am i really 25?! (birthday ramblings and the finally tally on that 24 in 24 list)

a funny thing happened with mine and alices birthdays this year: they happened to fall in the same week. now i know everyones like "well DUH victoria thats what happens when things are six days apart", but please hear me out. USUALLY (as in, the first three times alice had a birthday), things spaced out in a way so that our birthdays (though only six days apart) happened on VERY MUCH DIFFERENT WEEKS. she was born on a wednesday, my birthday was the next tuesday, her first birthday was on a friday, mine followed on the next thursday, last year hers fell on saturday, mine was the next friday. two birthdays, two separate weeks. intense, sure, but totally manageable. 

well, this year, her birthday was on sunday and mine was the following saturday. meaning, we had two birthdays in the space of ONE WEEK. 

i know mathematically this makes no significant difference, but psychologically this was a HUGE DEAL. totally freaked me out. so much so, in fact, that i scheduled MY birthday party (what? i turned 25, of course im throwing myself a birthday party) for a WHOLE WEEK after my actual birthday just to give me the mental space to acknowledge each birthday separately and not go insane. 

which on the one hand was super great because i got to have a whole weekend to be spoiled rotten by my husband and family: james happened to be home the day that my aunt took alice out for HER birthday so he treated me to dinner, a surprise shopping trip, AND gifts friday night, and my mom made an INSANE birthday dinner on saturday (my actual birthday) and it was amazing. but on the other hand it is a little weird that my birthday has come and gone and we still havent officially celebrated yet. but hey, you only turn 25 once so might as well spread it out for the whole month. 

oh, and its totally weird that im actually 25. i realize that this is maybe an unacceptably low age to have an existential crisis, but (due to having young parents and an exceptionally accurate memory of my early childhood) i totally remember my PARENTS at 25. i remember my mom being 20. I AM NOW HALF A DECADE OLDER THAN MY EARLIEST MEMORIES OF MY OWN MOTHER. i mean, i vividly remember making my stepdad a birthday card when HE turned 25 (my mom had me cut out shapes from construction paper to make a collage, but she had to cut out the numbers because i was 6 and that was too hard for me i guess). and i cant possibly be as old as my parents, can i? 

yes, yes i can. because thats how time works and my parents arent currently 25 and im being an emotional idiot about this whole thing. dont mind me, im just over here being dumb. 

and to be completely honest, 24 was a roller coaster that i am MORE than happy to get off of (im just not into roller coasters, ok?). 

so yeah, thats whats been going on in my head as i get ready to actually celebrate my birthday birthday with the first full-blown birthday party ive had in quite some time. im really excited about that. i seem to be growing into the kind of person thats really into parties, i guess. 

but theres another thing thats been on my mind a lot lately: 

that 24 in 24 list i made a year ago, back when our life was in a totally different place and i was going through a super goal-oriented checklist-y phase made some goals that quite frankly, i havent thought much about in recent months. so id like to shift gears and take some time to reflect on both this years accomplishments, as well as how our life has changed/priorities have shifted and, oh, i dont know, actually finish a thing that i started. maybe 25 is the age where i start finishing things i start. maybe. 

anyway, heres the list:

1. find a better place to live. ill be completely honest here: our tiny ugly crappy apartment in a less than great neighborhood had been a huge source of shame and embarrassment and feelings of inadequacy for a very long time. but in recent months, ive really grown to embrace our current home and the benefits of small-space minimalist living. so this one isnt even on the radar right now. and you bet ill be writing more about this soon. 

2. find a new hobby just for me.  in march i started taking fashion classes at the (conveniently three blocks away) local community college and its (mostly) awesome. after this semester i only have 8 more classes and then im a fashion designer!   

3. hit 25,000 blog page views.  i just checked and im actually just past 65,000, which is pretty ridiculous when you factor in this years extended hiatus. 

4. do a craft fair.  yep! i sold at create 2014 back in august, and while it wasnt a rousing financial success, i AM (both mentally and equipment-wise) ready to re-enter the craft fair scene (though more events will have to wait until the shop cash flow gets better)

5. quit my job at joanns. done and DONE. six months in, and i am STILL in love with working for jamberry. 

6. write a business plan. unfortunately, business (at least in the PL department) has been on the back burner because 1. school, 2. jamberry is where im actually bringing in the bacon, and 3. i really need some time to relax and not always be WORKING on stuff. so, no longer a priority. for now. 

7. take a family trip. this one got repurposed into "take a super amazing grown-ups only vacation to the best city ever", but ill still count this one as done. 

8. find a new family hobby. i surrender. disneyland is our hobby. so much so that were upgrading to the nicer passes and um maybe possibly founding a social club? maybe? 

9. try a new restaurant. with our recent development of a stable income and my guts deciding to calm the heck down, weve been able to try several new places and omg im REALLY into trying new restaurants now. 

10. clean out my closet.  ok, so i thoroughly purged my closet in march because there was a clothing drive at the blogger brunch i went to. we got rid of like three trash bags of stuff then. i started a (more vicious) purge over the summer, and while its taken me FOREVER to get through (every time i think im done, i find five more things for the pile) i have about TWICE that amount of clothes heading out the door. 

11. make something just for me. this one got shifted to "buy myself something absurdly expensive" instead, when i treated myself to a KELLY MOORE CAMERA BAG with my first big jamberry bonus!

12. make $100 from blogging.  i accomplished this sometime before my half birthday, but due to the aforementioned hiatus, i havent made much progress beyond that. 

13. color my hair an actual color. in case you havent noticed, ive added some pink. 

14. take alice to the zoo.  mission accomplished!

15. sponsor some new blogs.  ive lost count of how many new blogs ive sponsored over the past year, but breaking out of my original "blogging circle" has probably been the best blog-related decision ive ever made. 

16. get better at sewing. im in a sewing class right now, and while we havent gotten far into the territory of "things i dont know how to do", i HAVE learned how to use an industrial machine AND an overlock, and i have VASTLY improved on the things i do know. so well count this one as a win. 

17. publish my original knitting and crochet patterns. yep! well, a couple of them. the only ones that were really any good. 

18. host a dinner party.  not a "dinner party" per se, but we have had a couple of informal MST3K gatherings in recent months, which have been surprisingly successful. 

19. take real family pictures. havent gotten here yet. 

20. purge useless files and backup our computer. or here. but please bear in mind that james has been working hours the likes of which he has never worked before, and im taking three classes this semester, so neither of these last two have been things we even have time for. 

21. get a new tattoo. james and i both got new tattoos in july. he got an anchor, i got a peach (you can see mine in these photos). and because we are excellent parents we took alice with us and watched the whole thing and now she really likes "the tattoo store" as she calls it. 

22. get at least 12 etsy orders. um, nope. but please let me remind you of the whole back burner situation. 

23. start doing yoga again. yoga takes too long and im really impatient but i did find a 10 minute cardio/ab thing thats worked wonders for the sitting-to-much-related muscle spasm in my back/hip, as well as helped me gain a few pounds of much needed muscle so i dont feel like my bodys going to fall apart at the seams any more. its a good feeling. 

24. learn to relax. a year ago, this seemed like a tall order. six or seven months ago, this seemed IMPOSSIBLE. but the biggest, most important result of all the changes and craziness thats happened in the past year, is that i am totally capable of relaxing now. i have by no means become transformed into a naturally easygoing person, i mean, im still super uptight and controlling and anxious, but not all the time. actually (james probably doesnt want me saying this in public), at one point during our trip, i told james to chill out. so yeah, im pretty happy with my progress in this department. 

so whats the final tally? 19 out of 24 goals were completed (either exactly as planned or shifted to a similar accomplishment), and four of the five not-completed goals were things that are no longer priorities (family pictures though... that one still needs to happen). not bad for a flaky art school dropout that never finishes anything.... this was actually pretty fun. 

will i make a 25 in 25 list? i dont think so. not because i dont want to make goals, its just... we seem to be in a place where we need to start thinking in the longer term. like, maybe a 30 by 30 list will be coming your way soon...

maybe...

(winky face)