I'm a sucker for a good historical fiction, and The Woman on the Orient Express by Lindsay Jayne Ashford didn't disappoint. It follows the story of Agatha Christie as she tries to put her life back together following her very-public divorce from her first husband in the late 1920s. She boards the Orient Express under a different name and travels to Baghdad. Along the way she makes two new friends, Katherine Keeling and Nancy Nelson, each with their own secrets. If you are a fan of Agatha Christie, you should read this book. If you're a fan of romance, you should read this book. If you need to read a book about women helping women, look no further.

I'm excited about the next two books on my reading list - From a Paris Balcony and The Memory of Us. What are you reading?

It's that time of year when people are making resolutions. Last year, the top resolutions according to iQuanti were to get healthy, get organized, live life to the fullest, and start a new hobby. I'm not big on resolutions, especially not the traditional ones that most people tend to make and only keep for a few months. For me, setting goals is much more productive and likely to make a difference in my life. I already shared my top professional goals for this year. Today I'm sharing four personal goals, along with a little Monday Motivation perfect for anyone who's working toward a goal of any kind.

Goal #1: Love My Body Again
I hate my stomach. It wasn't always this way, but then I became a mother. Sure, I lost most of my weight after having the baby, but there are some things that just aren't and might never be the same again. So for the past year and a half I've been working on loving my body with its new softness and added curves. It hasn't been easy. For one thing, I've had to get almost an entirely new wardrobe, and while I love shopping, going up a size or two hasn't been fun. But I have been working on buying things that are more flattering for this new body of mine, and my Newsroom Fashion series has been a pretty big part of boosting my self-confidence. This goal is definitely a work in progress and probably will continue to be for the foreseeable future.

Goal #2: Slow Down

What a difference a year makes! Alexis was much more into Christmas this past year. From shopping to wrapping presents, seeing Santa and looking at Christmas lights she thoroughly enjoyed every bit of it. And I must be getting a handle on this whole mom thing seeing as how this go 'round I'm posting about Christmas in the first week of January instead of almost February.

Things got started off a little rough. Alexis got a terrible stomach bug that lasted about six days. As a result we missed two family celebrations. She was better for Christmas day, thankfully. We started the day off with just the three of us, then went to Christmas breakfast with my in-laws, and ended the day with my parents and brother. We celebrated with my in-laws and Chris' brother's family the next day.



So what do you get an almost-two-year-old for Christmas? Our "big" gift was a kitchen, but we also got our little bookworm a new book, a Mickey Mouse puzzle, one of those popper things, and some hair bows. Some of the other things she got include a pink cozy coupe car, tricycle, beads, babies, and Princess Sophia figurines. This year she was more into opening presents, which was a relief  because last year she really didn't like the sound of tearing wrapping paper. She and our nephew who's a month older also actually played together this year.

If you read my post this past weekend about my end-of-year funk, then you'll know that work was a huge struggle for me the last two weeks of 2016. There were many contributing factors, not all of which were actually in the station, but I'm determined to start 2017 with a clean slate and make it better than '16 ever thought about being.

The groundwork for an even better year was actually laid in November when we hired another producer. That may seem like a routine thing to happen at a television station, it's been a real game changer for ours. This latest addition to our team has allowed me to actually do the things an executive producer is supposed to do for three days a week.

For me, the past month and a half has been about identifying problems, getting new producers up to speed, and targeting areas that everyone can improve in. All of our producers except for one has been with us less than a year, so up until this point for them it's really been about learning the ropes and just getting the job done. Now it's time to move past that, and it's my job as EP to help them succeed at increasing the value of all of our shows.

I recognize how broad this goal is, which is why I've broken things down into three manageable chunks.

1. Better Content Choices
You can't have a good show with poor content choices. This is one of the areas we're struggling with, especially when it comes to choosing stories that aren't locally generated. That's why this is my top goal for this year. As producers, we have to think like our viewers - what do they want/need/expect to see? If we can't deliver that, we've failed.

2. Add Depth
This is so much easier said than done, especially in today's newsroom where hardly anyone is solely producing one show. Most of our producers are responsible for at least two shows, while we have one producer who also reports during the day. With that being said though, it is possible to add depth to our shows without spending a whole lot of extra time on it. After all, there was a time not that long ago that I was reporting while producing two shows.

3. Creativity vs Consistency
One of the biggest challenge with new producers (and sometimes old ones) is convincing them that they can be creative while being consistent. As crazy as this sounds, viewers set their clocks by us. If weather doesn't come on at about the same time every morning, it could feasibly be blamed for someone being late to work. But I'm not just talking about consistency in timing; I'm also talking about consistency in how our shows look, consistency in our writing, and consistency in our choices.

As for myself, my goal as always is to be better while helping my newsroom be better. A never-ending goal but one worth pursuing.