2011 to 2012

I know that it is already January 15th, so this is a little late coming, but I have just been busy. Every year I make a list of the new movies I have seen and the books that I have read for the year. Here are my lists:

New Movies in 2011:

-No Strings Attached
-Winter's Bone
-The Kids Are All Right
-How to Train Your Dragon
-True Grit
-Gnomeo & Juliet
-The Last Airbender
-The King's Speech
-Black Swan
-The Fighter
-Burlesque
-The Next Three Days
-How Do You Know
-The Tourist
-I am Number Four
-Pirates 4: On Stranger Tides
-Rio
-Blue Valentine
-X-Men: First Class
-Green Lantern
-Transformers 3
-Beastly
-Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2
-The Lincoln Lawyer
-Just Go With It
-Captain America: The First Avenger
-Red Riding Hood
-Bad Teacher
-Bridesmaids
-Horrible Bosses
-Friends With Benefits
-Crazy Stupid Love
-The Help
-Something Borrowed
-The Town
-Your Highness
-Real Steel
-Footloose
-Breaking Dawn: Part 1
-Larry Crowne

Books read in 2011:

-Spider Bones by Kathy Reichs
-Shopaholic & Sister by Sophie Kinsella
-Shopaholic & Baby by Sophie Kinsella
-Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling
-Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling
-Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling
-Mini Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella
-Harry Potter and the Goblet of fire by J.K. Rowling
-Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling
-Matched by Allie Condie
-Shalador's Lady by Anne Bishop
-Buried Prey by John Sandford
-The Devil Wears Prada by Lauren Weisberger
-Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling
-Remember Me? by Sophie Kinsella
-The Law of Nines by Terry Goodkind
-Can You Keep A Secret? by Sophie Kinsella
-The Undomestic Goddess by Sophie Kinsella
-Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery
-V is for Vengeance by Sue Grafton
-A Stolen Life by Jaycee Dugard
-Shock Wave by John Sandford

Sadly, my list of books this year I feel is considerably smaller, although I haven't actually counted to check. I used to listen to books on CD while I would drive. And even though I still do that, since my commute to work is now about 5 minutes, I don't usually listen to books on CD while I drive anymore. So, most of these I actually read, with the book in hand, or on my kindle that my awesome Alaskan family got me for my birthday.

So, that also leads up to another huge change for me this year, I got PROMOTED and am FINALLY managing my own Baskin Robbins!! I have worked at Baskin Robbins for 9 and a half years now! I know that is a long time, and sometimes I feel like it really should be time to move on, especially since I am not doing anything with my degree. However, I am LOVING the challenge of managing this store. Without trying to sound too conceded, I really am doing an awesome job of it. When I first took over the store, the store was making negative numbers, meaning that my boss was spending money that he was making at his other stores to help keep this one open. He has been doing that for three years now and out of his six stores, my store was the second worst. I took over managing in April, and by June I turned that around. My store is now making money for the first time in 3 years! So, I think I am pretty cool and doing a great job!

This year was also a year of traveling for me. I was lucky enough to take a week vacation up to Seattle and Portland that I just loved! It was so much fun! I loved seeing the places, visiting people (including my awesome Sis, Elisabeth!) and traveling with my friend Jennifer. This year I was also lucky enough to go down to the Shakespearean Festival twice with my family, and take a trip to Moab with a lot of my Photo friends. I want to spend another post on this to give the trip justice, but I also got to fly up to Alaska to surprise my brother and see him in his play of Les Mis! The entire cast helped fly me up there to see his performance, because if I hadn't donated my kidney to him last year, he wouldn't have been able to do that play this year. not only was he in it, he was the lead! So cool! I loved spending time with my family there and getting to see Kodiak! Like I said, I'll post pictures and go into more detail later on.

My third niece, Sophie, was born this year! She is a total doll and I am loving getting to know her! One really interesting and cute thing to me about Sophie is that she growls at people to show them that she loves them! I have no idea where she got that, but I think it is so cute and unique to her personality.

This past year I have also been able to spend a lot of time with my mom. With our schedules being so different, most of the week we were passing ships, but after I got her addicted to Grey's Anatomy, we spent most of every weekend together, eating potatoes and onions and watching Grey's Anatomy. It really was a lot of fun. Even though she technically moved in January, it has been a big adjustment for me to not have her here with me anymore. I really miss her a lot, along with all of my family that has decided to pick up and move to Alaska. (Geoffrey moved there in February and Allison in July.) I love you guys all so much and I really really miss you. It has been a huge adjustment for me this year to have now HALF of the family up in Kodiak. It just isn't the same. Our family has always been really close, so it's weird to not see you guys nearly as often as I would like.

To end my post, I think I should post a couple of things that I would like for 2012:

1-I would like to reach my goal weight this year. I have been working hard to get there, and I think it is really a reasonable goal to try and hit it this year. I also am working on getting my body fat percentage lower, so I would like that to be in the high teens by the end of the year.

2-I want to get my spending more under control. With the recent development of my shopping addiction, I have a lot more on credit cards than I am comfortable with. Especially since I am also now paying off my student loans, etc... so I would like to get my money issues back under control.

3-I would like to continue traveling more. I especially would like to always make a trip out of the anniversary of giving my kidney. That was a huge deal for me, and I think it would be fun to honor it in that way.

4-I want to try and take more pictures this year. I have had a block about it this year. I am not entire sure where that comes from, but I really only took pictures this last year if people dragged it out of me. So, I want to do more personal shooting this year in the hope that I will start enjoying it again.

5-I would like to try and be more organized and clean up after myself better. I am great about it at work, so I am not sure why the same habits don't apply to where I am living... I have been working on a lot of things that make me feel better, such as losing weight, or going tanning, or just working out in general makes me feel better, eating better... so I think the next step for me is cleaning my room and staying more organized.

6-I really want to stay in better contact with people. I like spending time and knowing what is going on in people's lives. I miss my friends and family, so hopefully I can find more time to spend with everyone.

That is all of my resolutions for now, and I don't even really consider them resolutions. They are just goals for what I would want to do, and hopefully they can happen within the next year. Love you all, and here is 2012~

(The top picture taken of me was taken by my friend Meghann Larsen. I helped model for her for an assignment for her portrait class.)