Grab some coffee. And a muffin. Or a green monster smoothie if you are on a New Year’s resolution kick. This is a long post high-lighting the best of my 2013. I am actually quite surprised at all that I accomplished and all of the life changes I went through this year! Although it was a process to put together, this post helped me realize how much I learned and grew in 2013.
You might want to check out these posts as well:
Best of 2013 Writing Wrap-Up for my favorite posts (freelance and on the blog).
January:
The beginning of this year I made the move to Lincoln, Nebraska, only an hour away from my hometown to go to school. I moved in with a wonderful roomie, who I found through DailyMile. Crazy, right? I wrote a post for her entitled “Dear Future Roomie” to help her know me better. I had been living with my dad for two years previous and before that I had lived on my own since I was 18. I got pretty spoiled living with him!
February:
Dave was working in North Platte at this time (on the far far west end of the state whereas we are both from the far eastern end) and I got to visit him around Valentine’s Day. I also kicked off a blog challenge where I called everyone (including myself) to love others and love yourself. I am hoping to do this challenge again, but maybe a little more structured…with prizes or something??
March:
This is when I found out that my roomie’s mom’s cancer came back. I felt awful for her, but never really did figure out how to help her. All I could do was listen, run with her and pray. I did end up running a 10K Leprechaun Chase with her this month which was pretty fun! I also had the opportunity to visit Dave while he was working in Kansas City.
April:
I finally joined the twentieth century and bought a touch screen phone. I had used my Blackberry for years. And I finally got on this Instagram thing everyone was talking about. Life changed! 😉 This was sort of a birthday present to myself as I turned 26 this month. I celebrated with Dave in Kansas City with some good eats. April was the month of the Boston Marathon explosions, which I still can’t even believe. I did not know anyone personally who was affected, but it was just one of those moments when you realize crazy things can happen anywhere. This happened when my first ever half marathon was only a month away so I definitely had some apprehensions running it. On a more positive note, I was able to go home for Easter and hang out with the family.
May:
After I wrapped up the semester at UNL, I ran my first ever half-marathon.With Forest Gump aka a friend with a sense of humor who loses his razor quite frequently.
This was quite the accomplishment for me since I had trained and failed to run two others! I then made the tough decision to move to the twin cities with Dave since he finally got a permanent position! We had been dating long distance for two years and decided we couldn’t spend another day apart.
I headed to my second Blend Retreat and had an amazing time hanging out with my blends! (blogger + friend = blend)
Oh then I wrote a fitness post that created much controversy and learned a few things about blogging: 1. don’t name names, 2. people read my blog, 3. there are fitness cults other than cross-fit. 😉 (Note that I added a wink to the end since I am simply poking fun. Don’t want a recurrence of May’s post.)
June:
June brought us moving day! This was the first time I’d ever moved out of the state and I will be honest, it was scary as hell. I was away from family and friends. I didn’t have a job. I knew about two people in the area and not even that well. Dave worked all the time, so I unpacked the apartment by myself while watching Netflix all day. I was, however, super excited to have my very own fridge (even wrote a whole post about it) and to be located right next to a sweet walking path. I also got to hang out with Becky, whom I’d met at Blend Retreat.
July:
Dave’s job was pretty rough at first since he was just getting used to things. It seemed like once a week he would get called about a problem and stay out all night. Him staying out all night = me waiting up and worrying all night. This unfortunately happened the night before the 4th of July. Becky was nice enough to have us over to watch fireworks from her amazing apartment in Minneapolis.
I blogged more than usual in July due to the fact that I didn’t have a job and had no real friends here (Becky moved to Chicago shortly after I moved up here dangit!). The funny thing was that since blogging was the only thing I felt like I had to do, it became stressful. I had blogging anxiety. I also had way too much time to get into my own head. This resulted in a slight depression and the need to pin all the motivational quotes possible. I did have a fun giveaway with some delicious Justin’s Nutbutter cup and was entertained by all of you and your chocolate-obsessed selves.
I was also able to head down to Des Moines and run the Color Run with blends Calee, Alex and Mollie.
August:
I started my blogging 101 series, which is an on-going series all about blogging. I had some guest posters write on the topic was pretty helpful since I had just gotten two online writing gigs. I was applying for jobs like crazy and ended up getting a sweet one at a gym cafe.
The pay isn’t anything to write home about, but it is seriously the perfect job for me. I am on my feet, in the fitness industry and talking about/making food!! In July I was also in the midst of raising funds for Girls on the Run (a crazy undertaking, let me tell you).
We celebrated Dave’s 25th birthday in style (at Chili’s haha) with our one friend who happened to move up to the area shortly after us.
September:
Dave and I finally made it to one of the infamous farmer’s markets in St Paul.
This was also the month I attended my first blogging conference, the Healthy Living Summit.
I met a lot of awesome gals, ate a lot of delicious food, and learned so much. The one thing I recognized about this trip (which happened to be in Minneapolis–yay!) was how confident I have become as a blogger and with meeting new people.
October:
With all of the excitement from HLS, I decided to make the leap by switching to self-hosted with Bluhost on WordPress. Julie from Deluxe Designs helped me with the process. Let me tell you: it was a process. At one point I was sobbing on my couch because I thought all of my pinterest photos and other links were ruined because they all had 404 errors. (No joke-sobbing.) The very day I was sobbing on my couch, I somehow pulled myself together enough to hang out with Lee.
We even managed to get a few good snapshots of me for my new and improved blog.
November:
This month I kicked off another 30 Days of Thanks Challenge.
This is actually my third year in a row! I think next year I might do some prizes or something because it is quite the challenge to keep it going all month!
December:
Yep, the recap is almost over! December brought about my revelation that I am in fact supposed to be studying for the NASM personal training certification. I have to take the test in March and I am a whole 3 chapters into it. Yikes. The year wrapped up with spending two entire weeks in Nebraska with family and friends.
Looking back, I realized I did accomplish a few things and am truly blessed. I might need to bust this post out again during those moments when I get all mopey and woe-is-me-my-first-world-life-is-terrible.
Okay, enough about me. Seriously! I want to hear from you! Link-up your “best of” posts below so I can see what you’ve been up to this past year or tell me your biggest accomplishment of 2013 in the comments!
PS I’m all about Pinterest this year, so I would LOVE IT if you could pin one (or two!) of these images. Just hover over the image to reveal the “pin it” button or use the handy dandy buttons at the bottom and top of each page (I know, right?). Also follow me so I can check out YOUR Pinterest account! 🙂
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So happy I got to see you several times this year! <3 <3
And by this year, I mean last year…err 2013. 😉
Yes we really did see each other quite a few times despite living in different states!! You know you can come to that bootcamp/brunch in a couple of weeks here… 😉
You had an eventful year! That is exciting you’re going to take the NASM test!
I just need to get to studying haha! And yes when I list it all out, I feel pretty accomplished! 🙂
Such a great year for you! I remember when I made the switch to being self-hosted. SUCH a hassle!
It was a crazy hassel, but luckily I had help! 🙂
It’s amazing how much seems to fit into 12 short months isn’t it? Congratulations on all your goings on this year, and good luck for the year ahead. I’m very glad I found your blog in 2013!
Thank you so much for reading, Jo! 🙂
Loved reading this recap- so much I had missed out on since entering the blogging community slightly late! Here’s to an amazing 2014!
Thanks, Arman! So glad you joined the community!!
I love wrap up posts or really anything that let’s you list all the things. I’m digging your monthly bullet points and can’t wait to link up my recap tomorrow. A link up to a link up. It’ll be sweet.
I didn’t realize you and your man lived long distance for such a period of time. I’m doing that with my Hubby now, and I’m not a fan. It’s definitely been an adjustment for me.
Happy Sunday.
A link up to a link up sounds strangely like Inception… clearly I need to stay in the loop though or I miss out on all the fun!
Such a great year and I love being able to look at it as a year in pictures along with the bullet list (Monday’s a list days after all!) Congrats on what sounds like a very successful year and best of luck with everything you are working towards this year!
Thank you so much, Sarah! Yes, lists for the win!!