Leaving 2013 Behind and Embracing 2014

Good morning!!

I am not usually at work on Fridays and it is making me feel productive today. I only have one class for 30 minutes, so 7.5 hours of hopefully productive bliss!! I have a LOT of my Bloglovin feed to get through today and my other goal is to clean out my inbox. Have you ever heard of the website Unroll.Me?

Okay, I stumbled upon it during one of my daily Buzzfeed reads and oh em gee I am in love. Basically, it scanned my email and found all of my subscription and then I could either a) unsubscribe, b) leave them in my inbox or c) "roll them up" aka they go to this website and I can read them here at my leisure but my inbox will be clean, clean, clean!!

Can you tell that one of my goals this year is to simplify?

With that being said, let's get into the nitty gritty of this post. It's my 2013 recap / 2014 goals post. I'm excited about this one. I've been thinking about it for almost 2 weeks now, but that damn sickness kept my brain from thinking clearly.

I like to start things with the future so here is my very short list of goals for 2014. Of course, I want to finish my 25 by 25, so it isn't that small. But, I digress.

1. Create and keep habits. You might remember from countless 2013 posts, but I have the hardest time creating habits - even those as simple as flossing my teeth every night and washing my face every day. No more!  This breaks down to:
1. Morning routine of: brush teeth, wash face, makeup, accessorize, drive, walk, read blogs
2. Night routine of: brush teeth, floss, wash makeup off
3. Weekly routine of vacuuming my room
2. Simplify and organize my THINGS. Yesterday I started reading Living Well, Spending Less and, along with the other blogs I try to read about living simply (The Art of Simple) it is inspiring me to get rid of clutter - something I have done a lot of recently. I am proud of myself and excited to continue this. I would love for mine and Iman's first place as a married couple be less cluttered than our tiny apartment we had last year.
3. Have an intentional marriage. Lately, I have been reading blogs about living intentionally and in the moment in your marriage - working everyday for things to be wonderful and to love more when you are feeling hurt. Communication, all of it. I want Iman and I to have a wonderful first year of marriage.
4. Get back to my feminist roots. This might sound scary for some of my blog readers but I'm not going to go all feminazi on you. If you read my archives from the very beginning of this blog, you will find that most of my posts centered around a topic or an issue I am passionate about. This is, after all a dream of mine. I would get burnt out only writing about those topics. Last year, I switched my blog to be more personal and lifestyle. This year, I want to find the medium. 

I am excited about these goals, and so far all that I have had is thought about them. I haven't begun them because I have been focusing on returning to my health (i.e. flossing my teeth sends me into a coughing fit for 15 minutes, so I'm waiting on that one). lol.

2013

January

This is the way my cat sat the entire ride from LA to OC when we moved. The other cat sat in the litter box the whole time, happy as a clam

This is the month that we moved out of our apartment and moved back to Orange County. Both of us returned to jobs we worked at prior to moving up to LA (Buffalo Wild Wings for me and Papa John's for Iman). Iman also quit smoking this month, we did a lot of wedding stuff (like venue searching), and we saw a bunch of old friends. 

 February

I made Strawberry Chocolate chip cookies, Red Velvet Crinkle Cookies, Chocolate and Confetti cupcakes

In February, we did a lot of working because we weren't making much. Iman was not yet a general manager again and I was only serving. I began babysitting this month. I baked a ton of goodies for my Bdubs friends and a cake for Iman on Valentine's Day. That is as romantic it got besides doing our registry and finding what we thought would be our wedding venue! 

March

After this trip, we printed this picture on a giant canvas that hangs in our room :)

In the beginning of March we went on the Anaheim Ducks Diehards Roadtrip to see the game in Arizona. It was what we called our last big trip before saving a bunch of money for the wedding...we then continued to go on amazing trips all the way through now. lol. Effective. We also pushed our wedding back this month, I got a near perfect secret shop at Bdubs and Iman's obsession with bowling began at his brothers' birthday. It became a weekly thing at this point :P I began blogging again this month with my attempted Thankful Thursdays and From Hot Mess to Organized Challenge

April

In April we bowled a lot and worked. We took our only trip to Glamis (boo!), went to Vegas (yay!) and I particpated in my first Carabox. I also quit babysitting and began working at the auto shop this month and Iman moved to a bigger store with Papa John's. I made the blog more into a lifestyle blog this month.

May

This was drunk me the night before we went on that awesome hungover hike. This dog rock climbed with us

In May, we got awesome haircuts, bowled a ton, worked even more (this is when I began 60-70 hour work weeks). I went to my first ever bridal shower. We also celebrated Memorial Day with friends and went on this crazy hike that was actually more rock climbing. Iman injured his knee falling off a sort of cliff and it took like 2 months to heal. 

June

Probably one of the best days of my life

We started June with our engagement photoshoot!! Then we headed to Vegas to celebrate both of our birthdays with friends! We spent a lot of time at our friends' pool because the weather was warm and we had what I call The Great Room Swap of 2013. Aka, all 3 bedrooms at my mom's house swapped residents. We also got our first Datelivery and did it...we still have a bunch piled up to do. We also attended Iman's cousin's wedding in San Diego and stayed the night down there.

The perks of working at Buffalo Wild Wings

July was a very rough month for us. We had a wonderful 4th of July, but July is always a rough month because July is both Iman's mom's birthday and the anniversary of her death. One awesome thing is that I won this Beertender and all of these cups at a Buffalo Wild Wings meeting. This is the month that I picked out the fabric for my wedding dress!! I also wrote this hilarious blog about my favorite workout excuses.

August

Some Bdubs regulars painted my car like this :)

August was spent with a lot of work, bowling, tanning and the beginning of football. We also did a lot of karaoke-ing. Karaoke always is better in the summer at Bdubs, but, after 3 years they discontinued it in November.

September

This is the one weekend a year I get to see a bunch of my amazing friends

In September, we took a trip up to Thousand Oaks and I saw a lot of friends I hadn't seen in a long time. There was my favorite weekend of the year (Sand Sports Super Show) and we filled the rest of our time with football and bowling. I wrote some cool blogs like why I don't have baby fever but my fiance does and a letter to my someday daughter.

October

This is our awkward high five circle my mom had us do when we finished making Save the Dates

We made and sent out the Save the Dates in October! I took my first pole dancing classes, went to my first sample sale and quit the auto shop and started teaching!! I had some good content like: proof that I am a workaholic, things that girls do when they live together, and things that I should be doing

November

At the game we met Philadehlia (a Youtube sensation) and Philly

This month we celebrated our 2 year anniversary with an amazing trip to Oakland to see the Eagles kick the Raider's asses. I almost met my first blog friend, Megalin, went to a babyshower and we did our first color run! Iman got an award from Papa John's for having the highest Halloween sales in the franchise. He got his promotion this month! I quit Bdubs and highlighted my life with anxiety.

December

December was full of holiday stuff and I loved it. We saw a lot of family and friends we hadn't seen in awhile, went to Vegas and went to the totally Crappy Holidays (aka Sinister Pointe's scary holiday maze.) I spent most of this month on antibiotics. lol. CMWQ stuff happened!!

What a crazy year! Looking back, I realize we took way more trips than I thought we did and we probably could have saved more but what was important is that we had such a blast doing it. There were a lot of tough nights sprinkled in, but we have really pulled through as a stronger couple. I feel stronger than I did halfway through the year. We've helped a lot of friends this past year, something I didn't even skim the surface of in this blog post. I wouldn't change 2013, but I am so excited for this year! 



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