Achievements in 2017
It’s 2018 now, the New Year’s number being one higher hasn’t quite yet sunk in. But it is the natural time for reflection and when I did this last year it felt pretty good, and it gives me something to look back at and see how well I did.
1. Family time.
We’ve had a pretty good family year. Rocco has been continuing to grow in to a lively, curious and good natured little boy. He brings us so much joy. Over the summer I helped my mum move house from Cornwall back to Sussex, and have been helping her every few weekends since he move. It’s been good having her closer to home. In October we enjoyed a holiday to San Francisco to see the Whipple-Kisses and Rocco loves hanging out with his cousins. Whilst there, we took a trip to Yosemite which was a first, a bit smokey with all the forest fires that were happening, but an absolutely stunning place.
2. Grow our family.
The year ended with Naomi in her 34th week of pregnancy. At some point in January we expect our second son to be born, we’re all excited for his arrival. It’s sometimes subdued and sometimes very anxious excitement but we are excited nonetheless. The grief we feel for Uma’s death is with us every single day and we have had many difficult moments throughout the year. A new addition to the family will bring us fresh challenges and new smiles, but the loss of Uma will be forever be with us.
The new garden. Small but well formed?
3. Design and build the garden patio.
I did this throughout the spring and summer. It involved brickwork, rendering, woodwork, rebuilding a shed, painting, gardening and well, more. It was very physical and broke various parts of my body, but I survived. Moving over one and a half metric tonnes of concrete breeze blocks messed up my rotator cuff which caused me much discomfort for the summer (at least I believe this to be the cause). The extra space outside gives our home a sort of extra room, and we’re looking forward to enjoying it fully in 2018. I've completely failed to post about the work involved, but I'll endeavour to do this.
4. Continue to focus energy on acting on climate change.
Working on Electric Brighton, with the aim to raise awareness of electric vehicles and help people to switch over, I launched the site in April and it has led me to meet some great people within the EV community locally. I'm also now collaborating with Ben Sauer and Damien Tanner to help push things forward. It's a rewarding side project which will be continuing in 2018. Roll on the zero-carbon future!
4.a. Save some money for the Tesla Model 3.
Saving towards this car has turned in to a hobby, with funds spread across various saving means, I've never saved this keenly towards anything in my life! I'm 67% saved towards my downpayment as I go in to 2018. The remainder will be a loan within my means, so I'm hoping to hit 100% and keep going to reduce the expected borrowing.
5. Think about getting a dog.
Done. The thinking that is, still no dog.
Well, that's it for last year, what about 2018? There's a lot to be doing this year so I'm going to keep things simple.
- Finish the little jobs around the house:
- Fix the air-brick out front.
- Finish the downstairs stair case skirting and flooring.
- The coving in Rocco's room.
- Continue to act on climate change:
- Continue to build on Electric Brighton.
- Keep saving for the Model 3.
- Try to update my blog more often (I've been really bad at that this year!).