19 things to do for 2019

ummmmmm. what am I going to do when it's 2056? do 56 things? that seems exorbitant. maybe I should have thought this through better.

Anyway.  Here's the 19 things I aim to do with my life in 2019:

1. Go to Scotland and London.

2. Spear fishing in Belize.

3. Take Owen to see our cousins in Boston/NH.

4. Astros road game in California. 

5. Find a cleaning lady and lawn people. 

6. Ride 5000 miles on my Peloton. 

7. Hit the 1000 ride milestone. 

8. Lose the 15 lbs that I gained in 2018 (I hate that this is on my to do list but it must be done.) 

9. Get my Bar Method Century socks. 

10. Save 20% for retirement. 

11. Read 20 books. (God, that is so lame. I better do it. I will read on the bike if I have to.)

12. Three quarters fruits/veggies with my meals. 

13. Either go to or plan a Hawaii trip when SW finally gets it together to fly there. 

14. At least one date night or day date a month. 

15. Do some work to make joining the PTO easier for people and create a FB group for existing members. 

16. Two summer staycations.

17. Work on being a better listener, especially when talking to people with different beliefs than me. 

18. Continue to work on letting go of the things I can't change. More serenity prayer. Less road rage. 

19. Make a decision on Big International Trip 2020 for our 10 year anniversary! 

18 Priorities for 2018 

1. Leave the country - we went to Belize twice. Contemplating actually buying land there next year! 

2. Find a house, preferably under $300K - did not come in under budget but nailed it. I love our house. 

3. Low buy all spring - did remarkably well with this. Saved money all year. 

4. Take Owen on a fun trip this summer - that baby child had an epic summer. 

5. Find a job in Houston - DONE DONE AND DONE. 

6. Save for the iphone X - purchased in January. Love that thing. 

7. Lose 15 more lbs - oops. can't hit all the goals, eh? Goal for 2019 is to lose 25 lbs. EEK.

8. Find a workout studio in Houstonn - YES MA'AM. not only do I have a great studio, I work there and we have an awesome community. 

9. Buy a peloton bike - Got it! Love it! 200+ rides under my belt. I'd say this goal was crushed.

10. Read 20 books - EPIC FAIL.

11. Reorganize all my workout plans - this goal was a tough one to meet with the way the year went. But I'm not mad at it. Life just had other plans. 

12. Survive the move and be nicer to Adam - I think we're good. We had a very, very tough year but at the end of it all, I love this man even more and can't imagine doing life with any other partner. 2018 was hard but what doesn't kill you makes you stronger and we. are. strong. now. 

13. Make plans for Scotland 2019 - Booking as a christmas day present to each other. 

14. Run a half marathon - was not in the cards for this year and that is ok. I'm not sure I'll ever run another one but I am doing so much else with my fitness that it's hard to be mad at it. 

15. Do a pull up - I need to see if I can actually do one! 

16. Find a local Houston ride or die beer - yeah. no. not sure this is going to happen. Blood and Honey is my life. 

17. Find a Shady's of our new neighborhood - not only one but we have 3-4 hangouts that we love, where we see people we know, where Bear frequently requests. We are all good here. 

18. Make 3 new friends when we move - DONE DONE AND DONE. We have our peeps we can call when we need. As I said before, 2018 challenged us in ways beyond our comfort zone but I think we're stronger and better for it. 

BRING IT ON 2019. 

**almost half way progress report**

18 Priorities for 2018 

1. Leave the country
Went to Belize in Feb. Already have tickets to go back in August with the whole family, looking into going to Costa Rica in early December. 

2. Find a house, preferably under $300K
Found awesome house, paid way more than I wanted to but we did that for shorter commutes and that is ALWAYS worth it to me. 

3. Low buy all spring
Meeeeeh. I refrained from buying any purses though! 

4. Take Owen on a fun trip this summer
Belize is planned. We're also going to have some fun times in Dallas for a week. My original plan to go to California driving will take too long and I wasn't anticipating being working already. 

5. Find a job in Houston
WOOOOOO DONE! 

6. Save for the iphone X
Also done! 

7. Lose 15 more lbs
First I have to work on the 10 I gained while moving.  But I still think I can achieve my goal if I work at it for the rest of the year. Trying to give myself a little grace because moving is hard. 

8. Find a workout studio in Houston
YUP! Just need our studio to open :) 

9. Buy a peloton bike
Best investment ever. 

10. Read 20 books
I'm a little behind (as in maybe zero books read) but I did join the Houston library the other day 

11. Reorganize all my workout plans
This one is a scratch. I have all new workout plans to memorize. 

12. Survive the move and be nicer to Adam
Part 1 complete, Part 2 in progress, haaaa. 

13. Make plans for Scotland 2019
Will work on this in December. 

14. Run a half marathon
Need to get on that! 

15. Do a pull up
Not sure if this one will happen but I am still working pretty aggressively on upper body strength. 

16. Find a local Houston ride or die beer
In progress. 

17. Find a Shady's of our new neighborhood
We found a reasonable substitute at this point but it's not quite the same... still searching. 

18. Make 3 new friends when we move
In progress! 

2018 To Do List

I saved this in my phone when I did it just before the New Year but apparently it never made it here for posterity:

18 Priorities for 2018 

1. Leave the country

2. Find a house, preferably under $300K

3. Low buy all spring

4. Take Owen on a fun trip this summer

5. Find a job in Houston

6. Save for the iphone X

7. Lose 15 more lbs

8. Find a workout studio in Houston

9. Buy a peloton bike

10. Read 20 books

11. Reorganize all my workout plans

12. Survive the move and be nicer to Adam

13. Make plans for Scotland 2019

14. Run a half marathon

15. Do a pull up

16. Find a local Houston ride or die beer

17. Find a Shady's of our new neighborhood

18. Make 3 new friends when we move

2017 in progress

Man. This year.

At least, unlike 2016, we knew going in that this year was gonna be hard. We just didn't know what kind of hard that would be and look like but now that we're at the end of November, I feel so full of WE DID IT WE ARE ALMOST DONE WITH TWENTY SEVENTEEN. AAAAAAA-MEN.

Without further ado, a progress report:

1. Learn to relinquish control over things and try to be less stressed about it. Wear my necklace and my mantra bands.  
I suck at this dudes. The damn intention jewelry tarnishes. Need to wear the bands more though. 

2. Do two yoga workshops.
I did one. Which, I'll take it. This year was ridiculous. 

In June, I did a yin workshop to help me since I spent the month subbing a ton of restorative classes. It was amazing and a huge win for me to learn a totally different side of yoga. 
3. Read 20 books.
I need to count again but I think I did it! 

4. Not feel like I overate too much over the holidays when next year's NYE rolls around.
I'm down about 20 lbs from last January. I still have some work to do but my goal is still the same, to not just destroy my body on holidays. So far, I survived Thanksgiving.

5. Help Owen learn the alphabet and some basic math since he's obsessed with numbers.
He's doing so well! 5 day a week school helps with a ton of that so I can't take too much credit but we try to work on math with him as much as we can. 

6. Help Owen to learn to swim better.
I enrolled him in these totally bananas swim lessons that we GODAWFUL FOR ME (he was fine but the teacher was SO STRICT and LADY, this kid is not the next Michael Phelps, sorry not sorry). Will do them again next year. He's great in the pool now. Swimming A+! 

7. Save money for our house projects, mainly the electrical ones.
We got the electrics all fixed up. Now we focus on projects for selling. 

8. Work on the outdoor landscaping.
F minus here. It's hard to care about a house where A) squirrels eat everything and B) you're going to sell it in a hot minute. This was a sad choice of a goal since about 2 weeks in to January we realized "We're Moving!" 

9. Do a low buy in January and in July.
I highly doubt I did this. Either month. I was the worst. 

10. Go on a family trip at some point, even if it's just a staycation.
NAILED IT! We went to Utah to see Adam's parent's new house. We staycationed at the Anatole with my mom in Dallas. We went to Mexico just the three of us. 

11. Save up for better season tickets for both the theatre and hockey.
We ended up not doing theater because the shows kind of sucked! We have similarish tickets for hockey but slightly better. 

12. Pay only in cash for Adam's MBA.
CURRENTLY NAILING THIS! Despite having a semester with no company reimbursement. We are still loan free and he is SO. DAMN. CLOSE. to being done. 

13. Make 1-2 extra mortgage payments.
oops. didn't care about this at all since we'll be selling soon. sorry, not sorry.

14. Make 1-2 extra 4Runner payments.
PAID. IT. OFF. in Feb. BOOYEAH. Crushed it. 

15. Save more money for Christmas this year.
Adam's new pay structure changed the game for us but we're fine. It's Nov 25th and I'm 99% done shopping so... 

16. Do at least one class per month for myself (yoga or barre).
I joined Peak Zone and did a ton of group personal training this year and then my friend opened a barre studio so now I do that several times a week. I also did a lot more yoga this year for myself. I'd say A+++ nailed it on this goal! I'm so happy! 

17. Be more generous with my time, money and friendship.
This is such a hard goal for me to quantify. I'm not sure I did any of this because things worked out so differently for me than we'd anticipated. I have gotten a lot closer to people I already knew, so I guess that Is an ok with generosity of friendship but I definitely almost immediately tell people we're moving to Houston so it helps me to keep somewhat of an armslength of distance between new friends. It's been such a struggle. We also have less money on a month to month so I think I am less generous in many ways. In time, I'm able to volunteer a little more and have dipped into that. I think once we move in 2018, I'll be able to do more with that. I think maybe C+ here overall?

17 for '17

1. Learn to relinquish control over things and try to be less stressed about it. Wear my necklace and my mantra bands.

2. Do two yoga workshops.

3. Read 20 books.

4. Not feel like I overate too much over the holidays when next year's NYE rolls around.

5. Help Owen learn the alphabet and some basic math since he's obsessed with numbers.

6. Help Owen to learn to swim better.

7. Save money for our house projects, mainly the electrical ones.

8. Work on the outdoor landscaping.

9. Do a low buy in January and in July.

10. Go on a family trip at some point, even if it's just a staycation.

11. Save up for better season tickets for both the theatre and hockey.

12. Pay only in cash for Adam's MBA.

13. Make 1-2 extra mortgage payments.

14. Make 1-2 extra 4Runner payments.

15. Save more money for Christmas this year.

16. Do at least one class per month for myself (yoga or barre).

17. Be more generous with my time, money and friendship.

2016 Year In Review

*If you had told me on January 1 that all of this stuff would happen, I'd have laughed in your face. This year was ridiculous in nearly every way.*

1. What did you do in 2016 that you'd never done before?

Bought a house! this was the big, exciting change we had this year although it was in many ways frustrating, anti-climactic (I was expecting the HGTV closing and ours was so lame), and really stressful.  

2. Did you keep your new year's resolutions, and will you make more for next year?

I sucked. Totally sucked.  Yes, will make new goals for next year and try to not suck as much. 

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?

Yes and no? I mean I'm kind of in that stage of life where lots of friends are having babies.  

4. Did anyone close to you die?
A wonderful friend from our church passed away this year.  

5. What countries did you visit?

none this year, which makes me really sad.  This will probably be the same answer in 2017.  

6. What would you like to have in 2017 that you didn't have in 2016?

more mental peace, which I hope in turn will bring me more and better sleep.  I spent a lot of nights having trouble sleeping or having totally awful dreams.  

7. What dates from 2016 will be etched upon your memory, and why?

June 14th, we closed on the house
October 26th, Adam was laid off

8. What was your biggest achievement of this year?

I got certified to teach interval bootcamp style classes last December and it significantly changed things for me because I am now able to sub for almost any type of class.  I spent a lot more time at the gym teaching people, which meant a lot more income for me.  Since we treat most of my yoga money as fun money, it meant a lot of really cool things for us, like season tickets to the theatre and partial season tickets for Dallas Stars hockey.  

9. What was your biggest failure?

Handling stress.  

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?

My foot bothered me for the entire year, off and on.  It's in a better feeling period of time now so I don't want to wax on about it but I do not recommend going to the type of physical therapy that makes you cry because of the pain on the week your husband loses his job. 

11. What was the best thing you bought?

The two packages of season tickets. 

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?

Adam, who handled his lay off like a champion, started school and got a 4.0, worked his butt off and is just an all-around A+ individual.  

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?

Trump voters.  And anyone who thinks they "voted for the babies" when they voted him.  I unfriended/unfollowed a lot of people this year.  

14. Where did most your money go?

The house, new furniture for the house, paying off Adam's undergrad loan and I just added up how much money we saved this year toward the MBA and I'm kind of shocked.  We crushed it and hopefully can pay for the entire degree (minus any company tuition reimbursement (fingers crossed) in cash). 

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?

not living in our horrible former house anymore with our HORRIBLE HOARDER NEIGHBOR

16. What song will always remind you of 2016?

I just heard on the radio that Twenty One Pilot's "Stressed Out" was the number one this year and that is JUST SO APPROPRIATE.  

17. Compared to this time last year, are you: a) happier or sadder? b) thinner or fatter? c) richer or poorer?

a) way sadder
b) way, way fatter
c) neither.  we hope Adam is back at work by Feb. 

18. What do you wish you'd done more of?

travel

19. What do you wish you'd done less of?

cried or just generally being sad or angry

20. How did you spend Christmas?

Christmas was a lot like all of the other holidays of 2016 (Easter was cold and rainy, Owen had an eye infection on Halloween, my dad got sick on Thanksgiving) and we had 35 people RSVP and either cancel last minute or just not show up to our Christmas Eve tamale people so I went to bed crying.  I would like a refund on the 2016 holidays. 

21. Did you fall in love in 2016?

with our house and especially our fireplace

22. What was your favorite TV program?

Mr. Selfridge's.  We started watching it on Prime and it is a delight. 

23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?

Oh yes.  Basically any of the higher ups that are still at Adam's company.  I also have had a hard time reconciling people who I really feel abandoned by.  It's been a hard year and it's funny how people disappear from your life when the times get hard. 

24. What was the best book you read?

I started a bunch of stuff this year and didn't like much of any of it so I'm not sure that I finished an entire book? Maybe I read one when we went to Phoenix in Feb but I cannot remember. I didn't do any book clubs and I've just had such a terrible headspace for getting lost in a book this year. 

25. What was your greatest musical discovery?

St. Motel Radio on Pandora

26. What did you want and get?
a new house and lots of beautiful new furnishings that we saved up for years for 

27. What did you want and not get?

a trip out of the USA, a job for Adam before the holidays

28. What was your favorite film of 2015?
The Secret Life of Pets, we took Owen and all loved it

29. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I turned 35 this year on a Monday.  I did my normal teach two classes in the morning and teach two in the early evening.  Adam had a final presentation at school that night so I ate pizza and watched TV. It was just appropriate and I had no expectations for it being special this year, so there was no disappointment. 

30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Adam getting a job sooner.  I almost said not getting laid off but I think that being away from that dumpster fire is going to work out just fine in the future, even if it did make the last two months of our lives suck a little more. 

31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept of 2016?
"I just came from class and therefore am wearing workout wear"

32. What kept you sane?
craft beer (and this is why I am way way fatter this year) 

33. What political issue stirred you the most?
We went to the G W Bush library and I cried.  I'd give anything to have that man back and I was not his biggest fan while he was in office.  It was just a simpler time.  

34. Who did you miss?
friends that live too far away. my grandmother. 

35. Who was the best new person you met?
maybe this is a part of my problem.  I'm going over new friends in my head and I knew all of them before 2016 so I think a goal will be to have a really good answer for this next year.  

36. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2016.

I really don't know.  I am not sure I learned any life lessons through the house buying or layoffs.  I knew in both instances that being in the middle of it would suck but it didn't make it hurt any less or feel any less stressful.  I just spent a lot of this year being really sad about things I couldn't control, despite knowing that I wouldn't always feel that way.  I guess, if anything, this year reinforced for me that time does heal wounds.  I'm also trying to take away from this year that I need to let go when everything is spiraling out of control around me and try to just ride the wave to wherever it takes me.