Before January slips away completely I wanted to pop by to say ‘hello’ and share some of my personal and work-based goals for the year ahead.

I’ll try and keep this short, not only because I have a tendency to waffle but keeping blog posts short, sweet and *fingers crossed* interesting, is one of my first goals for the New Year! Let’s see how that works out shall we?

PERSONAL GOALS

KEEP MOVING

Last year I wanted to find my feet and get back in to running again, which I did (YAY!) and I really enjoyed it. I didn’t run hard, far or fast but my brain (and my bum) certainly appreciated the time outdoors and the ‘me time’ those little outings provided.

I want to keep this up and even though I injured my foot last September and had to stop running for a couple of months, I started some physio sessions in the new year and am slowly ‘learning’ to run again.

Fingers crossed with the physio and slow re-introduction to building up miles, I’ll be able to stick to the couple of half marathons I signed up to but for now… baby steps. I’m also still keeping up wth regular yoga sessions, which I LOVE thanks to Adriene and Benji!

DRIVING

I think I’ve mentioned this before but I am a REALLY anxious driver! I never used to be but as the need to drive became less and less for me over the years, my confidence started to disappear and I need to work on reversing this. Especially as I now have the biggest and bestest reason to claw my confidence back again… BUDDY!

So, with the help of The Beard and his everlasting patience, I’m hoping to get out more in Buddy (and the car) so I can start feeling more confident on the roads again. First steps though… practice getting out of our driveway without turning it into that scene from Austin Powers!

MORE ADVENTURES

It probably goes without saying by now but getting outdoors, enjoying the fresh air and exploring new places is what keeps my sun shining and inspires a lot of what you lovely lot see within the business. So whilst it may be a personal goal it ties quite nicely into work too.

BUSINESS GOALS

WEDDING FAIR & PORTRAITS

In March I have my very first wedding fair (eek!) where I will be taking my Portraits and advertising my pop up, live illustration services to the wedding world (double eek!) After my very first wedding in November 2017, last year I was invited to draw and paint at a few more and it made me realise that THIS is part of my business I definitely want to push.

It’s a tad terrifying and I have a lot of work to do but I’m also excited about working with some of my favourite creative friends (and family!) to pull out all the stops and make this new venture an exciting one!

RE-FOCUS JEWELLERY

I’ve been thinking a lot about my collections of jewellery and looking at what products within them have sold well over the past couple of years. Sounds like a pretty obvious thing to be on top of, right? But if I’m completely honest, it’s not one I’ve paid much attention to as I get swept up in creating complete collections and ignoring the performance of each piece when it comes to sales. Oops!

This year, I’m planning to address that and hoping to give my jewellery collections and product ranges a little shake up. Although I’ll be sad to say goodbye to some of my personal favourite pieces, I am also looking forward to bringing some new designs to life along the way.

BLOGGING

2018 saw me keep up with posting quite regularly on here and I really genuinely it, especially popping by each month (albeit a little late sometimes) with a little round up of happenings, travels, work achievements and the like. Our wedding posts were really fun to write up and share with you all after the big day and although we won’t be doing anything that grand this year I thought I might try and start a little ‘Adventures with Buddy’ series and share some of the travels we go on with him.

I really want to keep up with blogging regularly but will be aiming to keep each one short and sweet so it’s manageable. I promise to keep them fun and full of photos though, to keep your eyes happy and hopefully inspire you along the way.

WORD OF THE YEAR

I feel like I’ve missed something, maybe I miss it every year, or maybe it’s a new trend that’s appear for 2019 but lots of people have been picking and sharing their word for the year and I think it’s a fun thing to do.

Depending on how you like to set your goals or plan for the year, month, week or day, I think having one word you can hark back to in order to keep yourself on track has to be a good thing. So I’m jumping on the bandwagon and I’m not even sorry about it.

When I started to think more about picking a word for myself, it didn’t take that long to settle on one. In fact, it was the first word that hit me when I was mulling over what I want to get out of my business, my life and the time I invest in things. My word for 2019 (and when I think about it, probably has been the underlying drive in most things I’ve done in the past and probably will do in the future) is…

EXPLORE.

It’s one of my favourite things to do, always has been, whether it’s a place, a material, your feelings, an activity, a design process, your fears, a recipe, or even just playing with a new toy. More importantly, exploring isn’t always fun or easy (it can be darn right scary!) but I believe it is so important. After all, if you don’t explore, take some risks and go after what you want, you’ll never know what you might achieve.

OK, that’s enough of the deep and meaningfuls and brings me to the end of my first blog post of the year! YAY! I hope you enjoyed the read.

I’m planning to return soon with a little round up of January, I can’t promise it will be jam packed with excitement as there has been a LOT of adulting and life admin going on this month but plenty has been happening and there have been some beautiful, bright winter days along the way too!

☀️