You guys. It’s 2018. Not much has changed in a year, and yet everything has.

2017 brought new freelancing opportunities, new connections, and new challenges. I figured out my anxiety was worse than I thought, and I took steps to help it. Olivia and I joined new activities and made new friends. I became an infertility mentor and infertility small group leader. I grew my newsletter to 145 people, wrote 85 blog posts, and 44 freelance articles. And I got a Snuggie.

Because I’m one of those obnoxious people who love making New Year’s resolutions, but can never seem to keep them, I decided this year again to rein it in and write about what I’m looking forward to this year—what I’m excited about. And 17 things was a lot and 18 seems daunting. So I’m doing 8. And it’s more likely you’ll read this post to the end if I only have 8, right? So here we go:

8 Things I’m Excited For In 2018

1. Doubling my writing income.

I’m going to be completely transparent and tell you that would be a little over $1,000/month. Which I know sounds pitifully small, but 2018 is the year for branching out for writing opportunities and going after some new sites and magazines. If I can make more than $1,000 a month, all the better. But I wanted to start realistically.

2. Continue improving my website.

I didn’t get to this very much last year, and I know I probably won’t finish fixing all the old blog posts by the end of this year, but I’m hoping to keep moving forward on it. 

3. Let Olivia help in the kitchen more. 

Hell hath no fury like a mom trying to cut up a damn carrot with a toddler rushing over with a chair to stand on so she can watch. Seriously. We started letting Olivia help more with the meals and while the girl loves it more than anything—I would rather Zumba with skinny girls than accommodate her. I know, I know, I’m awful. I’m also really OCD in the kitchen and you better get out of my way when I’m trying to cook OMG.

All that to say I need to work on this, because it’s a good skill to let her learn and she’s adorable and one day she will cook all our meals for us, so I better start her early.

4. Manage our budget so we can actually put money in savings. 

Chris and I sat down and listed out our monthly bills last month. The amount we owed in student loans and our IVF loan was enough to make me swoon, thank you very much. We’re hoping Chris gets a promotion here in the next month and then we can go forward coming up with a manageable budget. I’m hoping in addition to the FET, with careful planning and some new work coming in for me, we can still do our yearly family vacation weekend in the fall. Speaking of FET…

5. Get pregnant.

OK, this one is interesting. Doing a FET is a huge goal—whether I get pregnant is entirely out of my hands. More on this later. You know there will be blog posts on this, musing and whining about my stupidfacesonofabitchwhore reproductive organs.

6. Use my bullet journal every day.

I’m obsessed with this thing. I hope it helps me be more organized though I suspect it will just continue to be a time suck. Email me or leave me a message if you want to see mine and how I’m going to use it!

7. Put our marriage first.

Namely in date nights once a month, and spending one night a week without the TV—our “Wine Time.” I put this as a goal last year, but we didn’t hit every month when things got busy and time got away from us. But this has to be a priority for our marriage, so I’m doing it again and am making sure we stick to it. Date nights were so important to me after Olivia was born. And we will benefit from quality time once a week in the evenings. After Olivia goes to bed, we turn Netflix on, and Chris sits on his phone or iPad, and I am on the laptop blogging or doing some weird organization thing like writing out recipe cards, cleaning up my Trello boards, or putting my nail polishes in ROY G BIV order. Periodically, we’d come downstairs, pour some wine and spend time talking with the TV off. Granted sometimes I would eye the laptop because there was this spreadsheet I totally needed to set up for my article ideas, but for the most part, it was really good quality time and we grew closer because of it. So I’m looking forward to Wine Time once a week. 

8. Simplify my life. 

This is a lofty goal because I have a terrible habit of making things way more complicated than they have to be. But there are some different priorities for this year, and to do that, I need to skim down some other areas that don’t help me move forward with my goals. So I’m going to be removing myself from Facebook groups and Instagram pods that aren’t needed for me right now, unsubscribing from newsletters I don’t need (mainly ones that show how to make money blogging, since I don’t plan on doing any of that anymore), and coming up with a writing schedule.

So there they are. My eight things.

What things are you excited about this year?

What are you looking forward to?

Let me know in the comments!