Goodbye 2015...

Another year has come and gone.


As with everything, some are good and some are bad.  2015 falls in the lower bucket for me.  There were a lot of changes at my job that directly affected me.  Finances continued to rear their ugly heads in the worst way.  I really struggled with my health and fitness.  There were some moments of depression.  There was no motivation to do anything and I let things get way out of control.


Over the past week I did some serious thinking on how things were going.  I turn 40 in June and, while I've never really been concerned with the number, I feel a lot older than that.  I really don't feel like I'm having fun with life.


So I'm making some changes.


"Change" is my word to live by in 2016.  More on that later.


The first change was getting back into blogging and really putting some heart and soul into it.


The second change... well... we'll get to that in good time :)


So I leave you with this...


I hope you and your family have a happy, healthy, and prosperous New Year!




~AKO

Did I Really Do That?

Sometimes you can really surprise yourself when your kid is really counting on it.  I don't really consider myself to be an artsy or creative type of person let alone have the patience to pull anything even remotely Pinterest worthy off.  But, I have to say, I actually accomplished something that I'm pretty damn proud of.

It all started with a picture that a few people posted on my Facebook timeline about a month or so before Halloween...

I can't seem to find who to give credit to for this picture, so if you know, please let me know so I can add it.

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Best. Day. Ever.

Back in October, I had my first experience attending the New York Comic Con (NYCC).  I have been to conventions in the past so I had some idea of what to expect, but experiencing it was a whole different story.

I had always been under the impression these conventions were focused on comic books and that whole world, which I was not at all interested in.  My husband, on the other hand, has a full tote with nothing but comic books that he has collected over the years.  He is a bit like a comic book ninja.  I always seem to find random comic books that he has bought laying around the house.  I don't even know when he buys them!

Over the years, Freddy has always expressed an interest in going to the NYCC but he always had reserve duty during that weekend.  This year?  No reserve duty!  Well, turns out, when you try to buy tickets a month before the event, your options are few and far between.  There were only Thursday tickets left so I had this grand plan for us to take the day off work, take Marshall out of school, and have a fun-filled day in the city getting our nerd on at NYCC.

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A New Look

As you can see by my blog archive, it has been a long time since I have been consistently active on this blog.  I have wanted to get back into it for awhile now, but I just didn't like the way it looked and I definitely don't have the expertise or skill to make it look more than some guy writing in his garage designed it.  So, I decided to jump in and pay for someone with some skills to redesign my little blog.  And I couldn't be happier with the end result!

So, I give you the newly redesigned The Calm Before the Storm!

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Remembering 9/11

As we remember those lost on this 14th anniversary of 9/11, so many things go through my mind every year.  As I'm commuting into work, I can't help but remember every step I took that day.  14 years later I still remember every minute like it was yesterday.

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Divergent Trilogy | 2015 Reading Challenge

Please note this post does contain spoilers.  

All opinions are my own and I was not given anything as compensation for this review.

One of the categories of my 2015 Reading Challenge is to read a trilogy.  I decided to apply the Divergent Trilogy to this category.

Everyone kept telling me that if I enjoyed the Hunger Games trilogy, which I did, then I would enjoy the Divergent trilogy.  Each of the 3 books are over 500 pages, they are an easy read.  I don't have much time to read and it only took me about 3 weeks to get through all 3 books.

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Getting My Craft On...

The past few months I've been trying to visit my creative side, which, if you know me personally, is buried deep, deep down inside.  Meaning I don't consider myself very creative.

I've gotten a little better now that I've been doing Project Life scrapbooking.  More on that later.

I joined a card swap group on Facebook that focuses on swapping homemade cards for pocket scrapbooking.  In addition, they also do some challenges to help people work on different techniques or try new ones they haven't done before.

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You're my favorite...

Ever have those days when you feel like you are not really getting this whole parenting thing?  It seems like they are coming more often then not these days.  There are days when I just sit on the bed and cry for apparently no reason other then sheer frustration.

I have a 4 year old who is still in diapers.  He won't sleep in his own bed... ever.  He is combative.  He doesn't listen... to the point where I will be standing right in front of him saying his name and it is like I'm not even there.  He throws things for no reason.  He is disruptive in school to the point where he has already been kicked out of 1 school.  I have never seen a child his age throw tantrums to the level that he does.  He screams and yells and argues.  He rarely does what you ask to do (or not do) without the need to repeat it 4 or 5 times.  The list goes on...

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What I'm Reading | 2015 Reading Challenge

One of my 2015 goals is to spend some time on me.  That goal is going to be several parts to create the goal over the course of the year.  The 1st step is to get back into reading.

When I was in high school and college, I used to read all the time.  My yearly Christmas lists were usually filled with books, which were usually all read by March.  I don't remember when I stopped reading books, but I want to start again.  Especially with all these books being made into movies every year.

Starting this year, I am participating in the GoodReads 2015 Reading Challenge.  I am going to try and read at least 50 books this year.  But, on top of that, I am also participating in a category book challenge.  You can see the list in the 2015 Reading Challenge that I have posted in the header above.  I'm hoping this will turn into a yearly challenge for me and I'll try to find a new list every year.

I just charged up my Kindle and plan to use my daily commutes into the city for something other than playing Candy Crush and surfing Facebook.  My commute is 1 hour and 45 minutes so I know I can get some good reading done every day.

When I get home from the gym around 9:45pm each night, the first thing I do is turn on the TV.  Not anymore!  I will have a date with some tea and my kindle.  Or maybe a glass of wine on some nights :)

So, what is first on my list?

I haven't seen the movie yet... who am I kidding... I didn't see a single new movie last year!

I'm looking forward to getting into this one since I've heard a lot of great reviews on this.  Stay tuned for my review!

What are you reading this year?

2015 Reading Challenge

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~AKO

Time, Time, and Even Less Time

This weekend has been a bust.  I sat around and did nothing yesterday.  I didn't even get into the shower until almost 3pm so now that leaves a whole bunch of crap to do today... take down the Christmas stuff, grocery shopping, laundry, other odds and ends like organizing/printing pictures and getting started on my Project Life for 2015, and some miles need to happen in there somewhere.

Lately I've been feeling like I can't get even the simplest things done.  Been actually thinking about going to talk to someone about it because all I want to do when I'm home is sleep.  That can't be good, right??

I am trying to get in my head that if I can get at least 1 or 2 things done in a day that I should be able to call it a good day.  But it just seems like every day I don't get a task done, then 5 more show up the next day.

January is not starting out so well, but there are still 20 days left to get some life organization started!

What are you doing to get your life organized for 2015??

~AKO

Resolve to...

Here we are again.  That time of the year where we all make those resolutions to lose weight, fix our finances, fall in love...  I stopped making resolutions a few years ago.  I like to call them goals.  I think it sounds better.

I had kind of a rough 2014.  To the point where I had strongly considered seeking professional help about it.  With only 1 income for the past14 months and nothing to fall back on along with some other crap that has been (and is still) going on, I can safely say I was not sorry to see 2014 go.  And to be honest, I wasn't all that excited to start a new year.  But here we are.  No matter what has happened over the past 12 months, time still moves forward.  We have to move forward.  We really don't have much of a choice.

So I have decided to embrace 2015 as our year to get our shit together.

Finances

People always say money can't buy happiness.  Well, if you can't pay your bills and you have collectors calling every hour between the hours of 8:00am and 8:00pm, I guarantee you aren't all that happy.  I don't care what you say, money is a key factor in being happy.  It pays for things like your home, food, clothes just to name a few necessities.  It also pays for vacations and fun stuff.  If you can't do any fun stuff then you probably aren't very happy.  That is where we're at.  Not very happy and pretty deep in debt.  So, we've already starting writing out a plan to get our finances in order.  I've set the goal that by the end of the year, the only debt we will have is our house payment.  We will be using Dave Ramsey's snowball method.  I actually did something very similar about 10 years ago, before I even knew who Dave Ramsey was and was able to pay off around $15,000 of college debt that I had racked up in about 2 years.

Health and Fitness

I'm not going to say I want to lose weight.  I plan to just get healthy this year.  I've already put a few things in motion to help support my efforts.  I joined the The Max Challenge on November 24 for a 4 week session.  They offer small class sessions along with a nutrition plan.  The success stories they advertise are right next to you in class every night.  Their next 10 week challenge officially starts on January 12, but I've been going 4 - 5 nights a week since November 24 and can already tell where I'm starting to tone.  Their nutrition plan is not rocket science.  It is basically a clean eating plan.

In addition, as of December 30, I've started training for my 1st half marathon which is on March 21.  I ran a couple 5Ks and a 10K last year but I really want to step it up this year.  I also joined a challenge to run/walk 2,015 miles in 2015 sponsored by Run the Edge.  I'm doubtful I will hit the 2,015 mile, but I'm going to give it a go!

If I happen to lose weight along the way, then great, but the main point is that I'll be healthy.

Me

This year I'm going to make an effort to do some things that make me happy.  What I've been doing every night and most weekends is sit on the couch and stare at the TV or my phone or something like that.  This year I'm going to work on some of my hobbies like my Project Life scrapbooking, reading, photography, organizing, and of course blogging!

So there you have it.  The 3 things that I want to focus on in 2015.  I plan on writing up some blog posts on some of these things in more detail over the next couple weeks so stay tuned!

What are you going to resolve to do in 2015?

~AKO