New Year New Thing

Last year, on my blog I recorded all the books that I was reading. It was a fun experience to actually track the quantities and categories, and it pushed me a bit to read more, especially in the beginning of the year. Also, because of my reading and tracking, I won a gift card through a contest at our local library. This year, I’m not sure I’ll keep posting my book tallies. Maybe, but my TBR (to be read) pile has some rather thick tomes in it, so my book count may be way down. We’ll see.

Instead, I’m going to try posting about new experiences. I’ve grumbled (sometimes silently, sometimes not) over the past couple of years about how repetitive our lives have become. With jobs and kids, the days sort of bleed together. Same skyline. Same commute. Same conversations. Same dinner menus. It’s inevitable, in a way. This is the life that I chose.

I thrive on routine. Routine with scheduled-in change-ups. And lately, I frequently feel like I’m missing all the change that makes the routine part feel so comfortable. I've got plenty to whine about (like how our last vacation was in 2005....), but that's not today's point. To help myself think positively about my day-to-day life, I’m going to start recording all the new things that I’m doing. Most will probably be small: a new dish I’m cooking, or a visit to a store that I’ve never stopped in before.

I’ve seen some blogs (like this one) dedicated to doing a new thing every day, and its fun to see what others come up with. I’m not that ambitious. I’m not even going to set a goal number, just start writing down my new things. Hopefully by the end of 2009 I will be able to look back and marvel at all of the growth in my life.

New Thing #1: I made French toast on New Year’s day. Honestly, I’ve never cooked it before. I only ate it rarely growing up (usually at other people’s houses for sleepovers or at school lunch, where it always tasted awful). I’ve always thought I hated it (that school lunch problem). But, there was a recipe in a recent Cook’s Illustrated, and my kids love anything covered in syrup. So…I gave it a whirl. Bought a loaf of egg bread specifically for it. The toast (fried bread pudding really) tasted fine, and it wasn’t too hard or time consuming. Not exactly “light” (made with whole milk and egg yolks), but it was so rich that I didn’t need any syrup.