible potential that we will be leaving in 9 months. While it could take longer, I am planning for 9 so that we will be prepared for whatever may happen.

I will try to answer some of the questions we have been asked recently.

Q: What about the house and the dog?
A: We are not making any decisions on those till we hit the fundraising phase and we are locked into our trip. That being said, we will likely sell the house and poor Tucker will most likely need a new home.

Q: Are you crazy? Adam already has a good and reliable job!
A: We are going to be working for God! You can't get a better, more caring, and rliable boss than that. Fith has always been our #1 spiritual gift and we intend to fully use it in this. We are going all in with God and couldn't feel more comfortable with doing it.

Q: What is happening with all your stuff?
A: Most of it will be sold, donated, or given away. The big stuff we will worry about when we are locked in, like the house. We will store a very, and I mean VERY, small selection of things with family.

Q: What are you going to bring?
A: Clothing, a small selection of homeschool materials, bibles, Kindles, studio equipment, and a very small selection of personal items. We fully intend to start from the beginning when we get there.

Q: What does Little Guy think of all this?
A: He is really excited! He can't wait to be a short term missionary. Just the title makes him feel better. Long term sounds like forever, and short term sounds short. He has decided that he can handle a short term trip, even to say good-bye to the house and Tucker.

Our little house is all a-buzz about this exciting new turn around. We are all on board and planning for the future. We will be doubling our efforts to unload stuff and clean things out. It is also time to let our vollunteer activities know what is coming up, so they can prepare too. Mostly, we are just praying for wisdom and strength during this enormously changing time in our lives.

Long Term Goals

Sorry I haven't written in a while, life just happens at lightning speed sometimes! We have been talking long term goals for a few months now. See, we had worked on my staying home for about 7 years. It was a long term goal that started before we even thought of having a baby. I have been home for about 8 months now and I love it! It feels a bit like limbo though. When you achieve a long term goal it sort of leaves you with this "what now?" sort of feeling.

We talked about traveling or the possibility of buying a new house. We just couldn't quite latch on to a goal that meant buying things and spending money. We would still like to travel at some point but there is no urgency to spur us on. It cam to me the other day and I suggested it to sort of test the waters...

"Wouldn't it be cool if you could stay home too? we could run The Crazy Elephant together."

It was like the light bulb turned on for us. Since I have been a stay at home mom (although work at home might describe it better), I have built a pretty good business for myself with The Crazy Elephant. In fact, if we had 0 debt The Crazy Elephant could almost support us as it is now, no changes. So, we made being a stay at home family our new long term goal with the mind set of accomplishing our goal in 5-10 years!

Here is the plan:

Phase 1 - Pay off all of our debt! Adam's calculations show that if I contribute about half of my profits to debt reduction, we should be debt free in just under 4 years...that includes the house! We also are doing a remodel of the shop to really put our best foot forward and re-pricing for a sustainable store.

Phase 2 - Complete any major home improvement projects and buy a car. They are the things we want, not need, but should do before Adam stays home.

Phase 3 - The nest egg! Things happen sometimes and we want to be prepared. We will be making sure we have a nice big cushion.

It feels great to have a long term goal again! I almost wish I could fast forward to see how it turns out, but then I would miss all the fun along the way.

May Goals

It is a new month again and I can check off my goal from last month! So much happened last month and since I just let things happen naturally it wasn't bad.This month I am ready for a fresh set of goals. Here they are...

• We have made the decision to stay 100% on Etsy till we double in growth from where we are. So my goal is to do a minimum of 25 listings up a week. This way my available items go up along with traffic, they go hand in hand.
• This month we are going to finish up the school year for preschool. We have a couple of fun weeks coming up, including garden week and ice cream week. It should be fun and I look forward to a few months of lighter workload as we take our break...we will still be doing the All About Reading curriculum over the summer though so we don't have to start from the beginning in the fall.
• Most important is that we fix our roof. We have some unwelcome tenants (birds and squirrels) and we need to repair the damage they have caused. I am saving up the money to pay for it with my TCE sales but I have a lot more work to do before the roof is paid for.

Well, those are my big 3. They are totally doable if we set our minds to it. What are your goals for the month?

March Goals

Happy leap day! Today only comes once every 4 years. I will spend this extra special day sharing my March goals. I normally take a look back at how the goals from the previous month went. That won't be happening this month. We'll just sum up with, not so well. I am not going to dwell on how poorly February went though. I am going to go into the next month with optimism and resolve!

• Exercise - It went way down last month and I am going to stick with the goal of 120 minutes a week. It worked well before and I can do it again.
• The Crazy Elephant has been growing, a lot! Adam is giving me Wednesdays as a "work" day and evenings as computer time and it is working very well. The goal is to list at least 25 items per week with a long term goal of having a steady 250 items in shop by the end of the year.
• March is also the soft start of spring cleaning! I am going to be doing a kind of prep cleaning before the big clean in April. I am also going to be posting a weekly spring cleaning post on the Moms in Step blog. Feel free to follow it if you want to spring clean with me!

I hope everyone has a great March and feel free to share some of your goals in the comments section. You never know when you might inspire someone.

February Goals

Can you believe that tomorrow is February?! Winter will be over before we know it and I am already dreaming of rhubarb. Let's start by taking a look back on my January goals...

The Crazy Elephant did get a couple of V-day goodies but the focus turned to pads quickly and I chose to work on what everyone clearly wanted. We also got a large portion of our celebration chart done and it has been fun to watch us jump from less costly activities to larger ones as we get more orders.

Exercising for 130 minutes just doesn't seem feasible. I got close every week but always landed in between 120 and 130. I am still very happy with it though!

Reading through all of Exodus did not happen. We forgot just how many studies we were starting in January and we have been behind in all of them because we are trying to do them all.

So, now it is time to regroup and focus on what I want to accomplish in February.

*The Bible is awesome, but we are being overwhelmed with information right now and don't have time for them all. So, we will put our reading of the whole bible on hold until we get a break and leave our Sunday school study to Sunday morning. That leaves me 2 studies to work on at home, For Women Only and One Minute After You Die. Plus I will still get in an occasional chapter of Manna For Moms just for fun.

*The Crazy Elephant has really picked up the pace! We made a few changes that seem to have worked well. It is very important that I continue to get in at least 2 hours of TCE time each day plus computer and listing time. I would like to continue to see growth so it means it is time to kick it up a notch.

*I have been struggling to get everything in this January. Between Homeschooling, cleaning, cooking, TCE, and outside activities I have been feeling a little stretched. This month I really want to give my daily schedule a fighting chance and remember that I can make changes as needed. I am still trying to get the feel for this staying home thing and each month seems to get more organized and better maintained. With all the things I need to get done a schedule is going to be important so that things don't get missed.

That's about it for me. It's another month and I am sure each day will have a new surprise, be it good or bad. Are any of you adding a new goal for your month?

Janurary Goals

January is just about here! It is time to see how last months goals went and make some for next month.

Dec goals: Crazy Elephant Paperwork - Check!
                  120 minutes of exercise a week - Check!
                  House purging - The house areas are done, but we still need to hit the garage
                  Making time for Christ during Christmas - Absolutely, if it weren't for him I never could
                  have made it through all the holiday craziness!

Here is what I am working on in January...

*The Crazy Elephant is going to be a big focus for me this month. I want to get Valentine's goodies listed and lots of things sewn. We are also going to work on a new celebration format for our sales. We were going out for burgers when we hit a certain amount of sales and that was it. It was basically a race to see how early in the month we would be able to celebrate. Now we are going to wait till the end of the month and our celebration will be based on our total for the month. We will see how it goes and what we come up with.

* I am going to keep working on exercise, especially after all the holiday eating. To make it a little more of a challenge, I am going to bump it up to 130 minute each week. I am going to be doing my time between Wii Fit and Zumba 2 for Wii. They are both activities that I love to do so it makes it so much easier to put in the time.

*In November Adam and I started the 3 year reading plan that is layed out in my study bible. It covers the entire bible and of course with us being who we are, we want to shorten that time up. So for January I would love for us to get through the 9 chapters of Matthew and all 40 chapters of Exodus that are next on the list. That is 18 chapters more for the month than the plan lays out, but we can do it.

I am interested to see how my first full year as a stay at home mom goes. It will change how each day is in comparison to all the years before. Plus having the time at home means The Crazy Elephant will have the focus that I have never been able to put in before. I am so excited to see how the year goes, how about you?

December Goals

December?! My brain is not ready for December! Since I am no longer in retail and we rarely go shopping I am not bombarded with Christmas. I haven't been seeing it on TV either, so this year I am just not mentally prepared for it. So, with December starting this week, I thought that now is as good a time as any to post my goals for the month. I can honestly say that I haven't even thought about it yet. As for last month's goals, I have done well with them and will continue to work on them. We have 5 people left to do gifts for but all the rest are wrapped under the tree as of last night. So here are some things I would like to get accomplished before the new year starts...

* Get some serious Crazy Elephant paperwork done. I need to finish entering in receipts into my books, Get books for next year, and I would like to do a chart of what I actually sold this year to get a better idea of what I should keep doing and what I can let go of.

*I am going to up my Wii Fit minutes to 120 each week. I have been really enjoying my Wii Fit time and would like to get more in for fun and for my body.

*We are going to finish our home purge. We are done with the upstairs and just need to take care of the downstairs now. The amount of space is amazing and our home takes much less time to clean and tidy up now too.

* Remember what this time of year is for. We have 7 Christmas celebrations to enjoy this year. We can go to all of them since I am not working anymore. With all the hustle and bustle I want us all to remember the Christ in CHRISTmas.

To all of you, I hope you reach your personal goals this month.

November Goals

My guys on halloween

Have you thought about your goals for the month yet? Well, it's high time! It is already November 3rd, if you can believe it. To update on last month's goals:

*I have decided to let our schedule come naturally and is starting to come together.
*We have lots of family time ideas, they just aren't written down, and it has been great not watching as much tv.
*I hit 100 listings in my shop, now I just need to maintain it.

I am leaving this weekend to go on a crafting weekend with my mom and her friends. I am going to be sewing like a maniac filling orders and making merchandise. I will also be missing my family. Adam tells me I need the time away and to have fun. They are also having a boy weekend with Adam's brothers, so I hope they will be having fun too. I am excited to come back and get on top of my goals though and be back in my family's arms.

*Goal #1 is to make studying the bible an every day occurrence. I even added it to my daily checklist so I make sure to get it in. I am not as familiar with the Word as I should be, but each day I learn and grow.

*Goal #2 is to add at least 100 minutes to my Wii Fit Plus each week. I am not doing anything in particular to loose weight, I just want to get moving more. In the cold months it is harder to do that. This is also on my calendar.

*Goal #3 is to organize gifts for the holidays. We have roughly half of the gifts taken care of now, but we need a list to make sure we don't double buy for people. We also have lots of giving to do for those in need and those need to get organized as well.

I guess that is it for this month. I am also brainstorming blog ideas for December. If you have a stretch it topic you would like me to cover, let me know.

September Goals

It is a new month again! I love the fall, even if most of the month is "technically" still summer. We have a lot of big changes happening this month and it is going to mean a lot of work and planning. So here are my big 3 for the month...

* Research some new recipes to add to our menu planning to help get our food budget down, we have worked our way up to about $175 each month. We would like to get it back down to the $110 mark that it was at last winter.

* Start planning holiday gifts. We will be on a tight budget again this year, but we will be able to spend time with our families this year becasue I will no longer be working and that will be a great gift for us all!

* Begin work on the holiday season at The Crazy Elephant. With me being a work at home mom very soon, I need to put a huge focus on my shop as a source of income. I will have more time to work on it now and can treat it like my job, something I have wanted to be able to do for a while now. I will be working on Etsy's holiday boot camp toward the end of the month and I want to work hard to make it successful for me.

In case you have not caught it by now, I will be staying home very soon. We have been working on this goal for 5 years now and it is comming up. Our car's brake line broke on Saturday. We can't fix it till tomorrow at the earliest, but the cost of fixing it and time we can fix it will have a big impact on when I am done at work. In the meantime I am going to focus on my goals and look forward to personal success!

What are your goals this month? Share in the comments and inspire someone!

Goals for August

This month is a little short. We still have a lot going on. Jayne's and The Crazy Elephant's birthdays are both this month and it is bound to be exciting. I am still working with the itemized goals from last month and will continue to do so. I am mainly concerned about these 3 overall items...

*Get more exercise. That is a whole family effort. We have put a daily 30 minute dog walk into our routine and plan on having another hour of outside time, when we can, for Jayne as well. We spend too much time staying cool/warm in our house year round. It doesn't help that Adam and I are very much inside people as well.

*Check off my planner. I have gone through the entire month of august and written down all I want to accomplish. I can check off each item as I go. The items include household chores, Crazy Elephant work, and blogging. I am hoping to check off every single item on my planner.

*Finish getting ready for school. If I can get 2 weeks of school prepped per week, I can get the whole school year planned out before school starts. Of course there will be changes over time, but the groundwork will have been laid.

I am really excited for this last month of summer! How are you going to spend it?

Goals for July

It is time to come up with goals for the month. So, here goes...

Family: Spend more time together and try to take things a little more slowly. Also we are going to WI Dells for 3 days next week with my family.

Home: Just stay on track. Keep extra good care of the garden. Stay on top of the vacuuming to keep down on the earwigs. We don't want another invasion like last year! So far the cleaner house and weekly vacuuming is really helping.

Homeschool: Keep working on setting up Jayne's school year. I have 3 months ready to go. I would like to get a minimum of 8 weeks put together this month. Also, keep plugging away at head of the class.

The Crazy Elephant: Keep up with my 4 listings a week (not including the holiday and vacation weeks) and set aside at least one hour a week to create.

Blogging: The plan is to make my homeschool fun, stretch it, and collection posts a weekly thing with other posts (TCE updates, meme's (mommy to Jayne) day, and handmade finds, ect) mixed in.

Work: Attend

Money: Keep making it and paying down our bills. We are so very close and have worked so hard to get them down. We are also going to try to keep our vacation spending to a bare minimum. I will definitely update you all on how that goes...hopefully well.

What kinds of goals do you have? Feel free to leave a comment and share. Writing it down for others to see is a great way to keep yourself on track. You can also comment with a link to your own post about goals. Good luck everyone and stick with it!

Making Goals

What a let down, and on my birthday too...But you know what they say, when life gives you lemons, turn them into hope and ambition!

That is what I am feeling right now and I have made a list of goals for myself to help me make The Crazy Elephant a hopping joint. I want to do well, and I know that means working as hard as I want to do well. I thought I would share my goals with all of you. It helps to get them out of my head and maybe it will help my fellow shop owners with ideas for their own shops.

*List/renew 1 item each day on at least 1 of my TCE sites

*List 1 new item per week on my art page

*Do 1 collection/treasury a week alternating between the 3 shops

*Blog at least 3 times per week (1 about treasury/collection, 1 for illustration friday, and 1 about whatever else is going on.)

*Keep my facebook pages updated

*Get more involved with each of my teams