Goodbye 2016?...Hello 2017!?

Whew!

I’m not one of those who say they don’t believe in resolutions…well…I kind of am…

I don’t think you need a “Monday” or “New Year” to make positive changes in your life, but I do think that you need to have focus so that you know what you want out of life and have a plan to get there.



‘Cause I don’t know about you, but I can stay nice and busy and make no progress on those vague ideas of what I want to achieve.

I gotta say, 2016 went really fast and kind of felt like one of those wooden roller coasters that you’re not totally sure isn’t going to fall apart at any second. It’s still fun and there are high points as well as low, when you think the track might break, but you live through it…this time;)  As we rattled around, sure that with each loop de-loop we were one step closer to death we promise ourselves we would never make the same life choices that brought us here again…

I read more books this year than I have in a while…No ALL the books I wanted, but a good number.

*Half Marathon Training, * White Walls, * Everything that Remains, * Dave Ramsey- Total Money Makeover, * Where Will You Be Five Years from Today?, * Resolution, *Getting Past Your Breakup, * Two Hour Marathon

I’m debt free including my car, so that’s pretty darn nice. My next step is purchasing some property for all my gardening dreams! Oh, and retirement.;)

I wanted to do more volunteering…I have trouble totaling that up, because I guess technically I could count the community runs I lead but I kind of wanted to branch out and help out in other ways. I did some volunteering but I want to keep that focus so that I strengthen my community in ways that are important to me.

I made AMAZING progress on my project list. That list that has been haunting me for years…so many projects half started, but never finished. I have some focus problems when it comes to creating.

I FINALLY finished:

1. Megan’s lace scarf. Seriously…I’ve had the material for years and it literally took me 10 minutes. How ridiculous is that?
2. Cross Stitch Christmas stocking. I started it about 3 years ago, not realizing just HOW time consuming that project really would be. I ended up taking it to work with me and using my lunch break each day to work on it. By the time I finished it took approx. 110 hours. I also learned I can’t count.
3. The infamous Disney Quilt! Again, it was a project I started about 3 years ago that has been kicking around. I under-estimated the time involved and over-estimated my skill. Appliqueing 49 little Mickey heads…
4. Unicorn helmet cover
5. Monster hat, Seahawk Minion hat, Vixen hat

I failed miserably on sending birthday cards at all, let along on time. So…I’ll have to pay a bit more attention on that. I still think it’s important to make the effort. I really suck at these things.

I managed to hide 5 Geocaches by jamming it all in on the last week…so I don’t know if I count that as a success.

I didn’t really come close to finding 52 caches, I think I found 15 this year. At this point I kind of have to plan special trips or just find the boring virtual ones if I want to stay local.

I completely failed at adding cross training to my fitness regimen. It’s important and I’m definitely feeling the lack of balance. Just little naggy things. I think I need to add it, in order to reach my running goals. I’m so close…but just missing them.

I DID run an amazing Marathon PR! 3:25:52! That beat my previous PR by FOUR MINUTES!

Light at the End of the Tunnel 2016...yes, that's EXACTLY what it felt like:)

I learned a bunch of new recipes this year, and was pretty happy with them. Meal planning/prep is going to be an important focus for me this year. I need to eat more nutritionally dense foods.

 

I’ll be refining, and focusing my efforts on several of these goals in 2017 to make this upcoming year a positive one, that I can feel good about.

 

I want to be proud of how I spent my life.

 

2017…Please don’t be another rickety wooden roller coaster…pretty please?