Tag: Resolutions

2023 Resolutions

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It is that time of the year again, the time for planning and hoping that 2023 will be full of accomplishments. I will not look back on what I was expecting for 2022. It’s pointless. The year was great in so many ways and terrible in others. I can say it was balanced in a weird way. I have high expectations in 2023. I know the year will be difficult, with a lot of challenges, but I hope to stick to my resolutions this time.

Bookish Resolutions

1. Be consisten in posting : for the last days of 2022, I’ve managed to post daily and I hope to keep this up in the next year.
2. Be more involved in the community: I have not been the best person at attending on line bookish events or book clubs, but I intend to change that effective immediately.
3. Be more active on Instagram: so far, I’ve been posting often enough and even shared some stories. I hope you’ll like my photos and follow me there 🙂
4. Be organized: I have tried to keep my books in order using Goodreads but it didn’t work for me. So I’ve switched to excel. It’s more familiar to me, as I am using it at work and it will help me generate some statistics.
5. Grow my beta reading activities: I want my blog to sustain itself financially and hopefully beta reading will do just that.
6. Diversify my articles: so far, I am posting a lot of book reviews. I like my reviews and I hope you like them as well, but I do want to add something else, to promote the authors in more ways than just a review.
7. Achieve my Goodreads reading challenge: I failed miserably this year. I will not allow this to happen in 2023!

Non-Bookish Resolutions

1. Keep the negative emotions away: I do not want to be upset because of things that I cannot control. This year I lost too much time disliking people and creating more negative feelings myself. I need to stop that. Life sucks sometimes and it’s allright. No need to make the things worse…
2. Clean up my act: I’ve been all over the place, physically and mentally. I need to stay in one spot and rebuild my solid ground. It will be difficult, but it has to be done.
3. Find my balance: I have a more than 9 hours job, I have a blog and I want a sewing business. There has to be a balance, otherwise I won’t get stuff done. There has to be a mental balance.
4. Exercise: so far I have been the worst at this, but it has to change. I did it for a short while and it made me feel good, felt good about myself. In the last 2-3 weeks I kept finding excuses not to exercise. Well… something else that has to change.
5. Grow my sewing experience (after steps 2 and 3 are completed) : I still have a lot to learn. I need time to practice and I need to let my inspiration run free.
6. De-clutter: I have so much stuff that I do not need or use, starting with clothes, books and unused notebooks. I need to make some breathing space in my closet, in my shelves and in my life in general.
7. Finish outstanding projects: my sewing space is filled with projects that I did not finish. This is linked to item no. 6, but it also means that if I start a sewing project, I MUST to finish it.
8. Maybe start a Youtube channel: I’ve been thinking about that a lot. I am not sure yet, but it is on the list somewhere.
9. Do more charity: I keep saying that “when I will have my own business, I will donate a lot!”. Why wait? I can do so much already. I know how to sew, I know how to crochet, let’s start there!

Judging by the number of non-bookish resolutions, it seems I have more work to do on the personal side of things. I know for a fact that 2023 will not be an easy year. It will start with challenges and with tough decisions. But all things will fall into place like puzzle pieces. There is order even in chaos, so there is always a weird order in life as well.

In a world that gets messier and uglier, with conflicts, political interests and natural disasters, be organized, be kind hearted, be patient and helpful. Be healthy and stay positive. Love and be loved. Have a beautiful 2023 and may you accomplish all your resolutions and more!

Bookish Resolutions – 2020

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I have to admit to myself finally that I have failed to achieve my Goodreads goal for 2019. Unfortunately it was not a good year for my blogging activity: not only I had weeks I was not able to post, I failed to achieve my bookish resolutions, I did not manage to post all my reviews in time or read all the books I really wanted to.

I want to leave the failures behind, leave the bad in 2019 and start 2020 in a good spirit, with a higher motivation. I have drafted these resolutions since mid-November and they don’t sound so difficult to achieve:

  1. Stay organized and plan ahead: in the beginning of December I looked up ideas on the internet of the best ways to plan my articles. I started a planner (nothing fancy, just enough to get me through) and added as well some brainstorming pages or pages fr special projects. I am quite excited! I used this method for these last couple of weeks and it gave great results. Of course, I need to stock to it because articles ain’t gonna write and plan themselves, ya know?

  1. Prepare (and use) a predefined template for my reviews, or my weekly and monthly articles: this will eliminate the time I spend adding the same pictures or preparing the same formatting.

  1. Spend more time on graphics: having a nice banner and creating some simple pictures for my quotes has been on my list for 2019 as well but I did not invest so much time into it. Well, with point 2 from above on the table, I can accomplish this.

  1. Be active on social media: simply because having friends is nice 🙂

  1. Develop the promo and beta reading pages: this blog is a cost for me. Even if I don’t mention it enough, I do buy books and I do pay for my domain. I would like to have at least a third of the expenses recovered. So I want to add some promo activity to it, at a (very) low price.

  1. Start statistics in Excel: I was inspired by Portal in the Pages to start a data base that would give me an overview of what I have read during the year. Hers is much more complex, mine is simple and focused on what I need to follow (like making sure I post my reviews on NetGalley as well!)

  1. Complete Romanceopoly: I will come back to this in the beginning of January but Romanceopoly is a yearlong readathon inspired by Monopoly and focused on romance books. Except the board, there are also challenges that the hosts are announcing throughout the year. I want to be 100% involved.

  1. Complete my Goodreads challenge: I’m sticking to 100 books again. It’s definitely doable, if I stick to reading!

  1. Promote more: I want to promote more my 5 star reads. I feel I am doing so little in this regard and I know I can do better, with proper planning 😉

  1. Enjoy: this blog started out of passion. I love reading, it’s what keeps me grounded, it’s what keeps the negative thoughts at bay. So I plan to enjoy every book, every picture I take or make, every minute spent planning!

 

Ok, I’d better stop now 🙂 every time I write these resolutions I feel motivated and empowered. I would love to hear what your bookish resolutions are for 2020, so drop a message below and let’s chat 🙂splash

Happy New Bookish Year!

Non-Bookish Resolutions – 2020

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Definitely 2019 has not been a good year when it comes to my other activities. I was thinking even that maybe I am involved in too many and that I still have not decided where I want to invest my time. However, when put face to face with the decision of giving up sewing, crocheting or reading, I was not able to choose one and give up the others.

I will not even dare to review if I accomplished one or two of my Non Bookish resolutions that I set up for 2019. I was too ambitious (or too unorganized). For 2020 I have already taken steps in the right direction, so I am confident I will be able to achieve my objectives:

  1. Improve my sewing, knitting and crocheting skills: I still dream of following in my grandmother’s steps and maybe make a living out of it. I know wherever she is she is a bit disappointed I didn’t manage to work more on this in 2019, but I’ll rectify this!

 

  1. Start planning: the best way to stay organized is to plan ahead (I did my research on Google – rolling eyes). So I have started a planner for my blog that also includes a line or two about my non-bookish activities.

 

  1. Be better, care less sometimes: professionally, 2019 has been challenging. Toward the end of the year I became disappointed and it affected my health. Well, I plan to be more firm in my decisions and care less. In this way I will have more feelings involved in the activities that do make me feel good. I know, it’s vague…

 

  1. Organize my workspace: in 2019 I was supposed to move into a new home but this hasn’t happened yet. I trust the first months of 2020 will find me there. In my new “activities room” I will have my corner of sewing and reading and I hope it will motive and inspire me to create beautiful things (oh, the idea is also to keep that space organized properly)

 

  1. Start a YouTube channel: this is big. I’ve been having this idea of starting a crochet channel for a while now, but I never stopped to work on video ideas. It’s time.

 

  1. Post more on my Instagram account for crochet (@hookedonthread, if you want to follow): I must

 

  1. Have one non-bookish article a month on my blog: just to take a break from all the books, chapters and pages

7 items I need to follow don’t seem that many. I do intend to take them more seriously than last year and I really need these guide lines. In 2019 I lost myself into so many actions that did not make me happy or that pushed me away from my goals. As per item 3 in the above list, I intend to change this.

Let me know if you have some non-bookish resolutions of your own or just your plans in general in the comments below 🙂 until next time, Happy Reading!

2019 Non-Bookish Resolutions

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Again, because in 2018 I did such an awful job of sticking to these small guidelines, I decided to try again with the non-bookish resolutions. Even if third time’s a charm, maybe I’ll get lucky (luckier) with the second try.

I want to do so many things and time is such a rare commodity these days. I want to improve, to grow, to excel even. But without investing time, it’s not possible and if it’s anything I’ve learned from the past year is that priorities and being organized are key items.

Buy a planner and organize my activities: I am so bad at managing my time. I want to do so much and I forget I have only a very limited amount of time available after my job and that it needs to be spent with my loved ones as well. So I need to plan everything (and stick to the plan)

Finish all my started crochet projects: because in 2018 I didn’t do that and I even started more (and not finished, of course, why would I?!) (feeling angry!!)

Finish all my started sewing projects: see item 2 (the feeling persists)

Crochet more (and finish what I start): because I love it and I need to improve

Sew more: my grandmother was a seamstress and I want to be better at it so that she can be proud, wherever she is now.

Be more organized in my home and craft room: with a little hope, 2019 will bring a new home and with a little disciple, I will be able to keep everything organized and clean

Post one non-bookish article a month: just to show you guys progress and relax a little from all these books and pages and stories.

(Maybe… Start thinking about a sewing business – seriously thinking, if I manage to improve my skills)

These are the last of my resolutions for 2019. Hopefully I will manage to stick by them and just do better 🙂 let me know what your plans are for the next year and what is the most challenging of them 🙂 Until next time, Happy Reading and Happy New Year!

2019 Bookish Resolutions

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Because this year I did such a great job NOT following the resolutions, why not try again for 2019?

Next year will be marked by changes, both personally and professionally. My blogging activity will also change. I have read and reviewed so many books and I forgot to enjoy the whole act of reading and reviewing. There are so many articles I want to write, so many books I have to speak about and characters I want to analyze. But I`ve focused so much on quantity and forgot the quality and passion. My bookish resolutions for next year will focus on that.

 

  1. Sign up to less book blog tours: I’ve signed up to so many this year and I was always under pressure, not to miss deadlines, have good ratings and in the end, I did miss many of them. I am overwhelmed and tired and it feels like a job. I need to get back on track.

  1. Speak more about the books I’ve read: I have discovered so many amazing authors and I am doing so little for them. For 2018 I wanted to develop a promotion activity, which didn’t happen, but 2019 will bring it for sure.

  1. Follow a plan: Spend a day in the week planning my bookish articles for the next week, preparing pictures and scheduling.

  1. Definitely I have so many books on my TBR that must be read: all these e-copies have been received from authors, publishers or assistants and I haven’t been able to find the time to read them all. This has to change.

  1. Improve my profile on various bookish sites: for example I have various books from NetGalley for which I still need to post my review. I’ve had a NetGalley profile since I started this blog and I was not able until now to increase that review rating. I’m giving myself 2 month to change that.

poza

 

  1. Invest more time in the graphics for my articles and blog in general: I finally have a domain and I am so happy for that! Now I need to keep it nice and appealing, so that you guys can enjoy your visit.

  1. Continue the series I’ve started in 2018: Time for Pixels is one of them. I have started it together with my special someone, from the need to share with you all these beautiful pictures we take and all the emotions we feel. Because nature is beautiful, emotions are powerful and we need to enjoy life more.

  1. Participate in readathons: I had many fun experiences this year with readathons and buddy reading and I would love to do that again. There are so many amazing people out there and it’s fun to interact.

  1. Quotes: I have been enjoying selecting quotes from books and doing simple images. I want to create a collection somehow. I still need to think about that.

  1. Read the books on my shelves and read more books from my local library: because nothing can replace the joy of a physical book.

 

So my bookish resolutions for 2019 are meant to show you all the beautiful books I read and expressing my devotion to my favorite authors. This time I feel more confident I can achieve this and I am so happy already!

Thank you so much for being here with me another year and I am so proud and honored to be part of the online bookish community.

Let me know in the comments below what your bookish resolutions are and if you have a plan on how to stick with them 🙂 Until next time, Happy Reading and Happy New Year!

Lilly’s 2018 Resolutions

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bokish1

A little bit late in January I decided to put on paper my goals when it comes to my book blogging activity. Since I am trying to optimize my free time and to use it wisely, I need some planning ahead, or at least some guide lines. So here is what I plan to do in 2018, bookwise:

  1. Follow these resolutions! Because I have a tendency to make lists, then not follow them…
  2. Reducing the TBR pile is a MUST – finishing all outstanding books from 2016 and 2017
  3. Buy a domain for my blog – because it’s time
  4. Dedicate more time to graphics for my articles – maybe buy some Time from the supermarket…coz it’s a rare commodity
  5. Write at least one article per week that is not a book review – chances are I will forget to do that
  6. Write reviews for all the books I read – MUST
  7. Read more classics – there are a lot of classics I have not read… need to start that
  8. Read more books outside my comfort zone – which is now mostly Romance
  9. Buy more bookish goodies
  10. Read at least a few nonfiction books
  11. Keep the blog and books organized

Yup… these are my 10 resolutions. I want to respect the first one, and follow all of them. They don’t seem so difficult, do they?

nonbokish1

Books, books, books and then more books. Bla bla bla! How about something else? Here is what I plan to do, outside these paper or electronic amount of words:

  1. Read at least 100 books

Oh, sorry, no bookish stuff. Ok, here we go:

  1. Finish all my crochet projects. I have an entire basket of projects I’ve started for a couple of years now and I must finish all of them before starting a new one
  1. Finish all my sewing projects: same as my crochet stuff, I have a lot of sewing projects that I’ve started ages ago and they are still standing there, occupying space…
  1. Keep on practicing sewing. I am not an expert at all, but I like sewing and unfortunately I have not touched my sewing machine in months. That needs to change
  1. Crochet a sweater. My worst fear: sleeves, neckline, any part that is not a square and involves increase or decrease
  1. Learning hand embroidery. I like it a lot and I hope to learn it and use it for my other projects
  1. Post one non-bookish article a month: let’s get to know each other a little better.
  1. Start a clothes up cycling project: I have a lot of shirts and T-shirts I don’t wear or like that much. So maybe I can try and change them a little (Alarm bells! Danger ahead, proceed with caution!)
  1. Experiment more with cooking: I love cooking, but I usually stick to the few recipes I know well. It’s time to prepare something new
  1. Take more pictures (preferably good ones): I love photography and it’s an activity that relaxes me very much. So I need to do it more
  1. Become a better version of myself: more organized, more relaxed, do my best to keep that negative energy at bay

These are my hobbies, besides books. I hope to find the time to enjoy them more and explore that creative side … that I’m not sure I have, but anyway… Let me know in the comments below what are your hobbies and how you manage to combine them with reading. Until next time, happy reading!