Looking Back at 2017

Here we are again.  Another year older, another year wiser, another year under our belts.  Thank goodness that’s over!  I had made mention in my 2016 review that it had been a rough year all around.  I had such optimism for 2017!  Well, things definitely didn’t go as planned.  But I refuse to believe things won’t get better.  They will!  Hang in there dear readers!

We had another busy year around here, starting with our youngest son proposing to his girlfriend.  Many of you know that Griffin is in the Army and had just been stationed in Washington right before Christmas 2016.  He proposed via Snapchat (kids!) at the end of January with plans to get married while he was home on leave in July.  Griffin and Kirsten got married at our local city hall and we had a lovely reception in my brother-in-law’s backyard.  My whole family pitched in with food and help decorating and planning.  It was a wonderful day.  You can find some photos from that day here.

During all the crazy wedding planning my mother-in-law became very sick.  She lived 3 hours north of us although all of her doctors were down here.  (She lived in a small tourist town and didn’t have the options we have in our metropolitan area.)  Some tough choices needed to be made and she ended up having to move in with us and I went from being a mom with just grown children to a caregiver to my mother-in-law.  The good news is she is doing much better.  She’s even began moving into her own apartment this past weekend.  She’ll only be a few miles away so we are around in emergencies and she’s close to her docs, but the fact that she can be independent (to a point) again is a plus.

And yes, our oldest is still living at home in our basement.  He has a better job now, although still not what he considers a career.  But it’s allowing him to save up some money because he gets TONS of hours.  He also started back at school to finish up one more course this semester.  Hopefully he will have some doors opening up for him shortly.  He’s such a good kid.  Okay, adult.  He’ll always be a kid to me though.

I have finally found my groove in becoming a more consistent blogger.  Of course, that’s because I’ve been writing about my passion…reading.  Plus, I’ve had time.  With my mother-in-law getting sick, I never got a job as I was hoping to do after the wedding.  On top of that, I spent a LOT of time in waiting rooms for her appointments.

I had set my Goodreads reading goal at 150 books for 2017.  I once again exceeded that goal by reading 183 books.  I honestly don’t know if that would have been the case had I gotten a paying job rather than staying home to care for my MIL, but I’m not complaining about getting more reading time.

I really love how the array of all my books read looks on Goodreads’ Year in Review.  Check it out.

I’m pretty happy with the way I’ve been able to tweak my monthly recaps throughout the year.  Although, truth be told, I’m not sure they’re accomplishing what I had originally hoped.  That was to help others find new ways to read and obtain books.  I’m sure that has to do with the fact that my readership is low (if you’re reading this, thank you for stopping by!).  I’m sure I’ll continue to post a monthly recap, but I’ll also continue tweaking it as I go along.

One thing it has definitely helped me with is keeping track of my favorites throughout the year.  I rated 22 books with 5 stars throughout 2017.  I marked A List of Cages by Robin Roe and Harmless by Nicole Edwards as my very favorite of those.

While it’s great to look back at my 2017 goals in my Looking Back post from a year ago, I realize I should have taken a quick peek once in a while throughout the year so I wouldn’t forget my goals.  I didn’t too bad though.  The thing I didn’t do well with is my intent to have one post a month of a more personal nature so my readers could get a better idea of who I am as a person.  I’m going to re-up, so to speak, on that one for 2018.  I find the hardest thing for me is to not get too wordy when writing anything personal.

As I mentioned before, I exceeded my book reading goal…so at least I did well on one goal!  For 2018, I once again set my goal for 150 books.  The reason being that I really do need to return to the working world (the one where I can get a pay check which doesn’t happen with this caregiver gig!) so know my reading will be taking a nosedive once I find a job.  I’m hoping it won’t nosedive so much that I cannot reach my goal though.  Reading brings me so much joy and I don’t want to lose that joy.

How was your 2017?  Have you set any reading goals for 2018 or decided to do any reading challenges?  I’d love to hear from you.