Fourth Quarter Update: 101 Things in 1001 Days

Well it's that time again.... 

For the original post, you can go here. For the last quarterly update, you can go here.

Current List: 

Starting Date: Friday January 1st, 2010 Ending Date: Friday September 28th, 2012

1) Spend a rainy day watching films in my PJ's
2) Try two new cookie recipes this Christmas
3) Attend the midnight premiere of a movie
4) Get married (10-9-11!! Here is the recap!)
5) Go skydiving
6) Learn to knit
7) Organize my closet
8) lose 15 pounds
9) Go on a cruise
10) Go whitewater rafting
11) buy a house
12) See a Broadway show
13) spend a day at the spa 
14) Lose 5 pounds
15) Own an iPhone
16) Try a new (and possibly frightening) food 
17) Watch two movies at a cinema in the same day.
18) Influence a person to make a day zero list
19) go fly a kite
20) Pay off at least one credit card
21) Have a housewarming party
22) Floss every night for a month
23) Tie a note to a balloon and let it go
24) Go sledding
25) Lose 10 Pounds
26) start a family - This is a work in progress ;-) !!!
27) help a stranger
28) Have a sleepover party (I rented a hotel suite the weekend of my wedding, we gals had SO much fun!)
29) Have a friend choose a complete outfit for me 
30) Play a new board game
31) Travel by train (Did the Conway Scenic Railway Trip, but I'd like to do another)
32) Make homemade bread
33) Go to a casino
34) Take at least 5 photos a day for a month
35) Eliminate non-fitting clothing from my wardrobe
36) Save $5000
37) Read 100 books (36/100)
38) Compose a new list of 101 things to do in 1001 days
39) For every task I do not complete, donate $1 to charity
40) Put aside $5 for every completed task
41) Go to a Patriots game
42) Drink nothing but water for 2 weeks
43) Watch the sunrise at the beach
44) Host a giveaway on my blog
45) Organize photos and get and stay caught up with my scrapbooking
46) Climb Mount Washington
47) Attend a hot yoga class
48) Do 100 situps for a month (0/30)
49) Ask for someone else's advice and take it
50) Give a stranger a compliment
51) Write down something positive about myself for 30 days straight
52) Have “date night” one night of the week for 1 month (4/4)
53) Work out faithfully 3x a week for 2 months
54) Take a trip to Las Vegas
55) No swearing for a day x12 (0/12)
56) Play a game of 18-hole golf 
57) Put change in someone’s expired parking meter - I was so happy to be able to do this since the change meters are going away! Being replaced with those paper ticket systems.
58) Take the Cat ferry to Canada
59) Have a weekend getaway for SO and I
60) Start our own Christmas tradition - I didn't even realize it, but we have a tradition where we go and tag our tree and then cut it down. Ben insists on a live tree for the house. And I look forward to spending time with him while we are on the hunt!
61) Get my HAM radio license
62) Participate in a 5K (run/walk)
63) Make my own candles
64) Climb Cadillac Mountain
65) Learn at least 50 ASL signs
66) Go one weekend "Unplugged" no phone/Internet
67) Send/Give 100 cards “just because.” (35/100)
68) Leave SO a love note/note of encouragement/surprise email 1x a week for 2 months
69) Complete 3 – 1500 piece or more jigsaw puzzles (0/3)
70) Visit 5 new states not previously in (driving through doesn't count) (2/5) - NJ, HI
71) Participate in a 10K (run/walk)
72) help a friend in need
73) take a class (work related)
74) Have one day off per week for 1 month
75) Make SO breakfast in bed - I got off on a technicality, I had made him breakfast, but he got up, just as I was finishing. Also I realized, we don't own a breakfast tray table...*face palm*
76) Bring coffee in for the boys at work
77) hang pictures/art on walls
78) Buy flowers/edible arraignments for someone.
79) Be able to buy clothing in the regular women's section
80) Invest my money better
81) borrow books from the library; instead of buying them 
82) get a makeover to include makeup!
83) Try a new recipe once a week for 1 month
84) Call one cousin per week until all Bridle Cousins have been spoken to
85) Host a girls night at my house 
86) Host a couple's night
87) Prepare my will
88) Take a pole dancing class
89) Travel to Nantucket / Martha's Vineyard
90) Visit my grandmother at least once a month for a year (12/12)
91) plan a couples camping trip - I love our Memorial Day Weekend camping tradition with friends!
92) Play Bingo with friends
93) Host a transit party
94) See an old friend once per month for one year (11/12) - Coming up, hopefully catching up with one of my old co-workers, Ms. Holly!!
95) See Rocky Horror at midnight showing
96) Go and shoot a gun at a firing range
97) To get a physical each year
98) To see a UNH/UMaine Hockey Game
99) To kiss the Cat at UNH
100) To go to a Red Sox / Yankees game
101) To complete this list in less than 1001 days

Wow, 9 tasks this quarter, I didn't think I did that much! The two Christmas ones I had to rush! Since this is the last Christmas holiday that is covered with this challenge! That's another $45 dollars into my Day Zero account. A total of 41 items have been accomplished, that still leaves a large majority open and only till September to complete them! I guess I've got my work cut out for me.

And I've come to the realization that I may not complete everything on this list, that some items conflict with one another, like starting a family and going sky diving... it's just not going to work out. But I don't consider it a failure, since it's still something that I want to do. Just means I may have to delay certain plans for other things that I find more fulfilling. (If that makes any sense!)

Wrapping up 2011 & looking ahead

I have so much to be thankful for in 2011, and in the same breath so much to look forward to in 2012. Did I achieve all of my goals in 2011? No, but that's what my day zero list is for.

I still had my version of a perfect wedding. I didn't go Bridezilla on anyone, but I made my point, that the day was about Ben and I, no one else.

Because of the wedding, I got to see my brother and my sister in law a lot as well as my cousin. I could grow to see more of them. And hope that someday soon, they all will call New Hampshire home.

I wasn't a fit bride, but I can honestly say, that I am more acutely aware of my overall health and what I need to do in order to change it. I've got a lot of big plans for 2012, and a looming blood work date from my doctor.

2011 saw less blog posts than 2010, but if you've been an avid reader, you saw my departure from all of the blog giveaways. I still manage to find one or two I like, but I no longer dedicate any significant time to the venture. I decided to get back to my roots and blog more about my day to day life, and largely about my upcoming wedding.

2012 will start off with a facebook hiatus. Not sure for how long, at least a week, but we shall see. I was telling Ben tonight that I still will play Bejeweled Blitz and Words with Friends, but from my phone only. I need some vices in life.

I made a lot of new friends in 2011, I listen to the Cosmo channel on Sirius/XM. And although I didn't make it to CosmoCon, I still was able to meet up with a few of the gals in November for Lo's birthday party. Team Awesome was forged, Steve and Kerri have been two amazing people in my life, we grew so much closer in 2011, though I hope in 2012, I will get to meet them in person. Also I had a blog redesign done, much thanks to Erin from Samantha's Day, and in the end her and I became fast friends through our emails.

My work life has been crazy. I don't have the exact numbers yet, but I must have made more than I did last year or at least matched it. These last two weeks of 2011 have been insanely busy. With the summer season being especially busy call volume wise. I am looking forward to a slow down after the first of the year.

I went on a kick butt honeymoon to Hawaii, I spent an amazing 10 days in paradise, with a promise to someday return. It was probably one of the best vacations I have ever taken and I was so thrilled at the chance to get to go. It was also my longest vacation on record.

Post wedding, I cut my long hair and donated to Locks of Love, I was more than happy to be able to donate. In return I got a great haircut, my hair was the shortest it had been in a long time!

Most importantly I married a man in 2011. The man of my dreams. Because of social media we met by chance, and fell in love. We had our perfect day with our friends and family and pledged all of ourselves to one another. He loves me as me, but also supports me in making myself a better version of me. He challenges me to be my best, and is there to support me if I fail. We can laugh at one another, but also be serious when we need to be. He is my rock and I love being the reason he smiles. I cannot wait to see what the future has in store for us.

Twitter Update

My pending facebook hiatus naturally has me gravitating to twitter more. I position has always been that facebook is for my real life and twitter has been my fake/blog life. More and more the two are blending and my real life friends know me on twitter and I am friends with my fake life or blog friends on facebook. I guess it's natural to have some cross over. I've even been cross posting more. Although I dislike when people's twitter feeds is just their updates from facebook, or visa-versa. I'd like to see some new content! 

Anywho, here has been some of my stellar tweets from the past few weeks.

Yeah, I said it. What is she going to do, sue me? I did cross post this to my facebook page, I mean it was sweet enough to share with everyone. If you are getting a divorce after 72 days of marriage because you had a difference of opinions about where your life/marriage was going, you shouldn't have gotten married in the first place. These are questions you ask one another before you get married... ugh

With all of the hours I've been working I haven't been to the gym at all. I tweeted to Steve the other day, inquiring as to how he was doing with our challenge.

Truth of the matter, is I haven't been committed to this challenge. I knew going into this challenge, that December was going to be a challenge itself, between work and the holidays, it's tough just to keep up! So I tried to get some mileage in early on in the month and for the most part, it worked, but I know I am still behind where I should be and I've got some work to do in order to make it up.

And lastly, this tweet on Christmas:

I have been so blessed to continue to get to know and meet some fantastic people using social media.

I can imagine after the first of the year and my facebook hiatus begins, that you'll see some more twitter updates coming from me.

Christmas Wrap up

Merry Christmas! Oh it's been a nice holiday. Busy. But nice.

First off, I had been working for days on end. Christmas day was my first full day off in a week, and my next full day off will be January 1. So out of 14 days, I will have only 2 full days off. Ugh. It's a lot of work, but I've scheduled some me time for the first day or two of the new year. And I plan on not doing anything that I don't want to do.

Secondly, my holiday was amazing. It's the first time in several years that I had Christmas off! My work schedule is an 8 day rotating schedule, and it just happened to work out that I was scheduled to work most holidays. But I've finally come into the party of my schedule cycle where I get some of the holidays off. And it's been nice to enjoy the time with my family.

Holidays make me miss my brother and my sister-in-law. I got to talk to Nick on Christmas when he called to say hi, but it's not the same without them here. I look forward to the day when they can move back to NH and we can all be a close family again. They of course enjoyed their gifts that Ben and I had sent them. It was great to hear that they arrived and were still in good condition. I always get nervous about shipping stuff, especially with videos/stories like this one!

I worked Christmas Eve day, so after I had gotten out of work, I went home, changed and then Ben and I went to my mother's for our Christmas with her. We also brought all the professional wedding pictures so that her and Darla could see them. It was a fun night.

Christmas morning we got up and headed to my parents (Dad and my stepmom) for Christmas brunch and presents with them. My aunts and grandmother had come over as well, it was a morning full of laughs as that is typical for our family.

Christmas evening we went to Ben's mom's for dinner and presents with her. Again, it was great to see all of our families. And Ben and I were both happy that we were able to work it out. It's not easy to coordinate all those visits! Especially with my schedule.

We got home Christmas night and had our own Christmas. Very low key, as we both were just so tired from the days events and all of the traveling.

For those of you who may not know, I live in New Hampshire, that's in New England. We get snow. But this year, has been VERY mild, and such is the case, we didn't have snow on the ground for Christmas. There were hit or miss snow flurries, but nothing that stuck. When we went to Ben's mom's she had snow on the ground! Plus one for Maine! It definitely made us both feel a bit more "Christmassy" now that there was snow on the ground, as we were getting ready to leave it had started lightly snowing again. It was so lovely. Made my Christmas!

It was an exhausting day of travel, and I was so tired from all of the events. It was nice to have Monday day off so I could take it easy. We had breakfast with my cousin and his wife, I haven't seen them in years, so it was great to see them. But then it was back to home and napping before work that night.

It was great to see all of our families, but I do wish that we had more down time. I don't care to always be on the go. I am hopeful that next year we can combine some trips and condense it down. I still want the holidays to be enjoyable for me too!

My presents ranged from practical to very thoughtful and personal. They were all perfect to me, even though I didn't ask for much. All of our parents helped us out with the wedding so we weren't expecting anything really. 

Of note, this is the first holiday season where I didn't get sick. I chalk that up largely to me not being as active in the Toy Bank program that I ran for several years. In years past, I was doing so much work that I would get run down and ultimately get sick from not taking care of myself. So after a lot of thought I stepped down from managing the town's toy bank, but in the same breath I guess you could say I got a promotion of sorts. I went from managing the town's toy bank to the Seacoast wide toy bank. Which mainly I do a lot of the public relations, website and facebook stuff for. I coordinate a lot of the seacoast wide efforts and stay away from the individual towns. I enjoy the work, it gives me a wonderful sense of fulfillment and it's the truly a reason for the season for me. To take care of your fellow man.

And if you were wondering what I got Ben... tools. It's what he wanted and something I know he'll be able to put to good use. Hopefully soon one day.

I am so bummed, I forgot my camera, so I don't have any pictures from Christmas. It would have been so nice to share with you all, but I'm sorry.  I am a bad blogger.

So that is my Christmas wrap up! hopefully Santa brought you everything you had hoped for. And that you were able to spend time with your family and loved ones.

Hair no more!

So as I've been talking about for the last few weeks, but last night I finally pulled the trigger and did it. The post wedding chop! I've been growing out my hair since last July/August. Almost a year and a half of growing resulted in this:

All of the hair... like for realz

And after some talk about what kind of style I wanted, which I pretty much gave my stylist the green light to do what she wanted. My rule was simple, it needed to be easy to style, low maintenace. We got down to chopping it off

And we ended up with over 12 inches

That is a 12 inch comb next to my braids! I had no idea that my hair was really that long!

After the chop was done Rachelle, my stylist got down to business of giving me a proper hair cut and afterwards, she ended up looking like this

Bad day to wear a sweater to work...

It was worth growing my hair out for the wedding, my hair on my wedding day was beautiful and stunning, I even got asked if I was wearing hair extensions!

I will say towards the end, I was getting frequent headaches from the weight of the hair and from pulling it back. I couldn't really do anything with my hair it was just too long. It took way too long to maintain it. In the end, my long straight hair, became high maintenance!

I am so happy and pleased that my donated hair is going to help someone else.

So now that I've made you wait here is the after shot

All of the bags under my eyes! So tired!

My thoughts, my hair is SUPER short... shorter than I usually care for, but I know it won't be long before it grows out to a length that I am happy with. And I know that it was for a great cause. I love how much movement my hair has!

So there you have it!

The Salon was really awesome about it, they are going to mail my hair for me to Locks of Love, and all of the staff was really great. 

Side Note: I stepped on the scale this morning and was legit 2 pounds lighter. I know it's not probably all hair, but still, I am sure it's some of it.

Hi, my name is Cassie, and I have a facebook problem

I am feeling like after the first of the year, I'll be taking a facebook hiatus. I feel as though I am a little addicted to facebook.

So I am going to start with taking a week off from facebook.(phew there I said it...)

I just feel like I've stalled out on my list of 101 things in a 1001 days, and that a lot of my time is eaten up by just killing time on facebook.Even my daily routine is sculpted around being on and checking facebook.

It's going to be difficult, I have a lot of open tasks going on in my life, that facebook is associated with. I am the admin for 3 groups related to my job/professional organizations. On top of that, I've got messages I've been going back and forth with on facebook for things going on in my personal life. Facebook truly is a social network, but I think every now and again we all need to step back and reevaluate the priorities in life.

Of course, I'll still be on twitter and I'll have my email. I'll have to put some sort of status up, letting people know about my hiatus and to please don't expect a timely response from me, if that's their method of contact.

PS - today is my hair appointment and my donation to Locks of Love! I am excited to see what my new hair cut will be and I hope that I love it! Stay tuned for pictures and a post of that experience!

Still Roughing It

Still very much in a funk, and not really putting myself first. There has been a lot going on this holiday season, and a lot of overtime at work. I am getting some miles in, but not nearly what I should be doing. I am going to have to step it up BIG time in January and February to make a come back!

I also am going to be working on another update for my 101 things in a 1001 days challenge. Crazy to think that it's going into the final year of that challenge.

I am still here though, lurking in the shadows.

Rough Start

So in my last post I talked about my new challenge with Steve, and since then I've only walked once and it was for 3 miles.  So that means I have 452 miles to go.

I need to make this a priority for me. No one else will benefit from this, but there is such a great potential for me to reap some pretty amazing benefits.

Truth. I am back up to my highest weight, 321 pounds and I am not happy. Something has got to change. Those 3 miles I did, it wasn't pretty, I've basically lost all my stamina from before.

But I will get back there. I know I can do it.

In other, semi related news, my name change is final. So I went to the DMV and got my new temporary license, with my corrected weight.

My 30th birthday is in 6 months and I'll have to renew my license again. My goal is to be lighter than I am now. So I can update my weight on my license as well!