New Year, New Me & New Blog

Yah, "New Year, New Me" is an over-used, cliché phrase, but... I don't care! Ha Ha! I don't care, first, because I feel it's true, and, second, because it makes me feel good and energized for the year ahead of me! I've got a lot planned for the blog this year, and I just feel like this really is going to be an awesome year for the blog, and for myself as well! The year has only just begun and I've already got some really exciting news about The Creative Glow, we're being featured in a magazine!!!! I will be sharing more with you in a future post in early/mid February - REALLY EXCITING! As for myself, just before Christmas, I got a dramatic haircut, about 14 inches, and I feel like that helped me feel fresh and new to begin a fresh new year! I even got trendy new geek-chic glasses! Here are some other things I'm thinking about for this new year:

NEW BLOG

With a new year I am working on a new look for my blog. I feel like it really wasn't that long ago that I did a re-vamp of my original site, but when it comes to even graphic design, I tend to tire of the same look for long periods of time. It's just like hair or makeup or clothes or shoes; I get tired of the same things everyday. Being a graphic designer...and just a creative mind in general, there's always some new look that I want. It's really not good to change the look of your site too frequently, but if I can get away with once a year, I feel that's ok. And it really just started out as only wanting to polish things up on the blog so it looks nice and clean, and make everything look "on fleek" (ha ha ha) for retina display viewing, but after doing all the things I wanted to do, it definitely looks completely different. I am loving the new look, I hope you will too, and I will be going live with that sometime in the next few weeks, once I'm finished. So, if all of a sudden one day things look "weird" 'round here, you're still in the right place, don't worry!

PLANNING

Planning is something I am always working on, but being it's a new year, that means a new agenda planner and new notebooks. I LOVE cute notebooks! And I feel like the more you like the look of them, the more likely you are to pick them up and use them. I'm planning a DIY post on making your own cute notebooks, but for now, here are some planners and notebooks that I love!

FIND THEM HERE | 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10

MORE BEAUTY

In search of more great beauty products I might like and can share with, and review for, you guys without breaking my tiny bank, I'm thinking about some beauty box subscriptions. There are 2 I'm thinking of trying: TopBox and Birchbox. There are sooo many to choose from, but these ones look good to me because, living in Canada, they won't have a whole bunch of extra costs associated with actually getting them to me. To all my US followers, you're all so lucky to be able to get your American based beauty boxes without additional fees, and sometimes even free shipping! TopBox is a Canadian based beauty subscription that, from what my boyfriend's sister showed me, offers some great samples that are decently sized, and no shipping fees, but it's available to Canadian residents only - sorry US followers, I love you so, so much and you make up a huge portion of my visitors here, that's why I have 2 boxes that I want to try. That leads me to Birchbox - it's an American company, but they have a Canadian operation as well, shipping is cheap with subscription and there are no other fees.

FIND THEM HERE | 1, 2

MORE ART

This is one of the things I had on my list last year as well: I to do more art! I feel gotten back to doing more art over the past year, but I still think I'm not dedicating enough of my time to this love. It was so easy in college because I went to art school; all you're doing is art. But now that I have to schedule the time myself to do it, it's much harder with all of life's distractions. I did start working with a new medium this year - oil paints. And I am very happy about that because I've wanted to work in oils for a very, very long time now. I'm really enjoying the new challenge and will have an Art Series post featuring the painting I did for my grandfather for Christmas... which he hasn't received yet, so shhhh. You can see my very first attempt with oils here. There are many options for oils paints, I chose to go with M. Graham because of their reputation of rich colors and because I wanted to have a solvent free environment since my art room where I paint is a small room in our small apartment.

FIND THEM HERE | 1

NEW ME

Okay, yes, what you're about to read is even more of a cliché than saying "New Year, New Me", but, again, I don't care! I don't think there is anything wrong with being one of those people who say they want to get in better shape in the new year! Why is it bad just because everyone says it? Why is it bad just because a lot of people don't stick to it? You're setting goals for yourself, and that is never bad! Even if you say it every year, even if you don't make it... one of these times you just might! Believe in yourself and be a cliche! That's what I'm gonna do!

MORE WATER & HEALTHY FOODS

I am so guilty of not drinking enough water, or even just enough liquids, in a day. Terrible! My skin suffers for it (very dehydrated), and I'm sure other things are affected by it too, that maybe aren't so apparent. I get up in the morning, sometimes I get ready first, and sometimes I just get right to work and then take a break to get ready...maybe, but once I'm sitting down to work I'm then, most often, "in the zone" and don't realize the hours passing by, or the fact that I haven't moved in many hours let alone eaten or drunk anything. Okay... now this reminds me - it's now just about 1pm, I should get up and get something for lunch and get some water! Here are some great water bottle options while I go do that, and check out #5 - this bottle tracks you water intake...

FIND THEM HERE | 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Alright, so now that I've gotten my water and also eaten two mini pizzas, it's time to discuss my eating habits for the new year! Also, just kidding, I didn't eat mini pizzas, just thought that would be ironic if I had, being that I'm now going to talk about healthier eating. Sometimes I do, and still will, eat mini pizzas for lunch, and I think that's ok sometimes. Around here we don't commonly eat all that unhealthy, but we don't always make a point to make sure our meals are in the healthy category. It's like this: eating a chicken breast with mashed potatoes and some sort of veggie isn't unhealthy, it's decent, but eating a chicken breast with a smaller amount of rice and a large side of salad is healthy. I feel like knowing what's in your meals and how they've been prepared is a big part of "healthy" eating, so cooking meals at home is the best option and really saves money. I'm thinking about trying some meal prepping so that healthy meals are quicker and as easy as heating them up. There are lots of options and ideas for meal prep over on Instagram!

MORE EXERCISE

Yep, it's on my list! The biggest issue for me, as with so many people, is staying motivated! But I also don't think about it unless I'm feeling badly about how I look, which is usually when I'm getting ready for the day, and that's not the best time for a spontaneous sweat session. But exercise should be for so many more reasons than just looking good! I know from experience that it just makes you feel better and have more energy, but it also does amazing things for the inside of your body, stress relief, and anti-aging. A couple months before the end of the year I started setting myself an alarm for mid-day so that I could remind myself to take a break from my work day to exercise. This really helped me and I felt, by Christmas came around, that I was starting to notice some small changes. So I'm really just getting back to that routine, but I'd also possibly like to add a way to track how much exercise I am getting in a day/week/month. Perhaps a fitbit or something similar? Here are some ideas of gadgets.

FIND THEM HERE | 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

So those are just some of the things I am planning to for my year. How about you? Do you have any things you're going to start or improve on this year? Leave them in the comments, I'd love to hear what you're up to!

Sam ♡

P.S. Some of the links provided in this post are affiliate links meaning I may earn commissions through purchases made using those link.

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