Why New Year's Resolutions suck

The problem with New Year's Resolutions is not that they are so often not kept, it is that they are made without fore-knowledge of what will happen in the coming year.  

If we could tell what was about to happen in our lives, wouldn't our NYRs be better thought out and more likely to succeed.

Take 2011 for instance.  

If I had known 

what the year would bring, 

I would have made 

some humdinger resos!

Who could have guessed that Granny Camp would be such a hit with the grandchildren...or the Grandmas (and the goats)?

If you had told me that we would be baby-sitting a willful teenager with bad habits I would have laughed.

Or that because we did have that teenager to stay, that my Great Nephew would trade some of his time and expertise to help me build the outdoor kitchen.

At the beginning of the year the outdoor kitchen was only a seed of an idea.  I didn't have an inkling that the project would turn me into a scavenging, demolishing collector...

...leading me to retrieve the dunny door from the family home.

Nobody could have foreseen The Cook transforming into a chain-saw wielding lumberjack!  If you know her, you will be able to vouch for what a radical, mind blowing event this was.

Put up your hand if you thought that The Cook's tree-felling skills, combined with the Great Nephew's and my building attempts could change the view from the lounge room so dramatically.

Given the organisation in my sewing/crafting room, your may have thought that 2011 was the going to be the Year of Crafting.  Nope!

When making resolutions at the beginning of the 2011, I would NEVER have said, "This year I am going to write gardening articles for a web-site."  But it happened!  Daniel, from Fat Fruit Greenhouses, delivered this greenhouse bartered for a couple of hundred articles on his web site about gardening and greenhouses.  Who would have thunk it?

I could not have known that the chook population would explode to over 20 (with Hortense sitting patiently, ready to deliver more in the new year).

My granddaughter existed in 2010...just.  But I was only hoping, not expecting, a visit from her and Mr Muscle in the middle of the year.

My recent trip to the U.S. to visit them was certainly a surprise.

 Painting the house brown...???

Well...nobody can ever predict what goats will do.  To use the words 'resolution' and 'goats' in the one sentence is an oxy-moron.

In her 95th year, Mum left her home of over 60 years for an aged care facility.  I wish I had half the resolution she has.

I am sorry, I don't want to sound rude, but absolutely nobody on Earth could have been prepared for The Cook's sudden decline into madness!  Giving up a safe and cosy life, cooking, reading, resting and retired to return to the workforce. And no-one, least of all me, would have cast me as her 'side-kick' in this adventure.  I get to race about the countryside taking photos to add some colour to the publication she is editing.

Just to underline the severity of the Cook's condition, I give you this photo of her impersonating someone famous in a photo shoot for the front cover of the mag.   

So as the sun sets on 2011.  

I have decided to make only one New Year's Resolution... 

...be prepared for ANYTHING 

because that 

is what is likely to happen.