The goal is Gratitude

In all of this Christmas "commercialism" as it were, I have been struggling to keep real perspective on the reason for the season.  I know when I start to get the "green eyed monster" creeping up on me from the back, I do best to combat it with counting my blessings. Even better than counting them is writing them down.  Here is the start of the list. I say that because I don't want the list to ever end, and for that I am grateful. I am going to include my gratitude listing with each post and that is one of my goals for the new year.  2013 will be filled with at least 2013 things I'm thankful for (that's only about 6 per day).  
The first ones on my list include:

1.  Family; they are healthy, happy, and keep me running around really good.  
2. My Savior, for without Him, all of this would be for naught.  
3. Tim, my sweetheart. He is my soul-mate, my best friend, my confidante, and makes me laugh and cry and life worth living.  
4. My house.  I have struggled with this since we had to sell our "model home" in Gilbert 2 years ago, but I am thankful that we have a place to live, and call home, even if we don't feel rooted by owning it at this time.  We will own a home again eventually, right where the Lord wants us to sink our roots deep.
5. My car. It runs when I want it to, all the places we need to go, it fits us all, and has bonus entertainment in the form of a DVD player.
6. Cookies. We've been eating our weight in cookies this week, for that is what Christmas is made of, lots of sweets: family, food, and time spent together.

Well, there is the start of my list, and I have a jump start on next year. I have a few days to finalize some of my other realistic new year resolutions before the ball drops in Times' Square (which is actually going to be midnight real-time for us for the first time!) so I'll make myself accountable by writing them down here for all to see.