The Year To Come: 2014

A few years ago, the always hilarious and incredibly insightful Caitlin mentioned the concept of defining the upcoming year with a one-word focus point, instead of making a bunch of meaningless resolutions that no one ever keeps for the full year. I absolutely stole that idea for myself, because what else is the internet good for, if not borrowing the ideas of people smarter than yourself, to make your own life better?

Without much deliberation at all, actually, my 2014 word came to me in a surprisingly easy fashion: thoughtfulness. See, I spent a good portion of 2013 wrapped up in my own internal drama, and I don't really think I gave enough thought to how my internal drama was affecting those around me. I spent a lot of time being unhappy, and I don't want to do that this year. I want to think about making other people happy, not constantly focus on what's making me sad. Also, I want to be thoughtful about eliminating what it is that's making me sad, but I think I'm slowly coming to terms with that part of the equation.

And so, my list for 2014...

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1) Send more mail...thank you notes, birthday cards, and 'just because' messages.

2) Be nicer, in general, to my husband and family. They deserve a much less crabby me than the one they were stuck with for most of 2013.

3) Make more of an effort to communicate with the long-distance people in my life. I got away from facetiming with my sister on a regular basis, and I miss it. Plus, now that she's making me an aunt, I think it's even more important that we get back into the habit of seeing each other every week. I do not need her new baby asking 'are you SURE you have more than one sister?', just because Aunt Mary lives in Indiana and Aunt Tara lives all of the way in Georgia.

4) Call or email or even text my friends from college more than I do now, which is hardly at all. Just because we can pick up after not talking to each other for months like no time has passed at all does not mean I should keep letting all of those months pass without the talking. I'm afraid the picking back up can't keep happening in a friendship like that.

5) Do one fitness/health related challenge each month. - You know all of those '0 to 1,000 sit-ups in just 30 days!!' kind of schedules that pop up on Pinterest all of the time? I'm going to start doing those. One each month. Fifteen minute plank? I'M COMING FOR YOU. I'm also throwing my meat-free/sugar-free/alcohol-free months in this category, as well.

6) Run another organized 5K. - It was so much more fun than I expected. Minus the running up a hill part, anyway.

7) Renew my vows with Steve, in Vegas, by Elvis, for our 10th anniversary in October.

8) Create an art wall somewhere in my house.

9) Organize a workspace for me

10) Attend The Blathering in Seattle. - Charleston was such a great time, I'd love to make it back for the Seattle trip.

11) Read at least two books a month.

12) Take Brigid camping.

13) Find a yoga studio and start taking classes regularly.

14) Write something, anything, not blog related.

15) No spending money on new clothes this year. Using gift cards and rewards points are fine, but I need to get out of the habit of spending money on new stuff, just to make myself feel better. I swear, shopping is my addiction, but the high I get from buying a new sweater probably isn't enough to justify the amount of money I spend on clothes I don't need. 

16) No buying anything at all unless I absolutely need it. I have a bad habit of stocking up on things at sales (candles, lotions, make-up, beauty products), even if I have a cabinet full of the same stuff already at home. I will use the cabinet full of crap before I add more crap.

17) Be more consistent in updating my family blog, because my parents give me a hard time when I let it lag, and my personal blog, because I'm not as happy with myself when I let it lag.

18) Find a general practitioner and get a physical.

19) Post at least one picture a day on Instagram, to get myself into the habit of taking more pictures of my sweet girls, since I find entire events have passed where I've forgotten to photograph said events. Like Christmas. Sadly.

20) Get a haircut. - You can laugh at this one, if you must, but I did not get one single haircut in 2013. In fact, I haven't had a haircut since before Caitlin was born in November of 2012. I do not even know how this happens, but I know it must end. Soon. I think a Locks of Love kind of donation might be in order. My hair, it is long.

21) Make an effort to get to know the neighbors. - I tend to not get dressed/leave the house on the weekends, and this extends to not fraternizing with anyone who lives near me, because I'm afraid people will judge me for my make-up free, sweatpants clad weekend laze. I should probably get over that.

22) Write more thank you notes. - I am terrible at writing thank you notes. I should not be so terrible.

23) Buy new rugs for my new house. - The sunroom and foyer, in particular, need something fun.

24) Be more fearless in forming and maintaining relationships. - There are many times where I think of something I want to send to someone, whether it's an email, text, card, or what have you, and I don't, because I'm afraid I've maybe overestimated whether we have the type of friendship where I can do something like that. I don't want to worry about stuff like that anymore.

25) Put together an Advent/Christmas activity calendar for Brigid and Caitlin. - I did that for Brigid when I was home on maternity leave after Caitlin's birth, and it was so much fun. I didn't get the chance to do it this year, and I feel like I missed out on some part of the excitement of the season. I'm bringing it back.

26) Institute a once-a-month date night with Steve. Or date lunch, I guess, if necessary.

27) Institute a once-a-month girls' night, whether it be with my old college roommate, my SiLs, or the neighbors. I should get out of the house at least once a month with people who do not live in my house.

The Year That Was: 2013

It's always funny to look back at your list of goals for the year, because...wow. A lot can happen in a year. At the beginning of 2013, I had all of these plans to reorganize/redesign/redecorate some of the spaces in my house, only to have that all mean absolutely nothing when we started talking about selling the house midway through the year. And then we decided we'd wait until mid-2014 to sell it. And then we decided that we wouldn't, in fact, wait that long, and the last three months of the year spiraled into a chaotic hole of stress and frustration and general anger that I really should sit down and detail at some point, if only for the cathartic purpose of looking at the mess from the other side and gaining a little perspective on it.

But we came through the process with a house and location that I love, a plan in place to make life better for our family, and the readiness to actually live the next year, rather than just try to survive it. But first!

A look back...

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1) Lose the pregnancy weight. - I was back at my pre-pregnancy weight, but then we started living out of boxes and off of take-out, and I stopped running. Let's just say I had to seriously watch some of the angles on the Christmas pictures we took, if I had any plans of anyone ever seeing a copy of those pictures.

2) Give up meat for a month. - No.

3) Complete the Couch to 5K program. - I DID IT! And not only did I complete the program...

4) Run an organized 5K. - ...I DID THIS, TOO! My SiL and I ran our very first 5k, and we actually RAN it, hills and all. Except for one very small part, where we walked for about a minute when the hill was not a hill, because I'm pretty sure it was actually a mountain. Other than that? I RAN A 5K!

5) Clean/reorganize my closet. - I'm unpacking, slowly but surely. I have to share my new closet with Steve. This has no real bearing on the organizing of my closet, and there are two separate, good-sized halves to it, but it needs to be mentioned. I have never shared a closet with anyone before in my life (YES, I KNOW THIS IS THE WORST OF THE WORST OF ALL FIRST WORLD PROBLEMS. I'M SORRY.), and I am sad that I have to start now.

6) Take a belated anniversary trip with Steve, a long weekend somewhere without the kids. - No. We, uh, spent the last night in our old house alone, packing, while the girls were with Steve's parents. That's about as close as we came to a kid-free weekend anywhere.

7) Make a meal entirely on my own (I don't cook, so this might be the biggest one of the year!) - We stopped cooking, so neither one of us was actually making meals. But, I was doing it at one point, so at least I know I can do it when we start meal-planning again.

8) Create an art wall in my staircase. - See: sold the house.

9) Organize a workspace for me. - No. (We sold the house, you know?)

10) Attend The Blathering in Charleston. - Oh, man. This was the best. I completely failed to write a recap of the weekend (I haven't ruled it out, yet, even if it has been MONTHS since I was there), but I met so many wonderful ladies, and ate a lot of good food, and spent hours wandering a lovely city, and it was just the perfect weekend away with friends. I am keeping all of my appendages crossed that I can make Seattle happen this year, because I would LOVE to see as many of those friends again as I can.

11) Read at least one book a month. - Let's see, through September, I had: In the Garden of Beasts (Erik Larson), Wild (Cheryl Strayed), Discovery of Witches/Shadow of Night (Deborah Harkness), Wedding Night (Sophie Kinsella), The Great Gatsby (F. Scott Fitzgerald), Rules of Civility (Amor Towles), The Casual Vacancy (JK Rowling), Summer at Tiffany (Marjorie Hart), The Perks of Being a Wallflower (Stephen Chbosky), Austenland (Shannon Hale), These is My Words (Nancy E. Turner), and Fangirl (Rainbow Rowell). I added Jeneration X and The Tao of Martha (Jen Lancaster), Silver Linings Playbook (Matthew Quick), Allegiant (Veronica Roth), Eleanor & Park (Rainbow Rowell), Mulligan Girl (Rebecca L. Boschee), Thwarted Queen (Cynthia Sally Haggard), My Year With Eleanor (Noelle Hancock), and The Cuckoo's Calling (Robert Galbraith/JK Rowling).

That's 22 books, or two shy of the goal I set for myself on Goodreads, where I am apparently a little more ambitious than I am around here. I'll have to change that for next year, I guess.

(Plus the seven Harry Potter books, reread. I really like counting those, too. And I actually reread them twice, if we're being totally honest here, because I started them again as a distraction from the house situation, after we went to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal)

12) Take Brigid and Caitlin to South Bend for a weekend (preferably a football weekend). - We did it! We even took Brigid to her first football game, which she wanted to leave during the 2Q. We...did not leave. I did enjoy showing the girls the campus, though.

13) Research/practice meditation. - No.

14) Find a yoga studio and start taking classes regularly. - No.

15) Find a 'mommy and me' class of some sort for Brigid and I to attend. - No.

16) Write something, anything, not blog related. - No.

17) Take one lunch break a week, even if it's only 15 minutes, to sit somewhere quiet and recalibrate/reflect/replan the next few days. (when I go back to work...) - HA! HAAAAAAAA! No. (still, again.)

18) Start taking outfit photos again, in an effort to wear everything already in my closet instead of shopping for new items. - Eh. Maybe.

19) Be more consistent in updating my family blog, because my parents give me a hard time when I let it lag, and my personal blog, because I'm not as happy with myself when I let it lag. - Still no.

20) Start reading my favorite blogs again, since I haven't even LOOKED at my reader feed in months, and I miss keeping up with it. - No.

21) Find a general practitioner and get a physical. - Not yet.

22) Throw Brigid a NYE party next year, complete with hats, noisemakers, and fun food, since she was really excited to stay up until midnight this year, but I was so tired from the baby's schedule that we faked midnight for her at 11PM. - Yes. We did. Finally, one I can claim.

23) Send more mail...thank you notes, birthday cards, and 'just because' messages. - I've been better-ish. But there's still room for improvement.

24) Try a juice fast/cleanse. - I didn't even come close to doing this.

25) Decide, once and for all, what I want to be when I grow up, and formulate a plan to get myself there. - We're...getting closer.

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I'm giving myself a 10 out of 25. I...need to work on this process, don't I? 2014, I'M COMING FOR YOU!!!

My First 5K

I did it. I RAN A 5K!!!!

 Brigid. TRY NOT TO LOOK SO SHOCKED.

Much better.

My sister-in-law and I decided a few months ago that we wanted to run a 5K. She had started running several months earlier, while I was kind of half-heartedly attempting to get back into the Couch to 5K program, and signing up for an official 5K race sounded like good motivation for both of us. We had plans to run the trail between our houses at least once a week, once I was more up to speed, but life gets in the way, and we only managed to get out there twice. But I did run on the treadmill five to six times most weeks, with the sole purpose of not embarrassing myself serving as the main reason I managed to find the time I needed to do it.

(Of course, the secondary reason I made the time is that Doctor Who is available through Amazon Prime on my iPad, and it makes great treadmill viewing, and running gives me a good excuse to grab the alone time I need to make it through an episode, so...yeah. Hooray, exercise!)

On race morning, while we were killing time between registration and the start of the race, we were sizing up our competition. There was the guy that takes racing vurrrrry seriously, with his sweatband and shorty-shorts, stretching next to us. There were the kids that were running and jumping and acting like the three miles they were about to run was nothing for which they needed to conserve energy. There were the people RUNNING TO THE STARTING LINE, as though the 5K was only part of what they intended to run for the day. (In fact, we saw one of those people still running an hour after the race, which...wow. I don't have it in me to ever be one of those people, but that's impressive, right there. Also, it makes my knees hurt, just thinking about running that long.)

And then we decided that our goal for the day was not to be the last people to finish.

My poor sister-in-law, you guys. She is so much taller than I am, so her strides are longer. She's in much better shape than I am, so her endurance is better. And yet, she stayed with me the whole time, letting me set our pace. She joked that her only concern was that the rest of the pack would get too far ahead of us, and we wouldn't know where the course went next. I joked back that I would allow her to cross the finish line before me, at least, so she wouldn't be the last person to finish the race.

But! We weren't last! In fact, we were 42% of the field away from being last! For my first ever 5K, I will take it.

As demoralizing as it is to see someone trot on past you while PUSHING A STROLLER, for crying out loud, and as painful as it is to run uphill over and over again when the course claimed to be flat, we ran the whole way. Well, we ran 99.9% of the whole way, anyway. There was this one hill, towards the end, that was a STEEP em-effer, and we made it three quarters of the way up before we walked the rest of the way. I was basically moving at the speed of a walk while 'running' up it anyway, so it just made sense to dial it back a little. But that was maybe less than a minute of walking, and we finished out at a run, even when we had to run uphill to get to the finish line, where Brigid, Caitlin and Steve were waiting for us.

And you know what? No matter where I finished, I did finish, and I will call that a success. I have had this on my list of things I've wanted to do ever since I was trying to get back into shape after having Brigid, so three and a half years later, it feels pretty good to check it off, finally.

Now, my SiL is talking about downloading a 10K training app, and she asked me if I wanted to join that crazy train with her. I'm going to have to think about that one...

The List - September Update

You know, I actually feel like I've made some progress toward my goals this last quarter...

1) Lose the pregnancy weight. - I am back at my pre-pregnancy weight, which is awesome. My body shape still isn't what it used to be, which is not. But, it happens, you know? I'm kind of getting over it now.

2) Give up meat for a month. - No.

3) Complete the Couch to 5K program. - I DID IT! And not only did I complete the program...

4) Run an organized 5K. - ...I DID THIS, TOO! My SiL and I ran our very first 5k last weekend, and we actually RAN it, hills and all. Except for one very small part, where we walked for about a minute when the hill was not a hill, because I'm pretty sure it was actually a mountain. Other than that? I RAN A 5K!

5) Clean/reorganize my closet. - Sort of, if you count getting the closet cleaned up to put the house on the market. Organized, though? Not really.

6) Take a belated anniversary trip with Steve, a long weekend somewhere without the kids. - No.

7) Make a meal entirely on my own (I don't cook, so this might be the biggest one of the year!) - I've taken over dinner duties on the nights I'm home with the girls all day. It's not the best, most of the time, but I think (hope?) I'll get better over time.

8) Create an art wall in my staircase. - My house is on the market. This won't be happening this year. But...next year? Maybe?

9) Organize a workspace for me. - No.

10) Attend The Blathering in Charleston. - I will be on the road to Charleston in less than 48 hours. ALL OF THE EXCLAMATION POINTS!!!

11) Read at least one book a month. - Let's see, through June I had: In the Garden of Beasts (Erik Larson), Wild (Cheryl Strayed), Discovery of Witches/Shadow of Night (Deborah Harkness), Wedding Night (Sophie Kinsella), The Great Gatsby (F. Scott Fitzgerald), Rules of Civility (Amor Towles), The Casual Vacancy (JK Rowling), and Summer at Tiffany (Marjorie Hart). Since then, I've added The Perks of Being a Wallflower (Stephen Chbosky), Austenland (Shannon Hale), These is My Words (Nancy E. Turner), and Fangirl (Rainbow Rowell), which puts me at thirteen books through nine months. I win.

(Plus the seven Harry Potter books, reread. I really like counting those, too.)

12) Take Brigid and Caitlin to South Bend for a weekend (preferably a football weekend). - We did it! We even took Brigid to her first football game, which she wanted to leave during the 2Q. We...did not leave. I did enjoy showing the girls the campus, though.

13) Research/practice meditation. - No.

14) Find a yoga studio and start taking classes regularly. - No.

15) Find a 'mommy and me' class of some sort for Brigid and I to attend. - No.

16) Write something, anything, not blog related. - No.

17) Take one lunch break a week, even if it's only 15 minutes, to sit somewhere quiet and recalibrate/reflect/replan the next few days. (when I go back to work...) - HA! HAAAAAAAA! No. (still, again.)

18) Start taking outfit photos again, in an effort to wear everything already in my closet instead of shopping for new items. - Eh. Maybe.

19) Be more consistent in updating my family blog, because my parents give me a hard time when I let it lag, and my personal blog, because I'm not as happy with myself when I let it lag. - Still no.

20) Start reading my favorite blogs again, since I haven't even LOOKED at my reader feed in months, and I miss keeping up with it. - No.

21) Find a general practitioner and get a physical. - Not yet.

22) Throw Brigid a NYE party next year, complete with hats, noisemakers, and fun food, since she was really excited to stay up until midnight this year, but I was so tired from the baby's schedule that we faked midnight for her at 11PM. - I have a few more months on this?

23) Send more mail...thank you notes, birthday cards, and 'just because' messages. - I've been better-ish. But there's still room for improvement.

24) Try a juice fast/cleanse. - I probably won't do this. Most likely.

25) Decide, once and for all, what I want to be when I grow up, and formulate a plan to get myself there. - Blergh.

Reading Rainbow

Apparently, I can write more words than any one person should about favorite movies and television shows (if that one person is not a movie or television critic, anyway), but then the words dry up, and I forget to post again.

NOT THIS WEEK!! This week, I'm linking up with Ginger's Bring Back the Words prompt around what my favorite toys were as a child, which is actually a surprisingly short list, given how many toys were in my house at any given moment when I was growing up. In fact, there's really only one item on that list...

Books.

Now, before I could read, I had a few toys that I liked. When I was three, I wanted a barn and a farm and a horse for Christmas. This was the first Christmas my mom and I shared with my soon-to-be-step-dad, and when I unwrapped the Fisher Price farm set he'd put under the tree for me, I think I knew right then and there that he was a keeper.

(I was right, by the way. He's still a keeper, 30 years later. I am an excellent judge of character, obviously.)

Then there was the American Girl doll I got when I was...10? 11, maybe? I'd wanted a Samantha doll more than ANYTHING ELSE IN THIS WHOLE ENTIRE WORLD, and there she was on Christmas morning. The pictures from that day are a great testament to my joy that morning, but they're also a testament to pre-teen braces, frizzy hair, and remarkably pasty complexion, so...yeah. I think those pictures are in a box at my parents' house somewhere, maybe (hopefully?) never to see the light of day, again.

(Along with the video of my Jr. Miss competition (IT WAS A SCHOLARSHIP COMPETITION!) when I was a senior in high school. I think I've safely hidden that away somewhere, because it was awful. Picture a group of high school girls dancing a horrific dance to Jailhouse Rock by Elvis, in white sweatsuits with black electrical tape lines on them, made to look like jailhouse uniforms. Then imagine the ridiculous answers given to terrible pageant questions, and that is maybe the most cringe-worthy tape of my life. So. Bad.)

But books. Well, books were my life when I was growing up. I would read anything and everything I could get my hands on. I'd read every book in the young adult section at the library that earned me extra points in the Summer Reading Club. I'd read all of the children's books my little sister brought home to read, to her if that was an option, but even to myself, if it wasn't. I'd read really age-inappropriate books, now that I think about it, that I found on my grandpa's bookshelf. I'd read cereal boxes at the kitchen table, just to have something to do.

My mom loves to tell the story about how I got lost driving home from my piano teacher's house, even though she lived five minutes and one turn away from me, because I'd turned the wrong way. Turns out, when you start reading the minute you get into the car, you're not going to know how to get yourself around the small town you've lived in all of your freaking life.

Go figure.

My mom actually had to ground me from reading from time to time, because I wouldn't get anything else done. My room would be a mess, my homework would be incomplete, my chores would be unfinished. Seriously. My mother. Would ground me. From reading.

Who does that?

I hope beyond anything else that I am able to pass this love of reading on to my girls, because I don't know what I'll do if they don't enjoy it like I do. Brigid gets two books read to her every night before bed, and I'm trying to get back into the habit of it with Caitlin, as well. I am SO DAMN EXCITED for the day when I think Brigid is finally old enough to read the Harry Potter books with me, and I have a box full of old Nancy Drew books in the basement with her name on it. Lord of the Rings, Madeleine L'Engle, Narnia, The Babysitters Club, whatever new series they have out for kids now. I want them to want to read it all.

Just as soon as they learn how to read.