My 30 Before 30 List - The Wrap-Up

Well, technically since my 30th birthday was a little over a week ago, I'm calling this the wrap up, but I'm not calling it finished. For obvious reasons. They're still things I want to accomplish, soon, so maybe I'll stretch it out, and hopefully I can actually get 30 things on it!

1. Get my Mandarin fish tattoo - would love to get this, but still sort of undecided on the location of the tattoo, and it's expensive (and I'm a cheapskate).
2. Sew myself a wearable skirt - only laziness to blame for this if I'm being honest with myself, well, that and my irrational phobia of cutting into fabric.
3. Sell at least 1 of my photographs - I think I'm going to work through RedBubble for this, I'll have a link up soon to my portfolio.
4. Paint again (canvas, not walls) - just haven't felt inspired to pick up a paintbrush, the camera has been my biggest source of artistic expression lately.
5. Embroider a pillowcase - ooh, just got a fantastic book - Embroidery Companion: Classic Designs for Modern Living by Alicia Paulson of Posie Gets Cozy, I intend to work on this as the weather gets colder.
6. Preserve vegetables that I’ve grown in my garden - I actually did really well with this.  I froze several bags of green beans, at least 7 two-cup bags of shredded zucchini, some cherry tomatoes, red peppers and jalepenos.  I also ventured into pickling and pickled 3 jars of green cherry tomatoes. Which, by the way are excellent, here's the recipe I used.
7. Go to a stitch and bitch or knitting group - was too shy to do this yet.
8. Volunteer - I have recently talked to a person at the Ohio Wildlife Center to start volunteering with the wild animal rescue center there, and hopefully mentor with her and learn to handle the animals and teach.
9. Run a 5K - still want to do this, but nowhere near the fitness level I need to be.
10. Read at least 5 books on my bookshelves (preferably that I haven’t read before) - Getting there, but still have a little ways to go.  The intention was originally to read five books so that I can get rid of them, however, two of the books below are Kindle books. I'm still counting them as I'm glad to have actually been completing books. I still would like to get several more books out of my house though.

• Completed books: 


• 1.Poisonwood Bible - Barbara Kinsgsolver
• 2. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
• 3.The Princess Bride -William Goldman (in progress)
• 4. Winter's Bone-Daniel Woodrell

11. Invest some money for retirement (auto 401K with work does not count) - opened a Roth IRA on ShareBuilder, but haven't moved any money there yet.
12. Yarn Diet-knit down my stash - success! sort of, I haven't brought any new yarn into the house, but, I didn't do a whole lot of knitting this summer. For some reason, during the summer, I don't knit as much, I think there's just too much else going on outside. But, I did finish a couple of projects, and only started one, and it was with stash yarn.
13. Bake and frost a layer cake from scratch - talked about this and have pictures here.

14. Sell or give away 50 things that I currently own - success with this as well! Got rid of quite a few articles of clothing, shoes, makeup, books. Just as importantly, I didn't add much to replace them.
15. Paint the hutch in the dining room - no, but I got it cleaned out fairly well. I'm still up in the air as to what I want to do with it. I kind of want to get rid of it/sell it, because it takes up quite a bit of space, but, it also has a lot of storage, so, I'm torn.
16. Get into an exercise routine - I feel pretty good about this one, and am proud of the fact that I have been working out 3-4 times a week for the last three months. I really enjoy it now too!


All in all, I'm not completely satisfied with my progress, but I want to keep at it. Wish me luck! Anybody else have a list? Leave me a link in the comments, I'd love to see it!

**Disclaimer-the Amazon links are affiliate links, just FYI.**