Today is the 100th day of 2023! The only reason I know that is because I’m doing Project 365 and caption all of my photos with the current day of the year, hehe. It’s been a good start to the year for me, and I’m excited to talk about the progress I’ve made on my 2023 goals!
APARTMENT
1) Move to a two-bedroom apartment – No progress made. This is a Q4 goal.
2) Hire movers for my move – No progress made. This is a Q4 goal.
3) Change up my entryway – Complete! I’m so happy with it.
4) Buy a new mattress and bedframe – Nope. This will get done in Q2, though!
5) Install a bidet. I probably won’t do this until I’m in my new apartment. It seems like a lot of work when I’ll be moving in 6 months.
HEALTH
1) Go for a walk every day – (51/90) I’m 57% successful with this goal so far.
2) Complete 100 Peloton workouts – (23/100) I’m two workouts behind.
3) Drink at least one bottle (16 oz) of water every day – (36/90) I’m 40% successful with this goal so far.
4) Get a sleep study done – No progress made. I think I need to go through my primary doc for this and she has been on leave. I need to call her office and see if she’s back! Perhaps I’ll get this done in Q2.
5) Research my options for LASIK. My goal is to schedule a LASIK consultation in April, so hopefully I can mark this complete in my next update.
6) Establish a better morning and nighttime routine. I have been doing really well with my morning routine, but my nighttime routine still needs a lot of work.
MONEY
1) Have $3,000 saved in my CapitalOne emergency fund and $500 in my bank emergency fund by the end of the year. No progress made. I would really like to focus on building my bank emergency savings account back up in Q2.
2) Switch to a rewards credit card. No progress made.
3) Do a weekly budget check-in. No progress made.
4) Donate $50 to the following three charities every quarter: I made a few donations to an animal charity in Q1, but kinda fell off the bandwagon for the other charities. Just means I need to double-up in Q2!
HOBBIES
1) Read 100 books. (30/100) I am 5 books ahead of schedule!
2) Complete the A-Z reading challenge. (13/26) This challenge is always easy in the beginning since I have the whole alphabet to choose from! I am way ahead for this goal (I need to log 6-7 books in a category every quarter.)
3) Publish podcast seasons regularly throughout the year. So far, so good! We released season 3 in January/February and started releasing episodes for season 4 in late March.
4) Make a website for our podcast. Not complete. I’m not sure this is something I want to invest in. It’s a bit more expensive than I thought.
5) Complete my blog categorization project. I’m doing one year of recategorization every month, and I got through 2009-2013 in Q1.
6) Host a silent reading night. Not complete. This will likely be a Q4 goal.
7) Watch 6 movies and 6 standup specials. (2/12) I am behind!
- Glass Onion
- Jim Gaffigan (live standup)
FUN STUFF
1) Go tubing at Rainbow Springs. Not complete. I may try to do this in May or June!
2) Take a knife skills class. Complete! It was so much fun!
3) Learn how to French braid. Okay, I have been spending a lot of time working on my French braiding skills. We randomly started talking about it at book club last month, and my friend Katie showed me how to do a French braid. I won’t consider this complete because I still need to perfect my skills, but I’m excited for the progress I made in Q1!
4) Visit one new state. Not complete, but it will be in Q4! My mom, stepdad, the dogs, and I will be spending a week at a cabin in Tennessee at the end of December. I’M SO EXCITED! I’d also love to sneak in a short weekend trip to Charleston, if possible. We’ll see!
5) Get a tattoo. Not complete.
6) See a Dolphins game in person. Not complete. A Q3 goal!
7) Complete Project 365. So far, so good! I have taken a photo (or done a Reel) every day of 2023.
8) Go on at least 5 first dates. (2/5) And the second of those first dates has morphed into a real relationship. It’s not something I expected, but the best surprise of the year.
Oh, a date that is turning into something! How exciting!
I think you did great on your goals! Your French braids look really good!
It’s been a wonderful little surprise!
Thank you! I keep working on those French braids and I’m slowly getting the hang of it. 🙂
That is the best surprise of the year! YAY!!!!
Your french braids look fab to me!
When you mentioned a rewards CC initially I signed up for two of them. They are giving me minor rewards, but it’s better than nothing. Thanks for the idea!
I knew it was day 100 from my “hiding a rock a day for the year” challenge 🙂
LOL, I’m glad one of us is being rewarded for the goal I made! I just need to make it happen already and stop dithering about.
Oh yes – you’re also doing a daily challenge so you get it!
OOohhh…I must admit to have a lot of nosy questions about your new relationship, but I’m going to wait for you share when you’re comfortable.
I love how all of us are jealous of your French braid goal. I really should try to learn, too, but I’m so bad at spatial things that I think it will be super frustrating. Hm. Maybe I’ll just watch your progress and be proud of you!
I’ve been really proud of myself for figuring out the French braid! Although last weekend, I was trying to do them and one side came out perfect and I could NOT get the other side to look good for anything. I tried, like, 4 times and finally had to give up. Guess I need to watch a few more Youtube tutorials before I consider myself efficient!
That entryway looks so lovely – and also very practical! I’m a huge fan of hooks. Our entryway still has a lot of bare walls. I planned to go to IKEA today to get a few floating shelves but things conspired against that (a bad car battery, so I spent the morning at the auto shop instead)!
I can French braid quite well – but only if I’m doing someone else’s hair. It looks like a 3-toed sloth got loose on my head if I try to braid my own hair. Sigh.
Gotta have the hooks so I’m not searching everywhere for my keys every time I need to leave! The practicality of hooks is everything.
Braiding your own hair is much different, it feels like! I feel like I could probably French braid someone else’s hair, but I’m still struggling with getting the pattern down right for my own. I’ll get there!
I’m so excited that you are in a blossoming relationship! Squee!! I am excited to hear more about this person when you are ready (feel free to text me if you want to gush about it at all – to be clear, I am not romanticizing dating because it is generally God awful, but it is fun when you are excited about a new person!)
Q1 was kind of a dumpster fire for me to be honest… I know it was colored by the stress of work in the month of March but it was just such a hard month that it totally colored my first quarter. 🙁 But I have really ingrained myself w/ the sales force since I’ve had to do so many client calls!
It is very nice when dating feels more fun than awful! It’s been a nice change, that’s for sure. 🙂
I’m sorry that 2023 started off in such an awful way for you! I hope things start easing up soon so that work isn’t as stressful and all-consuming as it has been. <3
I want to hear about the relationship! I am sure you will talk about it when you are ready but I just want to say that I am very happy for you, and I think you can call that goal a success even if you never get to five dates!
I am also curious to hear about your blog categorization project; maybe you have talked about it before but I definitely have found that I have too many different tags but I still want to be able to search or group my posts when needed; what is your strategy for this?
My blog categorization project has been going on for way too long, haha. I’ve been blogging since 2009 and some years, I was blogging 5 times a week, so there is a LOT to go through. I started by listing out in a spreadsheet every single post I wrote with the date, the category, and any tags I’d like to add. Then, once I had gone through all of my blog posts, I figured out the categories I wanted to keep. (I had a lot of categories and didn’t need all of them.) Now, I’m going through the blog posts year by year and making sure the photos are showing up, typos are removed, and the right category/tags are listed. I’m also giving all the posts a meta title for SEO purposes. It’s a lot of work but breaking it down in chunks like this has been very helpful!
I used to wear my hair in a French braid a lot when I was young and worked at a hotel. It kept is out of my face and looked neat. After I got good at that, I saw a coworker with a beautiful braid that is basically the opposite of a French braid, called a Dutch braid. Instead of going over, you go under. Fun!
You are doing very well with your goals! I love my credit card points. And having an emergency fund is a very smart goal.
Ahh, the Dutch braid! I want to learn that once I master the French braid. They always look so cute!
First, I’m soooo curious about your new person! but also realize that you will share more when you’re ready. In the meantime, can I just be excited for you? (And hope that things are still good since this is a super-duper late comment?) <3
And second, wow, on the French braiding! So impressive! My lack of skills in this area is only one of the reasons I'm debating whether a pixie might be the best option for me… 😉
And finally, I think I've said this before, but you have a really lovely approach to decorating your home. I love your entryway – but it's nothing I could ever come up with!
Things are still going well in the dating department! 🙂
I love having long hair, but a pixie is such a cute, easy-to-manage hairstyle. I say go for it if you think you would like having shorter hair!
That is such a lovely compliment, Anne. Thank you so much!
Oooh, now I’m even more excited to (eventually, hopefully) learn about your person. 🙂
The one thing keeping me back from a pixie is my history of Really Bad Short Haircuts. I trust my stylist now more than I’ve trusted my past stylists, though, so perhaps I shall bring it up with her in May… 🙂
I love how you document your progress and hold yourself accountable.
Your entry way is so cute. Did I tell you that I bought that same key shelf after I saw it on your blog? Now if only I had a place to put it (no wall space right by the door). Hmpf.
So excited to hear that there’s someone special in your life. Yay! Hope that’s still going strong!
I didn’t know you bought the same key shelf! That’s exciting. I hope you can find a good location for it. <3