The 23 List Update // October 2014

I've had about four posts hanging out, languishing as drafts, for ohhh the entire month of October. At some point, I will {WILL!} get around to posting them, but until that day, here's a 23 List update!

I originally was only going to let you guys know when something was accomplished, but then I realized maybe a better plan is doing monthly updates so that I could show you {and myself} that there's been progress, even if something hasn't been crossed off the list entirely yet. By the end of September, nothing had been completed, but I had listened to eight out of the ten podcasts {and I took notes so I could remember which ones I liked and which ones I didn't} and had researched where I could take an aerial silks class.

By mid-October:

+ take a road trip... where I'm actually behind the wheel and there are other people in the car // a roadtrip to Portland had been suggested and halfway planned before the madres stepped in and expressed concern over how much driving this roadtrip would entail over a short amount of time in the dead of winter. Basically, they vetoed the roadtrip. SO. The new plan is playing tourist in San Francisco the week between Christmas and New Year's, which won't quite be a "roadtrip" for me, but I WILL be behind the wheel with someone non-related in my car at some point that week. Whoot!

+ bake eight new recipes // it was Steph-en's birthday last week and his favorite cookies are oatmeal raisin {riiight? what an old person}, and he's also a fan of pumpkin-flavored things, so I went in search of a "pumpkin oatmeal raisin cookie" on Google. And lo and behold, such a thing exists! In fact, it seems quite popular based on the number of recipes that appeared. I found one that looked promising, made a test batch, pinpointed the problems, fixed them, made a full batch of cookies, and sent them off into the world. I'll share the recipe and my changes later; but yay, cross one off the "bake eight new recipes" item!

+ bake eight new recipes // and I don't know if this will count {whether I count it depends on how far I get with the "bake eight new recipes" thing}, but I also made pumpkin butter with the rest of the canned pumpkin used in the cookies. It was surprisingly easy and, with no actual butter involved, it's decently healthy, too.

+ get a haircut I'm not horrified by // I am seriously tired of my long hair at this point, so I've threatened to cut it every single day these last two weeks {honestly, though, no one really cares, so I'm not sure who or what I'm threatening. I think I'm just stating my intentions aloud so that my hair knows its days are numberrrred!}. I still need to find a picture to show the hair cutting person what I want which is the only thing holding me back. The plan was to go get it cut today, but I might have an interview-y thing Friday and I don't want to risk a bad haircut for a first impression. So maybe I'll wait until early next week. A bad haircut second impression isn't as awful.

+ go through everything in my room and organize it ALL-- glean, donate, throw away // with the besties coming up to the Bay Area after Christmas, Steph will be staying conmigo those four/five days, which means my room has to be... cleaner... than it is now. Cause right now, it's kind of... heh. ANYWAYS. Now that there's a serious deadline in place, I've buckled down to getting the place organized and I'm actually doing pretty well right now. I'm gleaning through all the books and clothes in this room {as an only child, there's no one to pass down all your too-small clothes to, so if you don't glean regularly (I don't) then you end up with stuff from middle school hanging out, taking up space}. The amount of stuff I need to donate is growing every day and I'm learning to be more ruthless when considering, "Now will I ever use/read/need this again..."

+ reach 50 Instagram and 500 Pinterest followers // first goal has been REACHED. Yesssss. And the second is close. I'm excited to see what those numbers will be by the time we actually make it to the next birthday.

+ listen to 10 podcasts // like I said, I'm at about 80% with this one. Listening to podcasts still takes concentration and isn't something I naturally do when I have free time, so... we're working on it. I know I asked this before, but any MUSTLISTEN podcasts you think I should try? I'm always open to suggestions! (:

--

So that's what's going on over here on the 23 List front. I'm excited to see progress, although there still are quite a number of things to be attempted on there which can be a little daunting.

But look! Ta daaaaa... Photo evidence of progress! Yayyyy.

 50 followers has been reached!

497 followers-- almost there!