Wait what? In less than five weeks we will be watching a New Year’s Eve church service with Cookies, powdered sugar and (non-alcoholic) champagne. For Bartina and me, the end of this year is extra special, because it is also the last days in our apartment. Almost every year I make a ’24 before 2024′-like list in the last month of the year. This year I decided not to make it too fanatical. A move is already big and exciting enough for a month as far as I’m concerned, so there are not many outings on the schedule. But even small things can sometimes be really fun. That’s why no good resolutions for January, but 24 small things that I hope to do this year.
Using our Discount cards from Capital One to watch two fun blockbusters at home. Plopping down on the couch in the evening is suddenly one of my favorite activities during this DIY period .
Selling unnecessary items on Facebook Marketplace. Not all of our items will find a place in our new home. Hopefully, a few items will find a new owner via Marketplace. I have high hopes that we will at least be able to sell our dining table and a few lamps. Every dollar earned will come in handy for the IKEA visits and furniture store visits that are still to come. So I’m going to use my best Marketplace negotiating skills again!
Making gingerbread cake. And preferably before Santa leaves our country again. I recently saw a delicious idea for a date cake with gingerbread filling. That sounded too great not to give it a try. If it works, I’ll spend my Saturday morning on it. For those who also want to start baking for Santa, these gingerbread muffins and my vegan spice cake are also very tasty.
Visit Mark’ Rack. Among the category of small trips that absolutely have to happen, is definitely a visit to Mark’ Rack. My favorite second-hand store! This time to both drop off a bag full of clothes and hopefully buy some new gems. I haven’t done that in far too long.
Buy a new at Home Christmas ornament. Every year I make it a tradition to buy one or two non-standard kitsch things for the Christmas tree. A hangable donut, a pink gingerbread man with a feather scarf around his neck or something like that. The more glitter, the better! I saw a lot of beautiful ornaments from the brand Vivid Shine online, including a Miffy in a Van Gogh costume. Sounds wrong and fun enough to buy for our tree!
Emptying the pantry. Well, at least emptier than it is now. Our food supply could probably feed a family of four for another month. Handy to have, but not so handy if you have to lug all that stuff around in boxes to the new house. Certainly not handy if there are also heavy cans and 1 lbs flour packages. So I have made a plan to breathe new life into cooking and baking from the pantry next month. To start by making things with the exotic types of flour that I still have lying around. Anyone have any tasty recipes with coconut flour, chestnut flour and teff flour? I am open to anything!
Celebrating anniversary evening. We did that this weekend at my grandparents with the whole family, but this Sunday we will do it again with my family. The presents are slowly being collected and the first letters of a poem have already been put on paper. In short: time to celebrate December 5 early on December 3!
Cooking in the new kitchen. Oh my , is this really happening? Our kitchen is being installed next week. The countertop and tiles will take a little longer, but with a bit of luck we will have a finished kitchen by Christmas. A grey one with white tiles, a bar and lots of storage space for all my baking stuff. This is now my favorite to-do-before-2024 point.
A date night with Bartina. All our free time together is spent on chores, home improvement stores or birthdays and other December things. So we recently agreed wholeheartedly that one thing is a must for this month: going out together without a home reason. Just going out for dinner again! I’m already looking forward to it.
Watching a lot of Buying or Demolition. This program is our new favorite among the home programs. It can’t compete with Buying Without Looking, but it comes close. This program is a regular fixture for the coming weeks and we enjoy it even more, because we have experienced both the buying and demolition adventure ourselves in the past months.
Buy my 2024 year planner. Very handy to have it at home before the new year! Just like the past three years, I’m going for the nice affordable and beautiful year planner from Esty again this year. For $8,- you have a great thing in your home with enough writing space to even indicate per quarter what you are going to do. I’m a fan!
Choosing lamps. Many interior purchases can wait until we have lived in the house for a while. But one type of purchase is quite useful to have already: lamps. Now Bartina and I have quite different tastes in lamps, so that will probably take a few more online scrolling sessions.
Catching up with a friend who is coming to the US. A dear friend is abroad for a long time, but will soon be coming over to the US for a week. And she is also coming to me: to see our house, to try a new takeaway restaurant together and especially to catch up on a lot of the past few weeks.
Giving a guest lecture at a College. I still have to pinch myself that this is going to happen. I get to give a guest lecture to first-year Economics students at Texas Community College about entrepreneurship as an introvert . Mega-cool, especially because it is a subject that I find very important and that I like to talk about!
Choosing a new front door . Never thought I would ever have to rack my brains over these kinds of choices! But this morning we spend our time at a front door store to do just that. Our current front door was very old, didn’t close properly anymore and wasn’t our style. With the money we earned from selling stuff from our apartment, we’re going to pick out a new front door and storage door. We’re hoping for something in a mint green or light blue color.
Start with breathing coaching. Through a presentation training that I recently followed, I discovered that I have been breathing incorrectly for years without realizing it. Now you might be thinking “Breathing happens automatically. How can you do it wrong?” I wondered that too, but apparently my stomach unconsciously moves outwards when I exhale and inwards when I inhale ( note: it should be the other way around ). Since I am 1000% motivated to get rid of it as soon as possible, I have scheduled an appointment with a breathing coach. I have no illusions that I will come out of it as a differently breathing person after one hour, but I am hopeful that there is a lot that can be improved 😉
Admiring our painted living room. Just a few more weeks and our ground floor will be as good as finished! Then all the colours will be on the walls, the floor will be on the ground and the first furniture will start trickling in. Enjoying it thoroughly and taking hundreds of photos is definitely on the agenda.
Saying goodbye to this apartment. The number of photos I took of this little place (my first own home) is too many to fit on one SD card. Let’s just say that literally closing a door makes me a bit emotional. I plan to celebrate New Year’s Eve in our house, just the two of us. On the couch with Pip in the place that was our home for a long time. That seemed like a beautiful and dignified farewell to me!
To a workshop with a client. The owner of a copywriting agency I write for recently invited me to go to a workshop by DECAK Productions. I didn’t need to be asked twice. We’ll soon be joining a workshop on working with different types of people at the theater. A super cool opportunity!
Buy new running shoes. It’s almost scandalous that I’ve been running around in the same running shoes for 3 years. I bet my physio wouldn’t be proud of me if she heard that. So let me improve my life before it’s time to start throwing around good intentions. I’m going to pick out those new running shoes this coming weekend. New year, new house, new (not worn out) running shoes!
Joining our not too extravagant Christmas dinners. I am so glad that we never participate in the eight-course Christmas dinners with luxurious Matthew. Don’t get me wrong: I would love to eat along, but it seems like a hell of a job to organize something like that. Fortunately, my father-in-law only has to fire up the gourmet and we usually each bring our own dish to my parents’ house for Christmas. Nice and tidy and still very tasty!
All You Need Is Love crying fits. For me, it’s not a real Christmas without Robert Ten Brink opening his box full of tear-jerking stories. I still can’t get Bartina excited to watch this romantic vale of tears for 2.5 hours. Fortunately, I’ll watch it back with just as much love on Christmas morning, all by myself.
Writing a series of “Day 2023” blogs. In the last week of the year, my sentimentality always shoots up like a rocket. That’s why I traditionally type a bunch of end-of-year blogs every year. From my favorite products of the year to my favorite moments and a series of goals I want to focus on next year. A great moment to look back on a very special year, between the moving boxes!
In short: plenty to do and especially to enjoy this year before the champagne bottle is pulled for 2024.
