25 Things - The 2013 Edition

I kicked off 2013 in the best way possible... with some of my favorite people at a low key pajamas-required New Years Eve celebration. Meat pie, oysters, cheese in multiple forms, margaritas, champagne cocktails and more deliciousness were consumed. New Year's Day was spent recovering with a Walking Dead marathon.

I started back to the gym (again) last week, which was admittedly poor timing. I'm not going to beat myself up over it and this time I've set what I think are very reasonable goals. Sure I'd like to weigh what I did when Jay and I started dating, but the fact is that I wasn't all that healthy back then. Although I was working out like a maniac, I had some pretty unhealthy eating and drinking habits. My new goal is to lose about 13% of my body weight and to work out at least three times a week. My previous goal had been to lose almost 20% of my body weight, which I think was probably a recipe for failure. When I get down to my goal weight, I can decide if I want to lose those last ten pounds.

I'm looking forward to these 25 things in 2013 (not resolutions - and also not in order):

1. Be more positive
2. Lose ~13% of body weight (or eat healthier and exercise at least 3x a week)
3. Start a few plants from seed for the garden
4. Come up with a new budget and stick to it
5. Get rid of the red couch and chair that I freaking HATE
6. Purchase new furniture and decorate downstairs
7. Put together a time capsule for our house
8. Blog at least twice a week
9. Get organized - important documents, books, seasonal items, etc.
10. Be in good enough shape to hike the Tongariro Alpine Crossing (aka Mount Doom) in New Zealand
11. Raise a small flock of chickens for meat (at least six)
12. Sell some eggs, otherwise we'll be overrun when the new chickens start laying
13. Snorkel the Great Barrier Reef, even though I'm scared of being eaten by a shark
14. Snuggle a koala
15. Install the heat pump downstairs
16. Make room in the budget for a cleaning service
17. Get the crawl space insulated
18. Have photos done and send Christmas cards out this year 
19. Fence in yard
20. Hatch out some silkie and black/red star mixes 
21. Say no and not feel guilty afterwards
22. Have an awesome time at the Mardi Gras Ball
23. Can tomatoes from our garden
24. Print "before" collages to frame and hang in the house
25. Use at least one week of our time share

We'll have to see how active Mount Doom is for #10. Apparently it has erupted quite recently!

That's all for now... I suppose that I should start working on my next blog post and plan my next gym visit!