Happy New Year’s Eve everyone! What are your NYE plans?
My hubby and I are heading up to Anaheim today to meet up with my family, who are in town for a week. My dad is a high school football coach, and is coaching an all-star game with some of the best players in the nation here, so he’s in California with my mom, sister, older brother (who also coaches football), sister-in-law and nephews. It’s kind of funny that I was just in Jersey where they all live, and then a few days later they all flew out to my neck of the woods on the west coast, but I’m looking forward to getting to see them some more and spend New Year’s together!
As 2014 comes to a close, I thought it’d be neat to look back at the highs of my year. Here are my 2014 highlights!
My backyard
Buying a home & moving back down to SoCal – Purchasing our first home and moving back down to the San Diego area from the Bay Area was certainly a whirlwind of a time for A and me (check out my post announcing it here!). Slowly but surely we’ve gotten settled in in our new home, and I’m loving being back in SoCal! From great farmers’ markets and the beach to beautiful parks and vegan restaurants, SoCal just fits my lifestyle and the things that I love to do.
Studying holistic health coaching – This year I made a comeback to being a student – something I’ve always enjoyed and had missed since my time as an undergrad came to an end. Studying at the Institute for Integrative Nutrition was something that just fit me, and I’m excited to have earned my certification in health coaching just a few weeks ago. I have big plans for my health coaching business in the new year!
Celebrating 5 years of marriage – I’m not a huge anniversary person, but to me, this seemed like the first big milestone in my marriage. We toasted to a great first half a decade as husband and wife and reflected on what an adventure it has been…
Enduring the toughest hiking endurance challenge of my life – Oh, and we also commemorated 5 years of marriage by spending the weekend hiking 40 miles around Catalina Island (trip recap here!). It was one of my craziest memories of the year, and I hope to have more hiking adventures in 2015!
My First Trip to Lake Tahoe – Though travel is a passion of mine, my year wasn’t that thick with travel due to a few things, including that little ole thing mentioned above – buying a house in California. My hubby also quit his job to start his own business, so we had other priorities happening. However, we did fit in a short vacation to Lake Tahoe earlier this year, where we went hiking, ate some great food, and had a memorable day on the ski slopes – my first time trying my hand at skiing! As always, traveling to new places is something that I hope I get to do more of in the new year. I already have a Miami trip on the books for my best friend’s bachelorette party, and I’m anticipating it to be an awesome time!
Snapshots from pumpkin picking in NJ last fall; pictured: me with my little brother and nephews
Spending time at my parents’ house – I made three trips back to Jersey this year, and two of them were for a couple of solid weeks. It was nice spending quality time with my family and girlfriends, who I am so close with and am so grateful for.
Thanksgiving 10K with my cousin
Letting my fitness passion thrive – Since moving in May, I haven’t been a steady member of any gym…. mostly because I’ve been too busy trying out so many different workouts! There have been many HIIT, kickboxing, and FitnessGlo workouts at home, hikes around SoCal, Fitwall classes, Core40 workouts (which has been referred to as Pilates on crack!), yoga sessions, workouts at studios participating in ClassPass, and even a few races thrown into the mix. I’m looking forward to being just as busy with letting my love of fitness thrive and partnering up with more studios in the new year.
The end of the year seems to spark something in me – making me look forward to what I hope will be a wonderful next year. I’m not really a New Year’s resolution person per se, but I am feeling very motivated to achieve great things in 2015, and have come up with a list of goals of all types that I hope to accomplish. I’m looking forward to sharing them all with you. Thanks so much for reading and sharing my journey thus far, and cheers to a happy, healthy 2015!!
Tell me… What are some of your 2014 highlights? Any major goals for 2015? I’d love to hear em!
You have had such an amazing year! I love your backyard of your new house. That is definitely a great highlight. My biggest highlight was expanding my family! 🙂
Thanks, Britt! I do love my backyard. We’ve since made a few positive changes to it since that photo.. including repainting the fence, and cutting down oversized trees and replanting new ones 😉
Just seeing your pics of SoCal this year have made me dream of sunshine, fish tacos and outdoor races 🙂 Can’t wait to keep up with more of your beautiful life in 2015!
Thank you doll! Ah yes, I do enjoy living here and getting to be in the SoCal sunshine!
Aw, it’s so fun to look back! What a great year, full of big milestones and family time. Here’s to having a great 2015 as well! For 2015, my goals are to continue working on my career, do some volunteering, and get crafty by doing some DIYs! 🙂 See you in 2015!
Nice, looking forward to reading about what type of volunteering you decide to do! Volunteering is on my list of new things to restart in 2015 as well. I’ve volunteered at animal shelters for years, but last year after I moved I didn’t pick up any new volunteering gigs. Time to get back into it!
What a great year, loved this post!! I really loved the hiking recap post link-back! 🙂
Thanks so much, Brittany!
Happy 2015!! Looks like you had a great 2014! Happy 5 year anni!! That is so exciting! 🙂
Happy New Year, Cailee! Yes, it was cool to celebrate 5 years!
I am so jealous of your backyard – it’s beautiful.
I went to Lake Tahoe about 20 years ago and it is one of the best places I have been to. The scenery is incredible.
I know right?? I really want to go back to Tahoe when it’s warmer to spend some time doing water sports and hiking more around there!
That’s your backyard?! Ok, I’m coming to visit 🙂
You had such a beautiful year! I also don’t really do resolutions but something about this year has me super motivated to do lots of things in various areas of my life. One of them also includes a move to a place that I feel will be good for my lifestyle.
Have an amazing 2015, Nicole!
Thanks, Anna! Moving can give you such a fresh perspective on life — hope that you achieve that this year!
You had a really great year!! Congratulations on 5 years of marriage. You both look too young to have been married that long. And somehow I missed that Catalina Island post but I just read it and wow, I can’t believe you carried a backpack that whole way. Hiking for that long would be hard enough for me on it’s own.
I’m looking forward to celebrating my one year anniversary with the hubs this year. I’m hoping we can get away to Carmel or Big Sur. But I don’t plan on carrying a pack for 9 1/2 hours. 😉
Hahaha. You mean that’s not your idea of a relaxing anniversary getaway?! We got married pretty young! 😉
Wait, how have I missed that your family is in Jersey??? That’s where mine lives!! haha We were just there for Christmas 🙂
You had a fantastic year! I’m hoping the hubs and I can travel this year a little bit. We couldn’t make it happen in 2014 so I’m hoping for 2015!
Too funny! Where in Jersey??
I hope I will buy my dream house soon :). Great achievements! May your 2015 be even greater