*Whew*  I’ve finally got time to sit down and write part 2 of my New Year – New Start post.

This is the post where I finally get around to talking about goals.  No, I won’t be setting any grandiose goals or resolutions for the entire year.  As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve definitely come to realize that setting long-term goals isn’t a good thing for me.  If I find myself getting off track, I let it derail me completely.  These days I prefer to stick with more short-term goals because that just seems to work much better for me.

I have decided that I’m just going to take things eight weeks at a time.  I think a couple of months is a long enough time frame to let me set some decent goals without making them too far down the road.  It will also make it easier for me to track in week segments vs. two month segments because then I can tie my goals in with my weekly Weight Watchers meeting rather than whatever arbitrary day of the week the first of the new month would be starting.

Fortunately, my first eight week block times almost perfectly with our new challenge over at the Sisterhood.   There are categories for those shrinking as well as for those who are goal and not interested in weight loss.  I’m not sure if my eight week goal stints work in alignment with the Sisterhood challenges the whole year, but it’s working for now and I’m going with it.

Ok, so now that I’ve outlined how I’m planning to do things, let’s get down to some brass tacks!  Here are my goals for January 1 through February 26:

• Track all of my food in eTools – I’ve gotten pretty sloppy lately about tracking my food.  I know have much better success when I’m faithfully tracking.  I need to get back to this habit!
• Do some sort of intentional exercise four times per week – Exercise is a bit dicey for me right now with my knee injury.  There are some things I literally just can’t do right now.  That doesn’t mean I need to get lazy and not do anything!  There are plenty of ways I can get in some exercise that won’t bother my knee, so I need to just do it!
• Drink at least 64 oz of real water per day – Another area where I’ve gotten pretty lax is in drinking my water.  I think part of that comes from Weight Watchers changing their healthy guideline from “water” to “liquids” a while back.  I seem to rely far too much on flavoring my water with Mio, Crystal Light, etc.  I need to get back to some good old fashioned water.
• Try at least one new recipe every two weeks – I have a plethora of cookbooks (not to mention lots of recipes to try pinned on Pinterest)  in my personal library.  There’s no reason why I need to stick with eating the same things over and over all of the time.  I need to expand my repertoire by adding in some new recipes this year.

So, there you have it.  I think I’ll definitely have success if I stick with these goals over the next eight weeks.  What’s that?  Why yes, you ARE correct, there isn’t a weight loss number goal in there.  I’m not setting any of those this year.  My goal with my weight loss will be to try and fall within the recommendation of Weight Watchers and my personal physician of averaging between ½ to 2 pounds per week over time.  So, if all goes well, by this time next year I should be somewhere between 26 and 104 pounds lighter and I’m good with that.

I also mentioned in my previous post about a group venture I’m taking part in with several other members of the Sisterhood.  We’ve undertaken a group book project for the year following the principles outlined in this book:

Each week we’ll be focusing on implementing one of the changes in the book into our daily routine.  This week’s chapter is all about water which fits perfectly with one of my goals for the next eight weeks!  We’ve even got a group going over at The ‘Hood so we can encourage each other during the process.  The author even recognized our group on her website.  How cool is that?!  If you’re interested in joining us, and I hope you are, please head over to The ‘Hood and sign up.  You can also grab a copy of the book on Amazon.  If you have a Kindle, it’s available in Kindle format, too.  We’re all really excited to be doing this together during 2012.

Today’s assignment for the 30 Day Blog Challenge is to share your favorite store.  This one is a complete no brainer for me:  AMAZON!   I order from them so much that I think the property manager at my complex probably thinks I own stock in them.   If we’re talking a traditional brick and mortar store, then it would probably be Target.  I love me some Target!

In closing, I just wanted to take a moment to point out that you may have noticed the Google Friend Connect follow box has disappeared from my sidebar.  In an effort to consolidate some of their services, Google has made the decision to discontinue allowing GFC to be used on non-Blogger sites effective March 1, 2012.  Since it’s going away in a couple of months anyway, I just went on and removed it now.  If you would like to follow my blog, you can find several other options in my sidebar.  You can subscribe by email, RSS feed, or via NetworkedBlogs.  I hope you’ll choose at least once method so you can always know when I have new posts. Thanks!

Until next time …