2014 Word of the Year

I love this idea of choosing a word that will serve as a theme for your year. I thought so much about this one and could have gone with plenty: peace, simplicity, hope, grace, etc and so forth but what I landed on was... FOCUS. Last year was very much about moving and renovating and sweet babies and it was crazy and wonderful and chaotic. The year before that was very focused on pregnancy and working from home for the first time and adding to our family (read more about all that here). This year I feel good and inspired and strong and very intent on making the most of each day. I've let distractions and worry cloud my head for too long. Mindless scrolling through my phone, always flying by the seat of my pants, not making time to date my husband, over scheduling, eating junk, not exercising, not having a plan... no more. All of those things make me feel like a scattered mess. Here are a few things that I want to focus on this year (as a compliment to my goals). Click through to read them.


1. My marriage. Hubba hubba. Sam and I will be married nine years in march and are coming up on our big TEN years. I feel like we haven't made each other as big of a priority as we need to. This year we are going to have weekly date nights (even if they're from home) and they won't involve mindless TV watching. We are going to really invest in US. I'm thankful that we both want and feel called to do that. I also want to be a better listener to him and to make him feel special because he sure is. Casa Graham could not survive without this man. For one thing... we'd starve. :) Sam deserves the best of me and that's what I'm going to work on giving him. I'll be sharing more of what we will be doing for date nights and more on marriage in general in the weeks to come!

2. My babies! These girls light my heart up. I eat, sleep, and breathe them. I love that they're so different and have their own special and beautiful personalities. I feel so lucky to be their mama and thrilled that they love each other so. That was a big worry for me, that they would be four years apart and not have anything in common. To my surprise they have become the best of friends and it has been the biggest joy to see their relationship with each other grow. When talking about focusing I know (Lord, I hear you) that I need to be more present at times. Email and social media can really eat my attention (and texting and so forth) so it is a huge goal of mine to cut that crap out. If I have to hide my phone, I'm determined to do it. There is plenty of time at night and early morning to get what I need to get done so that I can fully focus on them. I don't want them to have childhood memories of me and Sam being on our phones. Vomit.

3. Last but not least... Lesley W Graham. This year I am really excited to build my brand. I feel really fortunate to have found what I love to do and I want to learn more about small business, collaborations, branding and the like. I would love to grow my blog significantly, I haven't been able to pour a lot of time into this space and I'm looking forward to doing just that this year.

If you have any feedback for me (good or bad!) or would like to share your word of the year, I'd love to hear it. You can also join these lovely ladies for a really amazing linkup: Anna, Jessica, Kelli, Small Fry Blog, Casey Wiegand, Oh Dear Drea, and Summer Saldana. #making2014count

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