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2012 Life Wrap-Up

January

The first month of the year was all about recovering from the holidays.  The boys spent all break with us in Omaha. Unfortunately I was still working most days, so they spent a lot of time hanging out in the house with J.  We did get a ton of board games played and books read.  After they left, it was back to the daily grind of work.

February

The second month always seemed to be a quiet one.  Not much happened.  We braced for the cold that never got too bad.  I read, watched tv, and of course, worked.

March

Things got very interesting in March.  It was my, the boys', and J's birthdays.  I turned 30!  Not as weird as I thought it would be.  I still feel like I'm 25 (which is probably a good  thing).  Plus, I am really looking forward to this decade.  It has to be better than my 20s.  To celebrate, I posted pics and stories from all of my thirty years each day of the month.  Check out the beginning of the My Years posts.  Beyond birthdays, J was offered a job for a company in Silicon Valley.  We always figured that we would move out west at some point, but this was very unexpected.  After a few phone interviews, we flew out for a weekend to do a final interview and look at living situations.  I spent the weekend driving around the San Jose area.  I even popped into a great little Egyptian Museum.  And J and I visited Sonoma Valley for a great wine afternoon.  Back in Omaha, we discussed the situation and decided that moving was our best opportunity.  He said yes, they worked out moving packages, and we planned on moving at the end of April!

April

Before all the moving stuff came up, J and I planned a Spring Break road trip with the boys.  We drove to Indiana to pick them up and then headed east to Ohio and Pennsylvania.  All in all it was a great trip.  I love old fashioned road trips.  Plus I got to visit some cities that I've never been to (hello Pittsburgh and Philadelphia!).  And I got to visit one of my Top 10 American Attractions... Fallingwater!  I made my mom really jealous with that!  After getting back, J flew out to California to start his job and secure housing.  He came back to Nebraska and a week later we packed up the truck and traversed the western half of the country to our new home.

May

May was all about settling in and getting to know my new town.  First things first, I located and obtained a library card.  Always a priority for me!  Plus, I found a coffeehouse, supermarket, park, DMV (CA driver's license), movie theater, and many many favorite nearby restaurants.  I also trolled Meetup and found a great card making group.  I really love some of those ladies.  On the blog, I topped the month off with a bit of a political rant with "I am a Citizen."

June

The boys traveled out to the coast to spend the summer with us.  We started a great two months of adventures and exploration.  Our activities were documented in my Sunnyvale Summer posts.

July

July was full of tons of adventures with the boys including the beach, the amusement park, summer camps, pool days, library visits, and trips to San Francisco.  I also confirmed my suspicions that I was pregnant.  Very happy news.

August

The boys returned the first week of August to Indiana for school.  I am so grateful that they love their school and teachers.  It makes the situation a bit easier to handle.  Unfortunately the heartache continued with my mid-month miscarriage.  More information about my experience can be found here.

September

September was a month of healing and restarts.  I had to deal with aftermath of my miscarriage.  My hormones made me absolutely crazy for a few weeks.  I also decided to finally make an appointment with a therapist to discuss the event and my past and current depression woes.  It didn't help that we had multiple apartment issues: fridge quitting randomly, dishwasher not really cleaning, and a dripping ceiling.  And J was super busy at work.  I hardly saw him.

On a brighter note, I accomplished a ton of crafting.  I really jumped in with both feet.  The end result found a home in my mother's flower shop in November.  I also got a jump on Christmas projects.  Obviously I can't tell you what they are, but they were greatly appreciated.

October

Some of the ladies I craft with decided to start a very informal book club and asked me to join.  We had our first meeting!  Such fun.  With the holidays we had our second meeting in December.  But hopefully this will become more of a monthly occurrences.  I also reconnected with an old high school friend who is now living in San Francisco.  I met her husband and adorable baby boy.  We had a few fun lunch/shopping dates.  I'm sure we'll continue these after the new year.

November

Starting slow, things got crazy when I flew back to Indiana to spend almost two weeks with the boys and family.  We had tons of fun and ate some great food for Thanksgiving.  I really needed that visit to reconnect with old friends and break out of my day to day routine.  I came back to California refreshed.

December

Just like November, it started slow, and then I traveled back to Indiana for the holidays.  Check back in few days for some vacation highlights.

tags: Year Wrap
categories: Life
Saturday 01.05.13
Posted by Tobe Buffenbarger
 

2012 Wrap-Up

Favorite Books of the Year

  1. Fables: The Witches
  2. The Magicians by Lev Grossman
  3. The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins
  4. Sunshine by Robin McKInley
  5. Timeless by Gail Carriger
  6. The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
  7. Allison Hewitt is Trapped / Sadie Walker is Stranded by Madeleine Roux
  8. The Lost Hero / Son of Neptune by Rick Riordan
  9. His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman
  10. Newsflesh trilogy by Mira Grant

Honorable Mentions: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Persuasion and Northanger Abbeyby Jane Austen and The Importance of Being Earnestby Oscar Wilde.  Since these are rereads, I decided not to put them in my Top 10 (seems like cheating a bit).  But that doesn't mean that I didn't just love these.  Check them out if you've never read.

Total Books Read -- 184 books

Total Pages Read -- 58,309 pages

I averaged 4859 pages per month.  My lowest month was August with 2751 pages (health issues).  My highest month was January with 7005 pages.  I hope to read 60,000 pages next year.

Book Rating Stats -- I may have to get a bit stricter about my ratings.  They seem a bit top heavy.  Or maybe I really have bene reading some great books.

  • 5 stars -- 100 books
  • 4 stars --  57 books
  • 3 stars -- 18 books
  • 2 stars -- 9 books
  • 1 star -- 0 books

Special Projects/Features

Readathons -- 11 total completed!  I wanted to complete at least one a quarter, and I definitely accomplished that.  For the start of 2013, I have already committed to Bout of Books 6.0 and am possibly hosting a challenge.

  • January -- Bout of Books and Winter's Respite
  • April -- Spring into Horror
  • May -- Bout of Books
  • July -- High Summer and Once Upon a Readathon
  • August -- Labor Day and Bout of Books
  • October -- FrightFall
  • December -- Book Drunkard Readathon and Book Club Bash Readathon

Bloggiesta in September -- I finally joined the fun.  I've gotten to the point where i need to take a break from time to time to work behind the scenes of the blog.  This was such a great opportunity to accomplish just that.  I'm sure I'll be joining in on the fun in the spring.

Day Zero Project  -- I don't think I'll finish it all, but I do love having goals.

Quote Wednesday -- I got back into the swing of Quote Wednesday this year and want to keep my momentum.

Music Monday -- This year was a ton of My Years music posts.  Next year I will be highlighting my favorite songs.  I still really really love this feature.

Top Ten Tuesday -- I got back in the swing of things, and also become more picky.  I didn't do every Tuesday list,  but picked the ones I really wanted to do.  This helped me keep excited about participating.

Reading Challenges

  • Goodreads -- 175/175  100%
  • Semi-Charmed -- 9/14  60%
  • Zombies -- 24/24  100%
  • Young Adult -- 12/12  100%
  • Vampires -- 10/10  100%
  • Fantasy -- 10/10 100%
  • Romance -- 10/10  100%
  • Telling Tales --  10/10  100%
  • Historical Fiction -- 10/10 100%
  • Graphic Novel --  20/20  100%
  • Shakespeare -- 12/12  100%
  • SciFi -- 5/5 100%
  • Outlander -- 0/5 0%
  • Mixing It Up --  16/16  100%
  • Back to the Classics --  9/9 100%
  • Harry Potter --  7/7  100%
  • Fables -- 5/5  100%
  • Read Your Name --  23/23  100%
  • A to Z -- 24/26  92.3%
  • What's In a Name -- 6/6 100%
  • Support Your Local Library -- 37/37  100%
  • Mount TBR --  95/150  63.3%
  • Dewey Decimal -- 27/38  71.1 %
  • Books2Movies -- 20/20  100%
  • My Years -- 22/30  73.3%
  • Color Coded -- 6/9  66.7%

Total: 19/26  challenges   73% done

Total: 654/743  slots    88% done

Overall Thoughts/Reflections/Musings/Ideas

2012 was a great reading year.  I got more organized and read some great books.  I participated a good number of readathons and challenges.  And I even got back into some of my regular features.  Overall, I am super excited about my accomplishments.  For 2013, I am trying to change up my reading challenges and branch out a bit.  Here's to the new year!

tags: Year Wrap
categories: Books
Wednesday 01.02.13
Posted by Tobe Buffenbarger
Comments: 1
 

2011 Wrap-Up

Favorite Books of the Year

  1. Fables Series
  2. Autumn and Autumn: The City by David Moody
  3. The Affinity Bridge by George Mann
  4. The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan
  5. The Parasol Protectorate Series by Gail Carriger
  6. The Walking Dead Series by Robert Kirkman
  7. The Prestige by Christopher Priest
  8. At the Scent of Water by Linda Nichols
  9. Have Spacesuit--Will Travel by Robert Heinlein
  10. The Russian Concubine by Kate Furnivall

Total Books Read -- 202

Total Pages Read -- 55,636 pages

Book Rating Stats

  • 5 stars -- 97 books
  • 4 stars --67 books
  • 3 stars -- 17 books
  • 2 stars -- 3 books
  • 1 star -- 0 books
  • Multiple non-reviewed books

Special Projects/Features

  • NaNoWriMo -- Failed Miserably...  I really don't think I will be trying this again any time soon.  It was interesting to hear about others' experiences.
  • Day Zero Project -- Loving this project.  I have 910 days left to complete 96 tasks.
  • Meal Plans -- I really focused on this for awhile and then I got lazy.  I think for next year, I will only be highlighting interesting recipes I try.
  • Readathons -- I have really come to love these.  I am recommitting to at least one readathon per quarter.
  • Friday Fill-in -- Got bored with these, I'm done with them.
  • Quote Wednesday -- Somehow I just dropped this.  I am recommitting to Quote Wednesdays especially since a list of  inspirational quotes is one of my Day Zero Project tasks.
  • Music Monday -- Keeping... I really like doing this.  But this year, I want to search out some new bands to enjoy.
  • Booking Through Thursday -- I had fun with this at first, but grew tired of the questions.  I think I am done with this.
  • Top Ten Tuesday -- I've done probably 85% of these since starting blogging.  I usually love the topic, so this will definitely be continuing into the next year.

Reading Challenges

  • Science Fiction -- 6/10 didn't finish, but enjoyed the books I did read.
  • Steampunk -- 9/12 Great books, just ran out of time.
  • Young Adult -- 12/12 Lots of great books
  • Historical Fiction -- 6/10 Another one I ran out of time
  • A to Z: Authors -- 19/26 Moving along until I got stuck.
  • A to Z: Titles -- 24/26 Almost got there.
  • Fantasy -- 12/12 Always love this genre.
  • Vampire -- 20/20 Always love these books.
  • Page to Screen -- 10/10 Bring on the movies!
  • Zombie -- 10/10 Loved it!
  • Fables -- 20/20 Love this series!
  • 2011 -- 21/21 Interesting mix of books.
  • Amazon Best of 2010 -- 3/20 Really bad showing on this one.
  • Georgette Heyer -- 1/5 Good book just got really distracted.
  • Outlander -- 0/7 Failed miserably!  Retrying next year.
  • Graphic Novel -- 10/10 Upped this one for next year!
  • Contemporary Romance -- 10/10 Mixed bag on this one, just not really my cup of tea.
  • Summer Romance -- 24/24 Didn't think I would complete this one, but did it right at the wire.
  • Support Your Local Library -- 100/100 So easy to finish!
  • Year of Reading -- 43/43 I quit this one after May, because I got really bored.  But I kept with it up until then.
Total: 16 / 24 challenges 66.7% done
Total: 360/ 408 slots 88.2% done

Overall Thoughts/Reflections/Musings/Ideas

I was disappointed that I didn't finish all my reading challenges this year.  however, I think my reading was significant and the numbers show it.  I challenged myself to read lots of different books and genre.  I challenged myself to commit to writing reviews.  I am happy with my progress and

I've come a long way in the one year I've been blogging.   I'm really excited by my record of documenting my reading, activities, thoughts, etc.  I think I'll give this blogging thing another go for the upcoming year!

tags: Year Wrap
categories: Books
Thursday 01.05.12
Posted by Tobe Buffenbarger
 

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