Goodbye 2013

It's been a busy year, full of ups and downs, thankfully many more ups than downs.

Two new members joined our family, one of the furry variety and the other not so furry. I love them both!





I went platinum blond... and then back to black.

I was lucky enough to travel a fair amount. First to Dubai in April...

Then Namibia in May...

And back to LA in June for the wedding of the year!

A long stay in Iceland in August...

And then a brief visit to Washington DC in November.

And Christmas in LA, of course.

Career-wise, it was pretty exciting with James making partner. We celebrated with some of his colleagues at Hereford Road Restaurant with Dom Perignon (yum!) and calf brain (yuck!).

I also made the big decision to leave law and maybe start a new career. More on that to come!

2014 is shaping up to be a banner year with 3 family weddings on the horizon.

We'd like to add a dog to our family, but that's not a done deal. That doesn't mean I haven't been researching dog breeds when J is asleep. Teehee.

A small thing, but I decided short hair is just not for me. When you have thick, wavy hair and lots of it, you wake up looking like you have a mushroom cloud on your head most mornings. It's also a lot more maintenance than long hair, and I just can't be bothered with all the combing and styling and cutting.

I'd also like to exercise more consistently. As they say, health is wealth, and I've got to keep in good shape to take care of J and my fur baby.

I'm not much of a resolution making type person, so nothing to add to that. Just to keep being happy and hoping that everyone I love is too.

Another New Year in London

I'm ringing in another new year in London, and it's another one I'll be spending at home in our cosy flat. J and I have big plans to split a beer and a pizza and watch a movie. If you can't tell, New Year's Eve isn't much of a holiday in my books.

However, it is the perfect occasion to look back on the last year and see what I have (and haven't) accomplished. Here were my resolutions from the beginning of the 2011:

1. Enroll in a photography class. FAIL. But I did play with my camera a lot and bought Photoshop and Lightroom.
2. Learn French. FAIL. I think this was a good fail on my part. As pretty as it sounds, it's probably not as useful as one would hope. In any case, the French would be appalled at my atrocious accent.
3. Get back to fighting weight. WIN. I've lost a lot of the extra weight I gained when I first moved to England (thank you, Heathrow Injection), but I'm not as fit as I'd like to be so the fight continues.
4. Visit Bath, England; Paris, France; Barcelona, Spain; Sydney, Australia; hike in New Zealand. WIN. I've visited Bath, Paris (twice!), Barcelona. I haven't gotten to the other side of the world yet, but I think I'll postpone those trips for a while yet since there's still the possibility that J and I may move back to LA and the plane ride to Australia/ NZ will be much more bearable from there.
5. Make more of an effort with my appearance - I probably shouldn't be proud of the fact that I could get ready to leave the house in less than 10 minutes, which usually just entails putting on a long coat over my pajamas. WIN. I suppose it was inevitable with having to go to work without the risk of them sending me home to get dressed properly. As for the coat over pajamas, I'm happy to report I've done that only once this year.

In sum, I think I did alright, and I even did things that were off the list such as:

1. Ran a half-marathon.
2. Visited Formentera and Ibiza (Spain), Zurich and Luzern (Switzerland), Lake District (England), Las Vegas (US).
3. Learned how to shoot a shotgun.
4. Learned how to golf properly.

And now for the upcoming year, I'd like to:

1. Run more half-marathons - I pretty much stopped running after the Royal Parks half marathon in early October and need to start up again.
2. Start weightlifting again - I also gave up weightlifting when I focused on running for the Royal Parks and so need to start this up again.
3. Visit Iceland (August); Seville, Spain (September); Rome, Italy (April); Santorini, Greece (October); Yorkshire, England (March).
4. Be better about keeping in touch with friends back in the US.
5. Learn how to use Photoshop and Lightroom.

I think that's a feasible list of to-dos for the upcoming year and now to see if I actually do it!

A New Year and Newer Resolutions

2010 is done and gone, and here's what I've got to show for it:

1. I moved to London - Yay!
2. I gained 10 pounds - Boo.
3. I lost 4 pounds - Kinda yay!
4. I bought my first digital SLR camera - more pics to come!
5. I resumed working as a lawyer - Yay?
6. I celebrated my first wedding anniversary - Yay!
7. I visited Edinburgh, Scotland

Now that the new year has officially kicked off, I suppose it's customary to make resolutions for 2011. It's also customary to break the resolutions within the first few weeks of making them, but I think I'll try to stick with it since one of my resolutions is to improve my stick-to-itiveness (yes, it's a word).

So for the coming year, here are the things I'd like to accomplish:

1. Enroll in a photography class
2. Learn French
3. Get back to fighting weight
4. Visit Bath, England; Paris, France; Barcelona, Spain; Sydney, Australia; hike in New Zealand
5. Make more of an effort with my appearance - I probably shouldn't be proud of the fact that I could get ready to leave the house in less than 10 minutes, which usually just entails putting on a long coat over my pajamas

It's going to be a busy next couple of months, but I'm actually looking forward to it. I wanted to run the London marathon, but the ballots are already closed, so I guess it's something I'll do in 2012. There, now that it's in writing, I can't back out.

Seems like it should be an interesting year...