2019 Year in Review

It’s been silent pretty much everywhere for the last few months with Sadie by Design. There may have been the occasional Instagram post, but ultimately I’ve been forcing myself to take a break. In a nutshell, 2019 has been the hardest year of my life. I’ve been surviving the holidays, and trying to process the jumbled mess in my head.

Reflection

At the beginning of the year, I set concrete goals for myself. Reflecting on this has been extremely hard for me because when my dad got sick, my whole life was derailed. I can’t look at a single one of my measurable goals and say I accomplished anything. Mentally, I have been struggling a lot to forgive myself for “failing” at everything I laid out for myself this year. Over the last few months this “failure” has compounded with the grieving process, and I’ve really been trying to find a way back to myself.

I have amazing friends and family, and I am eternally grateful to have such a wonderful support system in my life. This has caused a mixture of extreme gratitude and happiness to be so lucky, but also guilt for feeling sorry for myself when so many others have been dealt a worse hand. I don’t have my dad anymore, and this will forever be a pivotal moment in my life. Oddly, some of the best advice I’ve found has come from Frozen II, “How to rise from the floor/ When it’s not you I’m rising for/ Just do the next right thing.” It really is one day at a time when dealing with such a weight, and I just try to remember to treat others with kindness because you never know what anyone else is going through.

All of that being said, I can’t look back on this year, and only focus on the bad. There are many memories from this year that are still very awesome. Here is just a few:

• My dad and I saw Alan Jackson together in January
• My brother got married!
• I was on the Dragon*con banner
• Josh and I celebrated our one year anniversary
• The Southern Growl opened it’s new location
• I helped organize the biggest cosplay group I have ever been a part of with 19 girls!
• We remodeled our master bedroom.
• I handmade 8 new costumes/ outfits for myself, and created 2 outfits for little ones in my life.

What Worked?

1. Allowing myself to let go of personal expectations. Like I stated above, I have been very upset about this, but it is definitely what I need to be able to manage the mental load that was dealt to me this year.
2. Reading as though it was the equivalent of drinking water. Reading has always been an escape for me, and over the last few years, making it a normal habit has really been therapeutic. I read like it was my job to get me through some of the hardest times this year, and I have no regrets.
3. Focusing on quality over quantity. Even though I still managed to create a lot more than I expected, the quality of my projects has improved drastically because I refused to let con crunch take the front seat.

What Didn’t?

1. Bullet Journaling. Ironically, in 2017, I discovered bullet journaling, and abandoned dated planners. This year, I’ve found the lack of structure to be extremely stressful and unhelpful.
2. Setting measurable goals without a detailed plan for success. Looking back, I think my goals were pretty great, but I never made a road map to achieve them. Ultimately, once they were derailed, there was no plan in place for recovery.
3. Purchasing material for more than one project at a time. I need to try to focus on one thing at a time for the sake of my attention span. This will also prevent my fabric stash from getting (more) out of control if I’m not just buying fabrics because they are pretty, and maybe I’ll use them for something I want to do but have no concrete plans to do so at the time.

I mostly write these recaps as a personal reflection, but I hope maybe it helps anyone who is reading it. Admittedly, the holidays have been extremely hard, and it was pretty hard to stay focused on writing this. This blog is something I want in my life again, so today, I’m just making one step forward, and putting this all out there. After this post (OK one more), I am happy to leave 2019 in the past. Even though you were filled with ups and downs, I will not be missing you. The best is yet to come.

What was your greatest accomplishment or memory in 2019? Leave a comment below, and don’t forget to subscribe via email or Bloglovin’ to never miss a post!