2016 in Review

I know 2016 has been a total bust for most everyone and yeah, there have been some really upsetting parts, but oddly this has been one of my best years ever. 2015 was my personal dumpster fire so there was no where for me to go but up!

2016 was the first year I actually nailed more than one New Year's Resolution. I attribute a lot of this to reading Better Than Before - Gretchen Rubin, which helped me identify smarter ways I personally can achieve success in making habits. I also made a conscious effort to make goals of varying degrees; some were big, some were small. Completing the small goals helped motivate me to keep going on the bigger ones.

Goals Completed:

• Wear bright lipstick - I now unconsciously grab a bright lipstick to wear nearly 3 times a week. It was a small goal, but it forced me to be brave
• Get a black leather jacket - Black Saturday (best time for shopping!) I scored the jacket of my dreams after trying on nearly 30 different kinds
• Get ready everyday - Being a stay at home mom means it's really easy for me to stay in yoga pants all the time. I've noticed that I don't really ever feel ready to tackle the day when I'm in pj's, so this was an important goal for me. I defined getting ready as "no pj's, makeup, something done with my hair" and that worked great.
• Cook more often at home - My specific goal was to only eat out once a week, and have leftovers for lunches and one dinner, meaning I'd only need to cook 5x a week. I didn't hit this every month, but we have saved over $2000 in eating out expenses so that's a big a win for me. Plus, dare I say I even enjoy it now that I'm more in the habit??? I think I've really nailed down how to cook if you're Type-A and it's been awesome.
• Read something gospel related everyday - I'm probably most proud of this goal as it's one I truly did. Somedays it was a scripture verse, other days it was 3 conference talks. Either way it's been a huge blessing
• Attend the temple twice a month - We owe Nicole a massive thank you for helping us achieve this goal. We didn't meet it in August with my being sick from the pregnancy, or this month (December is so busy!) but we've gone more regularly this year than any previous year and that's a huge accomplishment.
• Read 3 books a month - Since I'm counting re-reads in this I can say I nailed this one. It's helped rekindle my love of reading and keep my mind occupied with more substance than social media usually offers me
• Explore Utah - Once the summer months hit and Kyle became very busy with work, and I dealt with first trimester grossness, we tapered off on this goal a bit, but overall we hit nearly 70% of the places I had planned for us!
• Start a garden - I really let it go once the first trimester hit, and we had a few learning curves to hurdle over, so this wasn't as successful as I wanted, but we still managed to get a few things to grow and ate a number of delicious salads from it
• Get pregnant - .....Check
• Visit all the parks in the Provo/Orem area - I got about halfway through them, which was about 30. Again, first trimester sickness stuff threw a monkey wrench in the plans, but half if better than none!
• Outings with friends twice a month - I didn't hit this one perfectly; I get extremely nervous in new social situations so I really have to force myself to go. I did attend the Harry Potter Book Club events more frequently, and Liz, Jill, and I have a standing lunch date once a month that I've really enjoyed. Again, proud of what I did, but there's room for improvement.
• Try new things - Probably my vaguest goal, but the overall idea for me was to lean into the discomfort of the newness. I tried aerial yoga (ouch) and went to a wreath making class, we did archery, I practiced a lot of new cooking methods (I made lobster!!), got over the hurdle of trekking two kids to places (it's so much easier to stay home!), went river rafting, got through 6 weeks of BBG before the miscarriage and morning sickness hit, and really nailed down my personal style.
• Blog more frequently - check!
• Notice the "aha" moments with my kids - When pregnant with Livvy and dealing with the post-partum/pregnancy depression, my therapist told me that one way I could keep myself from feeling like I was drowning in motherhood duties was to identify at least one "aha" moment with my kids. Any moment that I could think, "this part makes me happy", write it down and reflect on it like a talisman throughout the hard times. I haven't needed to do this for my own sanity so much this year (thankfully!!) but continuing the practice has helped me foster and recognize the gratitude I have for my kids.

Goals to continue:

• Learn Spanish - I got to be about 40% fluent (or so Duolingo tells me) before I trailed off on practicing. My proudest moment was being able to read the entire short story on the back of the Chipotle bag! Definitely one to keep at.
• Church attendance - Understanding that we had a new baby at the beginning of the year, making it all 3 hours of church has been a STRUGGLE this year. I'm trying to pinpoint ways that I can make this easier on us all
• Learn how to do webpage design - Didn't even attempt that one tbh
• Food storage - We didn't do too much with this, but now that I'm cooking more often I do feel more prepared and able to use the food we have in storage. So, half a win?
• Save money - We didn't do as well as we'd hoped to do for various reasons, and I think nearly everyone wants to do better saving money than they currently are. The good news is that we already have some really concrete goals and plans of actions in place for next year, so I'm looking forward to our progress
• Fitness - Kyle rocked this goal; he's been attending the gym at least 3 times a week since the middle of summer and has made some good gainz. Jessica has, uh, not done so well since getting pregnant so that's the next goal to work on.
• FHE - We've been working on this goal more so the last few months now that Milo is a bit older and can participate. We really had to throw out our own experiences with this so we can better tailor it for our family's current needs and that's been helpful. Doing a simple FHE consistently (ours takes 10 minutes tops) is better than doing nothing since we can't do an extravagant one without massive tantrums!
• Purge Closet - I think I've flushed out my personal style this year quite a bit which is great, but that does mean my closet has kinda taken a beating as a result of trial and error. So goal, not accomplished. However I'm already a bit ahead of January's purge; I started a separate IG account to sell some clothes (@jessicatuftscloset) and I've got a plan of action to tackle other untidy parts of the house.

As pleasing as it's been to complete a lot of goals, the best part has been that I genuinely feel proud of what I've accomplished. My biggest hurdle and blessing in life is my perfectionist nature. In 2016 I made huge strides in learning to not sweat the small mistakes I made - not letting perfect be the enemy of the good - and it's been wonderfully freeing. Even in the areas I didn't do as well as I'd wanted, I still feel proud of myself for what I accomplished and that feeling is more valuable to me than anything I completed.

In January I identified my word of the year as "Become" and I feel like I finally hit a point in my life where I gave myself the freedom to grow in nice ways. It's not that all the lessons I learned this year were easy, some were the hardest I've gone through yet, but my reaction to growth has changed a lot this year and it makes me happy to see what that has allowed me to become.

Here's to looking at 2017 and hoping it can be at least half as good as 2016 was for me. And maybe it'll cool it with all the celebrity deaths! ;)