2016 in progress

I was telling someone about LASIK yesterday and came back here for my full write up to send along and was confronted by the reality that I have done NOTHING on my to do list.  So, here we are on 10/25 with how things are shaking down and my excuses (WOMP WOMP WOMP).

1. Be more present. I even got a bracelet to remind me of it.  my bracelet fell off because I was dumb and bought the turquoise one even though it was made with the string instead of leather. I think it lasted until April. I don't think it helped me to be more present. I've probably done worse than ever this year. 

2. Get another certification this year.  This is probably not happening in 2016. I got pretty close to doing a Plyoga certification but we had some unfortunate stuff going on this month so I didn't want to commit the money at the time. 

3. Read 35 books.  um. I don't think I've read a single book this year. I don't even have a good excuse.  I've wasted way too much reading time reading about this stupid election. 

4. Not feel like I overate too much over the holidays when next year's NYE rolls around.  So, we've come to one that I can manage to not screw up, right? Ha. No. It's not even the holidays yet and I am far heavier than I want to be. It's awful. I spent October stress eating like a moron. 

5. Do a yoga workshop.  I have made no time for this. I don't even have a good excuse. 

6. Run two half marathons.  Once again, I've made no time for this. My foot has been nagging me for a bit but I haven't put in any mileage. I haven't even run a 5K. God, this list is so depressing. 

7. Expand my garden, especially tomatoes.  OOOH OOH I have a good excuse for this one! When I wrote this, we had no intention of moving. Then in January we decided to make that happen this year so I did only container gardening for the most part. The new neighborhood has terrible squirrels so I won't be doing anything other than herbs for the unforeseeable future. 

8. Leave the country, at least once.  I just had no idea how expensive an MBA would be. My dream of going abroad once a year has been crushed. 

9. Redo our guest room.  I DID ONE THING ON MY LIST YES! 

10. Help Owen learn the alphabet.  Ha. I suck. Still holding out hope that school will handle this for me. 

11. Do a no buy for the month of June.  In June we moved and I spent many, many thousands of dollars so HAHAHAHAAAAAAAA.  But I did really well from end-April until we closed on the house June 14th. 

12. Pay off the student loan and not have to finance anything for Adam's MBA.  So far, so good! Although I was just so naive about how much school was going to cost.  Everything extra has gone to the MBA this year. 

13. Save some of my yoga money this year.  I can't say I've done exceptionally well with this because I have no liquid savings to speak of that consists of yoga money but we have upped the contribution to my IRA and I started the non-profit equivalent of a 401K through the Y, so technically I am saving 10% of my pretax income so this was a draw. Really, this actually should go in the win column because I am pretty sure I will double my income in 2016 over 2015.  I spent a lot of it but at least the savings is all going straight to retirement. We also used yoga money for some really awesome stuff this year like theatre season tickets and a share in Dallas Stars season tickets. 

14. Start attacking the 4Runner payment.  This is another instance where the money required for the MBA program has squashed my dreams. (sob!)

15. Stay within the monthly budget every single month and use overage for travel.  Ha. My goodness I sucked at this.  I have to do better next year and also figure out how to deal with the fact that our water and electric bills were tripled since moving.  We moved into 700 extra square feet and now have an actual yard with a sprinkler system and paying double utilities for a month was really tough on my budgeting.  We also had to pay to transfer almost every type of service to the new house, that SUUUUUCKED.  

16. Fully fund Christmas by October 31st.  I have 6 more days to do this and it is just not going to happen.  However, I made HUGE strides.  I'm probably halfway done with shopping and I have a significant budget in both November and December to work with so even though I didn't quite get there, I think we will finish the year feeling even better than we did in 2015.  


I would like to take a brief moment and mention that about a month after this was written, we completely changed our goals and decided to buy a house a year early.  So it's not all doom and gloom.  We'll have a year of payments under our belt (including 2 extra principal payments) by the time our original date to purchase a house rolls around.  We had all of our savings to furnish the house and stayed really, really close to budget while transforming our lives.  We're infinitely more happy in our new home and new neighborhood so I'm basically joking about not meeting all of my goals.  I had no idea what was in store for us when I was looking ahead to the year.  There is always 2017 for half marathons and yoga workshops and certifications.  We also had a lot of added stress this year.  I'm working double what I was before, Owen has been in school 3 days a week all year instead of 2, Adam started school and has had a promotion and a TON of work related stress to deal with, we MOVED which takes so so so so so so so much time.  It has been a wonderful and incredibly rewarding year but also a year of immense change and at times, struggles for all of us.