New Year, New Post!

I'm just the worst at keeping up on things lately.  But I have promised myself that I've had my unorganized self pity time, and it would a wonderful Idea if I started to get my proverbial shit together and act like an actual adult.

I started stitching with a bang and then things fell apart in March when I went through HR shenanigans with my job.   Ironically?  Coincidentally?  Schadenfreudally? The higher up who put me through hell has been AWOL.   Not that there's any official word, but I can say (for certain) that this person's mugshot is out on ye olde interwebz, so that guy hasn't been around.  But that's all I'll say about that (or it will turn into a 5 page missive).  But in any event, I never really hit my stride again after letting myself get totally derailed (I should have been able to "right" myself in July, but never bothered - oops!).

On the upside, we (I'd say royal we, but it did involve the help of a lot of friends) did put in new flooring throughout the first floor, enlarge the coat closet from 31" wide to 6" wide, painted the hallways, painted/re-floored/re-did the guest bedroom ("LadyCave"), and built a queen sized Murphy bed, so I didn't exactly do nothing this past year ;)

But here are my Resolutions for this year (we'll see how well that works)

• Finish my certification (January).
  It's one exam, I should have had it done months ago ;)
• Enroll in an emergency management certification class/program
  I've been talking about it for far too long
• Read at least one book from my dead tree shelf/month.
  I want to go all mostly (I've saved my favorites) digital and put a dent in my physical Mt. TBR
• Declutter - I have a timeline/list.
  It should honestly not take that long and is more of a spring/winter cleaning thing.   This has been spurred by me having entirely too many kitchen gadgets/equipment (I got an Instant pot!  I can get rid of so much now!)
  I honestly did start decluttering some stuff (like in the garage, bedrooms, etc), but I stalled out on my piles of things to be donated/trashed/shipped.  I just need to finish up and part of my monthly/biweekly timeline is actually getting the crap out of the house that I finished with.
• Stitching - I want to get back to something regular.
  I have a planner now so I can actually get reminders to do things like check into WIPocalypse and/or any other bloggity good things.  I've even put little stickers on all of the dates I know I should blog!
  I even updated my WIPocalypse/goals for 2016!
• Quilting -
  I am working my way through the Allietare mystery at Quiltville.
  I'd like to finish that quilt and my bloomin' 9patch from the quilt class I was taking in March.
  I want to take a free-motion quilting class, although these two quilts will probably be straight quilted at home.
• Genealogy Do Over.
  Thomas MacEntee's Do-Over is really cool, and it changed how I'm doing things now that I'm starting over with my genealogy, but the 16 week program is just too fast.  For 2016 he is doing each topic Monthly instead of Weekly, which is just awesome, I think, and I have the work book as well.   My goal is to join the DAR this year, so I'm concentrating on my paternal grandfather's lines.   After I finish with what I know/have on hand, I will work on further verification and then my mother's lines, which came from Poland around the turn of the century.

I don't think these goals are crazy, I feel like they're totally do-able and leaving plenty of space for live and non-stressing (most of them could probably be knocked out in a couple of months if I rushed it).  I'm super excited about my new planner, because I think that having something with me to remind me what I'm up to is going to be key to success.  I find myself too easily distracted, and I know that once I start something I generally stick to it.   It's just a matter of reminding myself that tonight is the night I quilt or stitch or genealogy or something and I shouldn't pick up a videogame to get myself lost it (no worries, I'm leaving plenty of time for gaming!  I got a PS4 for Christmas (username Suzemo if anyone wants a friend - I don't know anyone on the Playstation Network) and I've been playing the heck out of Diablo III, but I also got some PS3 games for Xmas to play as well ;)

I have two positions with my professional organizations that I will endeavor to be good at.  One of them should be a cake walk, the other should be a bigger deal (one is a three year and the other is a two year appt).  So hopefully I'll grow professionally as well as personally.  At least that's the plan.

And just for fun - this is what I bought myself for Christmas (from Pretty Pretty on Etsy)

And this is my Instant Pot's first meal - Beef Ribs, and they were freakin' delicious (I've also cooked a crockpot/slow cooker chicken meal and steamed artichokes, just to play with the other functions)