New Year, new rules....

Happy New Year! Welcome to 2016!

Somehow I only managed a whopping two posts in all of 2015. Most of my activity was on Facebook, but even there I've kind of been under the radar.

Why? Who knows. 2015 was really a bit of a mixed bag. It had some really great times, like the Rush concert I went to in May, and celebrating our 25th wedding anniversary with a wonderful two-week trip to Germany including a week-long river cruise. It also had some not-so-great things, such as DH breaking his leg mid-year, although he's mostly recovered now. Other noteworthy events were DD getting her driver's license, and a job change for me.

Primarily, though, I came to the realization in June that I was losing motivation to work on large stitching projects because I diligently timed them, and that became a bit of a hassle at times. And hobbies are supposed to be fun, not drudgery. So after much thought, I decided that I'm not going to bother with timing my projects anymore, and just stitch or yarncraft what I want, when I want. And I've been much happier. I did finish several small projects - Ink Circles "Metamorphosis" and "Namaste" as well as my 2015 ornament design, and finished the maid section of Teresa Wentzler's "Fantasy Triptych". I'm currently on a crochet project, a Tunisian-technique afghan, and have other yarncraft projects I'd like to do, and there's unfortunately only one instantiation of myself.

Anyway, I'll start by looking at last year's goals.

2015 Goals

• Read 7500 pages - 8946 pages! Maybe I need to increase my reading goal.
• Do 10 101List items
  - I did 5, which is actually more than I'd thought.
• Rauros to Isengard (Merry and Pippin's path) - Finished in August
• Isengard to Minas Tirith (Merry's path) - Only 112 of 578, but I should arrive this year.

So...on to this year.

2016 Goals

• Read 10,000 pages
  
• Do 10 101List items - I've decided to retain this for now, but I expect my next list may be rather different, as I rework things. I would like to finish the magi panel for Nativity, and Around the World in 80 Stitches as two of these, but we'll see.
• Isengard to Minas Tirith (Merry's path) - Only 112 of 578, but I should arrive this year.
• Isengard to Minas Tirith (Gandalf and Pippin's path) - At 517 miles, I don't expect to make much progress unless I get more diligent about exercising. Which admittedly would not be a bad thing.

2016 will see some other changes, or at least that's the plan. DD has expressed a desire to eat dinner together as a family more often than we have been the past year or so, striving for 4 times a week. I think that's a wonderful idea - she'll be heading to college before too much longer, and it might also serve to have all of us eating healthier. I also need to get back to exercising regularly again, though I have yet to specifically quantify what that entails.

I do want to blog more regularly as well, and maybe I need to do that in the form of weekly updates for what I'm reading and crafting, and how I'm coming along with exercise and other important goals. Holding myself accountable, as it were. Mondays are probably a good time to update, because I will have had the weekend.

So....we'll see how it goes.