Another Birthday List

I realized that I never posted my list of what I plan on doing this year for my birthday list. Here is the list in it’s entirety, including what I’ve already finished. Now that I’ve been living with it for a few months I’m not sure that I like some of them so I might change them up. I love doing this again this year.

1. Finish the WiTL 2014 book
2. Get totally caught up on at least one podcast
3. Participate in NaNoWriMo 2015
4.  Do Week in The Life 2015
5. Spend a weekend at The Farm with girls
6. Do a Whole 30 challenge
7. Get a photo of us framed and hung
8. Buy a new set of sheets 
9. Get rid of all the old baby stuff in the house
10. Learn a new braid
11.  Learn how to bake bread
12. Make more Vietnamese food
13. Eat at Everest on grand & tan po po
14. Go camping
15. Take each boy out to dinner for a mom date
16. Go to 4 movies in the theater (Inside Out, The Force Awakens)
17. Listen to 2 books a month (Aug, Sept, Oct, not Nov, Dec)
18. Meditate every other day
19. Do yoga 3 times a week
20. Work on learning crow pose
21. Make a photo book for WiTL 2015
22. Do an amazing toast at Halo’s wedding
23. Hold a plank for 60 sec
24. Read one physical or e- book a month
25. Finish The Desire Map
26. Get hot for Halo’s wedding
27.  Finish Shay’s baby book
28.  Start Shay’s school book
29.  Cook food at least 4 times a week
30.  Reach out to people about device training as an independent contractor
31. Get a horcrux tattoo
32. Rent another house from airBNB someplace
33. Downsize the books in the house
34. Make 4 quilts

33 Things To Do While I’m 33

Last month I turned 34. A year ago I created a list of 33 things I wanted to do while I was 33. I read about it on a blog somewhere and I thought it was a great way to mark each year, try new things and be productive. I accomplished about 75% of the 33 things on my list for last year, which I think is pretty good. I’m certainly going to aim to do more this year.

I think it’s important to think about what your goal is in writing a list like this. I didn’t just want to fill the list with things I knew I was already doing, although I’ll admit there are a few of those on there. I included things I hoped I would accomplish, things I hoped I would do and things I didn’t think would happen but wanted to. Many of them were straight forward things. Do it and it’s done. There were very few long term projects and only one emotional/mental thing on the list. I think that contributed to my success of accomplishing so many of them. I created a school album for Gabe. Done. I made a few different kinds of ice cream. Done. This coming year will be very different as I’m going to focus more on less tangible goals and more on mental and emotional accomplishments.

I loved doing this, by the way. It was an awesome way to measure a year and to do things that I probably wouldn’t have otherwise. I would highly suggest it to anyone.

1. Go to 6 movies in the theater (dec- the battle of the five armies, jan- the box trolls, June- age of ultron, July- home, mad max)
2. Refresh sheets and towels
3. Learn how to make a pie crust that doesn’t fall apart
4. Paint our bathroom white
5. Learn how to do a perfect wing
6. Learn how to curl my hair with a curling iron
7. Get my ombré hair back
8. Organize and downsize my wardrobe
9. Perfect my hollandaise
10. Take a trip with Matt
11. Go camping
12. Learn how to edit for story, not just line edit
13. Explore making different flavored of ice cream
14. Create a school album for Gabe
15. Have a wknd in sf by myself
16. Invest in higher quality clothing not just cheap crap
17. Have a dinner party
18. Make a book about the Seattle trip
19. Stay at a cabin with my mom and sisters
20. Finish the 2nd and 3rd draft of my 1st book
21. Read at least one book a month
22. Go out more with friends
23. Get some current photos of us framed and hung
24. Have a lot of prep done for nano 2014
25. Participate in Nanowrimo 2014
26. Plant something and take care of it
27. Organize and attend another lovebomb
28. Become someone’s virtual assistant (Twitter for Holey socks art, consultant for Jacki z)
29. Buy awesome boots
30. Buy art in Seattle trip
31. Get an iPhone 6 
32. Try not to be mean mommy
33. Get an awesome photo of the 4 of us at the cabin

All the Books- August

No cover shots this time around, there are just too many books. A couple are kids books so they went fast, and I was often reading more than one at a time in a variety of formats. And we went on vacation for a week so I read more there too.

Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard: (physical book) This was good but not great. I’d recommend other YA books over this one.

Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton: (ebook) I read this ages and ages ago and enjoyed it just as much this time around. Go dinosaurs!

Wizard and Glass by Stephen King: (downloadable audiobook) I love SK and I love The Dark Tower. And I actually listened to the entire thing instead of skipping the middle since I find it boring.

A Wind in The Door by Madeline L’Engle: (downloadable audiobook) A Wrinkle in Time is one of my favorite books ever so when I saw this available as a downloadable audiobook one day while I was searching through Overdrive I had to snatch it up for a quick listen, which it was. And I loved it.

A Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeline L’Engle: (downloadable audiobook) Ditto

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by JK Rowling: (downloadable audiobook) I waited forever for this one from the library. I’ve read it a bunch of times but there’s something different about listening to it. Another fave.

The Shadow of Night by Deborah Harkness: (ebook) My other favorite series is the All Souls Trilogy, of which this is the 2nd. This is the 3rd time I’ve read this one and it will be the 2nd time I’ve read the last one. I looooove them.

All in all it was a really satisfying month of reading!

All The Books- July

July feels like it was a less successful month reading-wise but I probably just listened to a lot of podcasts.

The Book of Life by Deborah Harkness. I finally let myself finish the All Souls trilogy and I actually read a physical book to finish with the Book of Life. It was the perfect ending to what may be my 2nd favorite series ever (it’s a hard race between Dark Tower, Harry Potter and this).

Bag of Bones by Stephen King. Other than the Dark Tower this is my favorite SK book. I recently got this from Audible and it’s the only book that Stephen King reads himself, which for some reason makes it that much more awesome to me. I’ve read it a bunch of times and I will continue to listen/read it over and over again.

The Waste Lands by Stephen King. More SK. I’m working my way through The Dark Tower on audiobook and each month using my Audible credit to fill in the DT books I don’t already have. Next up, Wizard and Glass, which is my least favorite book of all of them, I really don’t care about young Roland. However, that’s up for next month!

The Desire Map

I was given this book by a friend called The Desire Map by Danielle LaPorte. It’s supposed to help you create goals with soul, which is a hell of a catchy subtitle. As to whether or not it works we will see. I’m only through 2 pages of the workbook but along with the awesome Amy thought I would share some of my work here.

Here are some of the pre-work questions and my answers.

I crave: peace of mind, safety, laughter, feeling sexy, feeling smart

Other than time or money what I want more of is: peace in my heart, his hand in mine, mindfulness with my boys

I need to give myself more permission to be: daring, calm, fearless, joyful, honest with myself, sad

So there’s the beginning. It feels huge and overwhelming but I’ll keep slogging through it even though I’m not too sure about the end result.

All the Books- June

June was a big month for listening!

Cress by Marissa Meyer. The third book in the Lunar Chronicles. I was so sad when it ended because I had no idea there would be another book after this! Winter is coming out in the Fall and I can’t wait!

half of The Illustrated Man and The Golden Apples of the Sun by Ray Bradbury. I just couldn’t finish either of them, although I love Ray Bradbury. The Veldt and The Fruit at the Bottom of the Bowl are still two of my favorite stories of all time though, I highly recommend them.

The Drawing of the Three by Stephen King. The Dark Tower is my favorite series ever and I’m working my way through them all again. I could spend all day with Roland, Eddie, Susannah and Jake.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by JK Rowling. Because it’s Harry Potter. What’s not to love?

All the books- May

It’s a bit past May but I still think it’s worth sharing what I listened to last month.

The Tommyknockers by Stephen King (e-audiobook on iPhone 6, borrowed from the library)

Inferno by Dan Brown (e-book on Android tablet borrowed from the library)

Salem’s Lot by Stephen King (e-audiobook on iPhone 6 that I bought from Audible awhile ago)

I hadn’t read Inferno before, it wasn’t great, but it wasn’t horrible. I read it while we were in Seattle. Both The Tommyknocker’s and Salem’s Lot are books I have read many times and it was great to listen to them because it felt like every once in a while I would pick up on something that I might’ve missed while reading it.

Yay for e-books and e-audiobooks!

Summer Goals 2015

A blogger I love does this every year and I never have so I thought I’d try it out. These are my goals for the summer:

1. To finish my damn quilt already. (I’ve been working on it since the fall)
2. Learn how to make a  mojito. (I need to branch away from G&T’s)
3. Go camping
4. Make caprese panini’s
5. Can some stuff from our garden
6. Go to a museum
7. Embrace a later bedtime
8. Let stuff go 

#GrinsWamSeattle

This place is blowing my mind. I feel so connected to Seattle and yet kind of melancholy at the same time because it would be very difficult for my family to pickup and move out here. I guess I’ll settle for the constant longing. 

   
                         

Waterlogue

I use a lot of apps for editing and playing with the photos I take on my phone. One of my favorites is the Waterlogue app. With this app you can take your photos and turn them into watercolors. One thing I’ve found is that it works really well with landscapes or photos where there isn’t a lot of small details because they get lost in the translation from photo to watercolor. I could spend all day making these kinds of photos and watching as the app first draws your photo and then fills it in little by little with color. There are different styles of watercolor that you can choose from but I always find myself going for the same couple that I really like. Here are a few of my favorites from the past month.