2012 Goals

This year is going to be absolutely crazy, nuts, busy, and a whole lot of fun! To start this year off with a bang here are my 2012 Goals!

1. Read my 2012 book list! After my 2011 list I'm scaling back so it's less stressful! Stay tuned...it's coming soon!
2. Lose an additional 40lbs and meet my healthy weight range!
3. Run 4 days out of the week.
4. Complete my 5K race in May in under 30 minutes.
5. Participate in a 10K race.
6. Create and stay on track with a weekly chore list!
7. Scrapbook two layouts a month.
8. Celebrate our Anniversary - This is very important to us!
9. Complete my Hawaii, 2008 and 2009 Scrapbook Albums.
10. Leave more spare time to relax! Meaning scheduling in free time and weekends on my calendar!

There you have it folks! I think this year I'll print these out and tape them to my bathroom wall to keep me motivated! I am so excited to get started on my goals!

Who else has 2012 Goals or Resolutions!

2011 Wrap Up

Boy oh boy did the last couple weeks of December fly by! I couldn't even make time to post but I'm back and ready to start 2012 off with a bang! First things first - lets do a recap of my 2011 Goals.

1. Dress up for work 4 days out of the week. (We have a pretty lax dress code but I want to start dressing more business casual instead of jeans everyday) - FAILED! I tried but then I shrunk out of my pants and have been waiting to buy new work slacks. When you don't need them for work it's hard to justify spending the money on new work pants. Plus I realized I'm very lucky to get to go comfy to work so I am taking advantage. Point in fact - today I'm in sneakers, jeans, and a sweatshirt!


2. Work 40 hour workweeks!! I am sick of working extra hours so this year it's 40 hour work weeks (Overtime ONLY when absolutely NEEDED and NEVER on a Friday) - ACCOMPLISHED! This year I only worked a few hours of overtime when it was absolutely needed! I wish I could say I never did on a Friday but it turns out Fridays are the best times for me to work overtime. I accomplish way more and then I get to go home and veg with the honey!

3. Lose 2 dress sizes by Summer (3 by Christmas) - Somewhat Accomplish/Somewhat Failed - I lost 2 dress sizes but not until October. I am almost down one more but alas, I did not meet the goal by the end of the year. However - I lost 53 lbs this year and started excercising 3-4 days out of the week! That to me makes up for the dress size.

4. Read 2011 Book List - ACCOMPLISHED! Yes the side tracker says I didn't but if you notice my original 2011 Book List was 46 books and I read 49 this year!!

5. Clean the house top to bottom every week! - HAHAHAHA FAIL!! This was definitely a wishful thinking goal. We just got so darn busy that it didn't happen. I will say though we have a new cleaning goal for 2012 that is totally attainable! Stay tuned...

6. Take Buster to Camp Bow Wow twice a month - Half Fail/Half Accomplished! This one is half and half because we did take him twice a month and then I started excercising and started taking Buster 3 days outo f the week. The Camp Bow Wow was to give him some excercise but once I started walking him we stopped taking him twice a month. He still goes but since it's expensive we cut back!

7. Finish my bookkeeping certificate - ACCOMPLISHED!!

8. Finish up the Home Improvements (List coming soon) - With the wedding planning (and saving) we did very minimal work on the house, which I knew would happen. In case you forget I made my goals before our engagement, which definitely put a damper on some goals, but hey there's always this year right....or next year :)

9. Scrapbook 2 layouts a month - ACCOMPLISHED! I successfully scrapbooked at least 2 layouts a month!

10. Finish my Hawaii album - FAILED!! I completely forgot this was a goal until yesterday. Where I spent all afternoon working on it, with only one layout left to do I am positive it will be finished before the end of January.

11. Spend more time with friends - ACCOMPLISHED! In fact I overbooked myself too much in 2011 and started hating making plans. While I love spending time with friends I found myself overly stressed over life and committments so this year my friends - Yes we will spend oodles of time together but I'm going to say No a lot more to give myself some downtime!!

12. Date night EVERY week! - FAILED!! We were extremely good at this until Chuckle's got his new job, now it's like date night every single night and weekend!! Plus when the weather got cold we wanted to stay home! But we always make sure to do something on date night, whether its playing games at home or at least going out to eat.

13. Take a FUN vacation - like Hawaii, Vegas, Disneyland, or a Cruise - This got put on the back burner due to our engagement. But we PLANNED our Honeymoon for this year so I think it counts!!

14. Go camping at least 4 times - Again with the engagement we decided to cut back costs and we lost quite a few weekends, BUT we went 2 TIMES!! So I deem this an accomplishment! Once just us two for our big vacation and then once for the Annual Campfest! Both times were so much fun! 

15. Celebrate our Anniversay (we never do cause I am so not into those things) - ACCOMPLISHED! We went to the Melting Pot and had a great experience! So great we are going again this year! WOOHOO!!

I hope everyone had a wonderful 2011, a Safe New Years, and most of all that you completed your goals you set out to complete!

For this year I am going a little more specific and probably a few less with the weddings (yup my Seester is getting married this year too) taking up all our time :)

Happy New Years Everyone!

Baking Day 2011

Excuse the interuption but I have to share a few pics from our 2011 Annual Baking Day!!

This past saturday I headed on down to my Mom's for a whole day of baking and hanging out with my awesome family!!

Here we are at the end of the day, all cookied out, but still smiling!

This year I brought lunch (since I'm trying to stay healthy) so I brought in the amazing new recipe I discovered for Grilled Chicken Sandwiches. 

And since I don't want to bore you with a bunch of shots of us just baking away I will share with you our final product picture! We filled Mom's entire table (like usual)!!

Our grand total was more than last year - we made a total of 460 cookies which calculates to 38.33 dozen!! WOOHOO!!!  

And out of all those cookies all day long I ate ZERO! I didn't have one single cookie until I got home that nihgt! YAY me! Normally I'd stuff my face ALL DAY LONG!! Cause when you are surrounded by cookies what else is there to do but eat away! Nope I kept myself in check and I couldn't be more happy or proud about it!

However the minute I bit into the Salted Caramel Stuffed Chocolate Truffle Cookies my Mom made it was all over from there. They are soooo amazing!

How is everyone else's Holiday Baking going?

oH mY

Do you ever come across pictures that make you LOL or that completely capture a moment! Yes I'm sure you have, who doesn't? And that is the reason we take pictures right? to capture a moment?

Well how about catching a personality?

Recently I went and got some pictures from my parents that I've been needing and in those I came across these two super funny pictures and I have to share!

I love this picture cause my Paps and I love to goof around and horseplay! This picture to me shows how we have been for as long as I can remember. I even have a picture from when I was in junior high (or possibly freshman year of high school) that I've kept cause it captures this same thing.

Personally I love photos that are not posed and that really capture more than just a "snapshot"

Now my Seester will kill me for posting this but I laughed my ass off over this one.

Of course my Paps took it and it captures the "WTF" look on my face showing off my attitude as well as my Sister's more relaxed attitude. She may look goofy but it shows her laid backness in comparison with my more "showing" attitude!

While I know that there was nothing going on in this picture warranting a WTF moment, but how can it not look that way right? No we were simply hanging out at an event for Father's Day and my Paps just snapped at a great moment!

I of course have many other pictures with these moments but it's been awhile since I've come across new ones.

In fact one of my favorites is one of my Mom and I on one of our annual baking day! It is a very clear Mother/Daughter role picture because even though I was 19 (or possibly 20) my Mom is scolding me for goofing off in the kitchen. Was she seriously "disciplining" me? No, but our body language and my facial expression remind of a little kid getting caught with their hand in the cookie jar! It is seriously one of the best pictures cause I know it's just my Mom and I's playful way :-)

So I'm risking some backlash from my lovely Seester about posting that picture but I have to share cause these are two awesome pictures that I intend to get developed just for me. Who knows maybe one day I'll combine all my favorite "moment" pictures and do a mini scrapbook!

Who else has some funny pictures to share?