It’s 2022, y’all! A new year and all that … you didn’t think I’d let the new year come without a post about what goals/resolutions I have, did you? 🙃 I might have let this post slack until the last week of January but I got it in there, didn’t I?

First – an update on how I did with my 2021 goals.

1. Lose COVID weight – didn’t happen. If anything, I gained weight after we brought Daisy home in November because I wasn’t sleeping well and didn’t workout AT ALL. ❌
2. Read the whole Bible – THIS WAS A WIN! ✅
3. Blog consistently – ANOTHER WIN! ✅ I had a content schedule all of 2021 and for the most part, I STUCK TO IT. I am so proud of myself!! This is a “habit” that I think I’ve definitely owned as just part of my routine/day. I don’t think I need to make this a carry over goal to this year because of that. It’s just what I do (and I’m so glad!).
4. Journal at least once a month – I stuck to this for the first few months of the year but definitely didn’t finish it through to the end of 2021. That said, there was still so much personal healing that I was able to do last year, and that was the main purpose of trying to journal every month. So even though I didn’t meet this goal… I still fulfilled the ultimate goal I was trying to reach if that makes sense. ❌
5. YouTube – So … I DID do this!! I started a channel and posted, maybe, two videos on there? But I don’t know … I just couldn’t get into a good rhythm when it came to really making this goal FEEL like a success. I guess technically I did meet it but when I wrote it out at the beginning of last year, I was thinking I’d try to post around one video a month and that definitely didn’t happen. I actually ended up posting a lot more video content on my IG, which sort of replaced YouTube for me personally. But in any case, I did do this! ✅

Okay, so NOW the goals for 2022. I know having a “word of the year” is something a lot of people enjoy doing so my word for 2022 is …streamline. I felt like 2021, I had big lofty things I set out to achieve (IG, YouTube, journaling, all the things) and while it’s great to dream big, I also felt like my focus was so scattered and all over the place. What is all it for, anyway? So this year, I really would like to focus on STREAMLINING my life. There came a point at the end of 2021 when I was just overwhelmed with the amount of excess I had in my house, in my closet, in my head, in my emotions, in my schedule, blablabla. Most of my goals this year trend toward getting me to a place where my life is one filled with the people, time, things that I love the most and no more of the extra “fluff” the world tells us we need. Instead of thinking about “resolving” to do this or be that, when I thought of what goals I wanted to set for 2022, I tried to think more in terms of habits that I could work to implement on a permanent basis in my life; similar to how blogging regularly off a content schedule became a habit that I ingrained into my lifestyle last year. So without further ado … let’s go.

1. STREAMLINE MY HEALTH: aka FINALLY FINALLY FINALLY losing the extra COVID weight I’ve been saying for the last two years that I’d lose. And I know weight loss is a super popular (if not #1) New Year’s resolution that people make but for me, I REALLY want to make 2022 the last year that I have this goal on my list. I’m tired to setting this goal for myself, not doing anything about it all year, then just letting it roll over the next year, you know? It feels mentally exhausting to have this idea that I’ve gained x weight looming over my head …. like, what’s stopping me from eating healthier, moving my body more, and doing something about it? Nothing. So, let’s … do something about it. I completely fell off my workout routine when we brought Daisy home so part of achieving this goal means getting back into the rhythm of early wake ups and daily (or almost daily) workouts. I actually already started doing this by returning to my beloved Bar Method classes IN STUDIO as of last week. I haven’t been back in studio since the pandemic hit in March 2020 so it was a big moment for me. I lost SO overall muscle tone and strength, the class was the hardest it’s literally ever been for me. But I’m doing something about it, right!?
2. STREAMLINE MY CLOSET: I really want to get to a place where I love every single thing in my closet. It’s such a cliche but I am totally that person that has a closet full of things and “nothing to wear”. It’s ridiculous. There are two big factors that contribute to this “nothing to wear” problem I’ve created – not enough closet/storage space to display everything I have so I don’t know what I own, and buying too many clothes that I’ll never wear/need. When I say I want to streamline my closet, I don’t mean that I want to live via a capsule wardrobe or “minimalist style”. I don’t mind having lots of different options but I SHOULD LIKE EVERY SINGLE I HAVE, you know? And I should also be able to SEE EVERY SINGLE THING I HAVE. So this year, J & I are working on rearranging our master bedroom furniture a bit/buying some new furniture for more storage so that I have more space to hold all my things. I’m also going to be doing a big closet purge sometime in the future where I am brutally honest with what I want to keep and what I don’t. And … this year, I am only going to be purchasing 24 items for my closet (shoes, clothes, accessories). EEEEEEP! I’m sure I’ll blog more on that process throughout the year but I am basically trying to be more thoughtful of the items I buy/making sure I REALLY love and want everything I purchase. There is no price limit on my 24 items and gifts from other people do not count. We’ll see how it goes!
3. STREAMLINE MY SOCIAL MEDIA: So, I feel like last year I spent a LOT of time trying to nail down what my social media “niche” was going to be and it felt a little bit all over the place to me. I still don’t really know what my niche is BUT I think .. my niche is just .. me. I’m just going to post what I feel like or want to without thinking too much about whether it’s “on brand” or not. I don’t want to overthink it too much. I am ALL THE THINGS – mom, style inspo, humor, bookworm, beauty tests, food hacks. I’m just me. Maybe I’ll get to the end of 2022 and find that it didn’t work that well but that’s okay. I’d also like to try and get to 1,000 IG followers (I’m in the 700s right now!) and I feel like it’s a doable goal if I post and engage a bit more consistently.
4. Read the Bible: Okay, so this isn’t a “STREAMLINE” goal but I really enjoyed reading through the whole Bible last year so this year I’m going to do it again. Last year, I focused solely on reading. Just read the Bible, Sophia! Do it! This year, I want to be a bit more engaged with the text, jot down notes and questions, highlight sections, etc.
5. Cook more new recipes: I feel like I’ve been stuck in a cooking rut for the last five years (since A was born LOL). I just cook the same things over and over again. Or we eat out. My repertoire isn’t very big either so cooking the same things again and again is a bit boring! This year I want to challenge myself to cook new recipes and to incorporate them into my regular rotation if I like them. I decided to do this by using Hello Fresh… I tried Hello Fresh back in, like, 2014 or something when I only had two kids. And I think I was still in survival mode with E being such high needs and D being a baby that it didn’t work for me at the time. I restarted my subscription though (and probably the service itself has vastly changed/improved since 2014) and have so far LOVED the recipes I’ve been given. I’m on just a 2 recipe/week plan since my kids do love our family favorites that I usually cook and we always eat out at least 1-2x a week. Hopefully I can keep it up all year and have a new collection of family favorite recipes in my arsenal!

Five new habits/goals already feels like a lot, right? That’s five areas of growth that I’d like to focus on this year. I want to put my best foot forward this year and not have any regrets. I’m turning 37 toward the end of 2022 and (sorry for my readers/friends who are already 37+) but that number feels SO CLOSE TO FORTY AND IT SCARES ME. I feel like if I put in the work right now to create the life & habits that I want, then I can enjoy the fruit of it in my 40s. WOOOHOOOOO! Tell me: are you the type to set new year’s goals and if yes, what are some of yours!?