At the beginning of the year I had two categories of goals that I’d set for myself, down from five in 2012 and four in 2011, and certainly down from six in 2010 and TEN in 2009. Because I think I said it pretty well in my 2011 ‘accomplishments’ post, I’m just copying and pasting and editing where needed:
For the past five years I’ve set year-long goals for myself, and at the end of 2009 I did a retrospective, “Here’s what I accomplished, and here’s where I failed” post. Like the previous two years, I have no intention of talking about what I didn’t do, but prefer to focus on the highlights. What I did accomplish. I will, of course, set new goals for 2014; after all, if I have nothing to strive toward then I’m merely floating along, just being. I’d rather be doing than being. Those posts will come later.
If you’re interested in knowing what my goals were for 2013, you can click here and that’ll bring you to everything I’ve written about regarding them (don’t worry – there are only 3 posts from all of last year). If I haven’t written anything about them below, you can deduce that I didn’t meet my own expectations. The good news is, though, that I achieved more than I originally thought would be possible. And that’s my focus right now.
So, without further ado, in 2013 I (we):
- Paid off the camper. And Tony’s truck, which we bought when he returned from his deployment. I haven’t talked about the latter because, quite frankly, I’m embarrassed that we own a vehicle that’s too large to fit in our garage. And we also took out a loan to buy it, which I had sworn we’d never do again. BUT the day after Christmas the title for it arrived in the mail, which means we own both of our cars and the camper outright. I am more than proud to announce that we are 100% DEBT FREE! Granted, we don’t own a house and are just renting right now, but not owing money anywhere else means we can start saving to buy one when someday we’re ready to settle down somewhere permanently.
- Got our emergency fund back up where it needs to be. I had thought it was under-funded until I checked our account balance while writing this post, and lo and behold! It’s more fully stocked than I realized. Yay me!
- Sold our house! I talked about this already, but while Tony was still gone I got the house all repaired, interviewed several real estate agents, got it staged, and accepted a full price offer on it three days after it went on the market. We closed three weeks after Tony got home, and squatted in a friend’s house for a couple of weeks before living in our camper for the better part of a month. It was a fun adventure.
- I am better about not using my phone – and definitely avoiding my computer – during the hours that The Critters are home. I still actively use Voxer to stay in contact with my Colorado friends, but I don’t listen or chat when any other members of my family are around. I also do everything in my power to avoid doing anything work-related when they’re home. I get plenty of time to myself when they’re at school (and when Tony’s at work), and I don’t feel the need to take time away from them when they’re around.
- When we first moved into our house here and The Critters started school I had a really terrific work schedule for myself. It worked really well for about a month, but then the websites starting having many unexpected issues, and that’s when Tony’s work schedule picked up. I have not yet figured out how to work around him being home. But I have a beautiful and functional work space that’s waiting for me to sit down and get back at it.
