Learning and growing - some family goals

I've been thinking about the way we live at the moment, and how sometimes I need a kick up the backside to do what I know I want to do. I've also been thinking about WHY I have made the choices I have, what things really matter to me right now, and how I want things to change. I have a list. Maybe I'll even use it. ;)

- I need to start carrying water when we go out. We buy too many drinks, and a fair few of them are not even stuff I'd have let the children drink six months ago. It's wasteful too and I want that to stop.

- We will spend more of each day out of doors, get more fresh air, pay more attention to the vegetable patch, and worry less about traipsing mud onto the carpets. Carpets can be replaced. Childhoods less so.

- I want to keep the dining table clear and decorate it more often. I want to pay more attention to the areas of the house where I let piles of junk accumulate, by working through one area a week and then trying to keep it clear. Things I need to sort day-to-day will go in a basket, which will have to be dealt with when it gets full. ;)

- I want to spend more time reading with the children. And I want to start planning an evening activity to do together as a family, perhaps from a list, so that when Martin gets in from work we can do something meaningful all together - probably just after teatime. One of our planned activites will be family drawing time around the table.

- We are going to further cut down on the meat and dairy we eat, I want to not slip back into using so much milk and we have planned next month's meals in advance for more than half to be totally vegan and most of the rest veggie. I want to involve the children in cooking every meal rather than herding them out of the kitchen because I can't be bothered or am in too much of a hurry. It shouldn't matter so much to me to have the inconvenience of their "help" - so what if everything takes twice as long?!

- I need new jeans. I want to make much more effort to find second hand ones and I will buy loose fairtrade trousers online instead if I can't find any charity shop jeans that fit me. I would rather wear jeans less right now than buy another pair of cheap ones that don't last and are made in a way I don't want to support.

- I want to play music CDs every day and not use the television as a babysitter (including DVDs). I need to learn to include them in the things I feel so urgently need to get done rather than spending so much time deciding whether to spend time "with them" OR time "doing jobs".

- I am going to put up an art wire finally. And get another apple tree. Not THINK about doing those things. Not PLAN to do those things. Just DO them. Today if possible. If not, tomorrow. Not "one day". Because I'm sick of waiting for "one day" to just present itself whole and ready formed for my free use. ;)

Anyone want to join me in making something good happen today? What have you been "getting around to"? I'm really excited about this, because I was feeling down during my pregnancy about all the things I was putting off, and now I feel like I've come out of a tunnel and the world is so full of things I can actually do and actually have the energy and desire to do all over again. :)