Photo Credit: usdigitalpartners.com
After posting my 2014 goals, I realized I’d better hold myself accountable for this year’s! For 2013 I mostly made fun goals but there were a few that required some work:
Re-do the home office. This was my first project last January and the new office is where I do my blogging and spend all my online time now.
Clean up my work office. Yes. BUT it was not completed until the day I left my old job, so I didn’t experience the benefits. Serves me right for procrastinating!
Inventory and pare down my wardrobe. Done – I am happier with my reduced selection of clothes that I really like and wear often.
Savings. I met my goals for long-term and vacation savings. NYC in 2014! The one thing I’m proud of is that I paid for a a couple of major expenses, like dental work and home repair, without dipping into the new savings. However, I was going to get a couple of dings in my car repaired (estimated at $1000) and I’ve delayed it.
To Buy List. I planned to keep a list of items I needed to buy, so whenever I was out and about, I could check my list and focus on Needs instead of Wants. Somehow I kept forgetting to make the list. Coincidence? Making this list is now on my To Do list for 2014, LOL!
Canning / Preserving Food. I reviewed how to make pickles with my mom again this year, but didn’t make any further progress.
Meal Planning, Real Food and Vegetarian Eating. These have all become second nature. But I am going to have to acknowledge that my candy eating has gotten out of hand.
Here’s what happened with the fun ones:
Scouting out the best vegetarian restaurants. Done! We now have a roster of go-to restaurants that we patronize as much as possible (for a couple that only dines out once a month!)
Work with a shared entertainment budget. Rom and I each contributed an equal amount to an “entertainment budget” and we used it to pay for event tickets and outings all year. When we had a surplus we had extra meals out. We ended the year in the hole because we bought expensive tickets to see the Black Sabbath reunion tour next April!
Go to a greater variety of music shows. I would have to say this was a fail. We went to the symphony once, and an ambient music show during the jazz festival. Otherwise we continued to see rock shows all year. I am going to try again on this goal! I had wanted to see a live opera film, a drag show, a folk show, a rockabilly show, and a Celtic punk band 🙂
See a bunch of movies from my life-long cinema list. I have a long list of movies I want to see before I die, and I did not see a single one of them in 2013! In fact, this was my worst year ever for movie and DVD watching. There was always something else I wanted to do. Plus, I got a little bit obsessed with Game of Thrones instead…
Read 12 of the best-reviewed graphic novels of 2012. I have read 8 from my list, and the library has 3 more. I’m really happy I made a point of doing this because there are such impressive books in this format. I have already started reading the Best of 2013 titles in the hopes I won’t always be a year behind!
Take better photos. I was hoping to take a photography course to make better use of my DSLR. Not sure if this will happen. I hope my photos will not get any worse!
Drawing. I wanted to get back into drawing a little bit, and I posted recipes with hand drawings here and here. I enjoyed it but found it very time-consuming, so future editions may be few and far between!
CELEBRATING. Finally, I wanted to celebrate every month and not just have a big blow-out in December. I think I accomplished that, and there were things I enjoyed every month of the year. I am almost ready to see out the old year and find out what 2014 has in store.
For those of you who are taking a blogging break for the rest of December to celebrate holidays, I wish you the happiest! I will still be here 🙂
An Exacting Life 
Z and I also got tkts to see Black Sabbath in SK in April. Mostly just to see Ozzy’s awesome hair!!
Cool! I must say that Ozzy is probably my least favourite Black Sabbath singer but, you know, he is still The Ozzness!
And there’s me ‘having’ to go and see Justin Timberlake in April…I..’d rather see the Sabbath lol
I haven’t seen many pop shows, Laura, but I’d like to see a big production show like that!
Oh gosh it’s that time of year isn’t it? Looks like you knocked some of your goals out of the park. Good stuff. I really like the idea of a “To Buy” list.
Some out of the park, some strikes!
I love to see annual reviews! What a wonderful year you’ve had 🙂
It was all in good fun – except for saving money, I was not too serious about anything!
Well done! I especially love your celebrating throughout the year. A lovely way to make sure you appreciate things and don’t let the bad things dominate – I’m going to try it!
Thanks – since I became an empty-nester a little over 2 years ago, I’ve wanted to be sure I “have a life” 🙂
Love the range of goals – from having fun to organising and tidying. I love the idea of celebrating and having fun. We can become so busy at work and with work, and save our best selves for work. And it is also so easy to be caught in a rut, and do things out of routine.
I have found Mr Sans and my weekends are a bit stale. We catch up on household chores and sleep but not much fun things. Luckily we’ve had three brilliant holidays this year, and have another one to NZ in a fortnight.
Oh, good for you on the vacations! I suppose our default is that we go to a lot of rock concerts and the occasional meal out – anything else requires a bit of planning – and that’s where we’ve been trying to step it up. Otherwise we are fine with lazy weekends! Last winter we went out to a nice coffee shop most Saturdays which brightened up the day.
I usually don’t do New Year’s goals but I may this year especially related to organization and better eating. I started my clothes inventory and plan to do a post about that in the new year. My number 1 goal of course is to get a full-time job.
Yes, employment is always the priority! I look forward to your clothes inventory post. I think if you cut back on candy/sweets, maybe I could, too…
Good stuff!! I don’t even remember if I made year long goals… I doubt it though, I have enough problems remembering them from month to month! lol!! Do you have any iGadgets, can I can recommend a fabulous APP for you that will help you learn how to use that DSLR!
You bet – I love my iPad Mini – please do recommend an app!
Well done! 🙂 My husband and I had talked about attending a photography class together but it fell by the wayside this summer. Maybe next year.
Have you heard of Happy Cow to look for vegetarian places? They allow you to search by location for vegetarian and vegan restaurants (none around me, but I can’t wait to use it during our next vacation). http://www.happycow.net/
I hadn’t heard of Happy Cow but it did bring up some results for my area just now! I started out using the website of a local vegetarian association. Where we live is a manageable size (maybe small for some) so we have hit all of the major choices this year!
I’m quite rural (the nearest towns are home to 400 and 1,900 people) so I’m sure your city would be huge to me, haha 😉
Loved reading your goals for this year and looking forward to seeing what you achieve for 2014!
Thanks, Jen – Happy 2014!
Wow what a great year you’ve had! Enjoy the holidays and I cant wait to see what you achieve in 2014!
Thanks, April. You always do so much, too! Happy 2014!
I love reading back on “Goal” updates. I think the Celebration theme has really shone through all year. What a great year, full of positive happenings! All the very best for Christmas!
Hi Fiona, Fortunately there weren’t many negatives to report – it was a good year. I can imagine how busy you are right now – enjoy Christmas and New Year’s!
Congrats on all the achievements. I dropped off my 2013 goals tracking in about October, or maybe November, after most of them were on course, or totally off!
I enjoyed you choosing to celebrate every month, I think that was a genius idea.
Thanks, Sarah. I kind of forgot about some of mine toward year end. Happy Christmas!
Sounds like you met most of your goals, and I really like that you had some fun ones 🙂 Real food has become second nature to me too, but I also eat too much chocolate
Have a great Christmas 🙂
You too, Liz! And you know I am a candy fiend!