Twenty-Seven Things

On Saturday I turned twenty-seven. Remember a mere six months ago when I was celebrating my 26 1/2 birthday? It's now official...I am in my late twenties! I feel good about 27 though. It's a good number and I think it will be a good year.

Last year, a friend and I went out on a Tuesday night to celebrate our birthdays, since hers is a few days before mine. We were sitting up at the bar at Chino Latino chatting with the bartender, when my friend pulled out two pens and said, "Ash, we're going to make our birthday lists."

"Birthday lists? What are we? Twelve?"

"No, we are each going to make a list of things we need to do or accomplish this year. You'll make a list of 26 things, and I will make a list of 27 things." (she is one year older)

So, we sat sipping wine and writing out our lists of personal development on cocktail napkins. Looking back, I did pretty well checking things off the list. Among some items on my list were:

Take a new aerobics class (belly dancing AND cardio-kickboxing-check!)
Throw a housewarming party (last December-check!)
Go to Washington, DC (went in August-check!)
Run around Lake Calhoun with ease (I ran it all the way around, "with ease" is questionable)
Find a church to go to (Wooddale-check!)
Buy art for my walls (got a mirror, but that's it)
Read more (joined a book club-check!)
Publish at least two writing clips (I'm not sure where I was going with this at the time, but do 35 self-published blog posts count?)
Learn to rotate my rollerblade wheels (reference "handyman" blog post-check!)
Learn to use chopsticks well (I tried-but I'm still pretty hopeless!)
Be more patient with my mom (no comment-this will probably be on my list again)

Okay, so you get the idea. This year I did it again, adding one more item to that list. I'm not going to post my entire list of 27 things "to-do" while I'm 27...some have to remain private, right? But I will share a couple with you. I figure if I actually make some of them public, I'm more likely to get them done!

Drop a ski waterskiing (I've never done this before and want to do it before I get too old!)
Milk a cow
Get a nice new comfy down pillow
Visit one of the following places: wine country, Denver, Arizona, or Vegas
Learn more about finance and investing
Cook one new recipe a month
Print all my digital pictures from the past two years and organize
Use the word "like" less often
Incorporate new words into my vocabulary
Take a different kind of dance class (salsa, line-dancing, hula)
Get back my six-pack (stomach, not beer)
Attempt to read more non-fiction books
Strengthen my queasy stomach and see BodyWorlds at the Science Museum

Give you a little taste? We'll see how I do this year.