my crystal ball for 2016

Happy 2016! I hope you had a great New Year’s Eve!

We stayed in, had a date night (like this one), rented a couple movies, watched the ball drop and then went to bed promptly after.  Totally lazy celebration on our part, but incredibly fantastic, really.  What did you do for New Years? Was your 2016 celebration go/go/go?

Last year was a welcome surprise.  We’ve struggled with something every year prior, from unexpectedly changing jobs to mass chaos.  2015 was not so bad, all things considered.  We did lose a couple great people, and my Grandparents took a turn for the worse.  No one escapes the circle of life, and we deal with that the best we can.  All things considered, especially in light of how we ended 2014, 2015 wasn’t so bad.

Did I tell you that Joe had a fluke accident right before Christmas 2014? He basically ripped his arm off.  He slipped off a skateboard, landing hard on his hand and resulting in a compound dislocation of his elbow.  While he didn’t have any broken bones, his arm was attached to his body only by nerves.  All soft tissue was severed and it was a scary prognosis.  Because of his field of work (carpentry), we were more than concerned with his recovery and what it meant for his career.  Luckily, Joe is a mutant.  He rebounded FAST.  He was back to work on light duty within two weeks, and is totally fully recovered.  Better than normal if you ask him. 2015 was good to us in this way.

2015 was good to us in many ways, actually. We gained a new nephew and niece, we welcomed a new brother-in-law.  We experienced Ocean Beach with our puppy, took a really cool gun class together, watched someone’s first skydive and reveled in our memories of long-gone drop zone days.  We made some great work friends, went solar on our house, celebrated three housewarmings, cheered on our niece at her graduation (at my old high school!) and discovered Tucson together. I transferred the blog to a different platform, checked out some new places in LA for Spring Break (also check here, here and here), celebrated my tenth year at work,  and went on the trip of my dreams to Europe (here, here, here, here, and here ). I got me a new closet, experienced my first Garth Brooks concert and faced the first year without our annual Pumpkin Party (see amazing past parties here and here).  I worked hard to build my photography portfolio, and went red. Did I share my new red hair? Here are a couple pics:

All in all, I’m pleased with 2015. If I had a crystal ball, I imagine I’d see a great 2016. The new year gets me all excited, and I end up dreaming big for the coming months.  I feel like every time an old year is celebrated and remembered, it’s a chance to consider what worked, what didn’t, what I learned, what I gained and what I lost.  My birthday is in January, and that probably affects my attitude, because that’s also an opportunity for reflection and wonder.  The type-A part of me looks forward to organizing my life, our home, making plans and working hard to become a better person.  Lists are my jam (remember this oldie?), and I always create an inventory of goals and plans for the coming year.  I have a word picked out for 2016, too.  It’s “FOCUS.” I want to focus on what’s really important to me this year, what I want for my life and who I want to become.  Focus on my photography business, focus on my artistic side, focus on seeing new places and experiencing new things.  Focus on my loved ones, and my dreams. Focus on what matters, and lose sight of those niggling little frustrating things.  Will I accomplish everything on my list? Probably not.  But past lists included some great accomplishments.  Like seeing England. Reserving one day every month for a year just for me.  Building a photography portfolio, creating a morning routine, keeping up with the housework so it’s not a project every week.  Getting a puppy and training him to be a good canine citizen.  So many of the things I’m most proud of started out as a dream, made it to a New Year’s list, and became a reality.  I know it’s nothing new to make resolutions every year, obviously I’m not a trailblazer in this.  But rather than have hard and fast laws of what I need to stop doing, I prefer my way of creating a few important goals, and actually accomplishing them.  I realize I create the images in my crystal ball more often than luck or chance do…

I hope everything you see in your crystal ball for 2016 becomes an accomplishment.  I am rooting for you! Cheers to the New Year!

Editors Note: Curious how 2016 turned out? Click here.