Happy New Year Friends and Fashionistas! I can’t believe it’s 2018! Years are starting to fly by! Maybe it’s because of the kids, but time gets away from me so quickly nowadays. This year, I want to be more intentional with everything that I do – with the kids and Mr. S, at home, at work, and on the blog. It’s been awhile since I did a yearly roundup, and this is the perfect opportunity to reflect on the past year.

(P.S. You can click on each picture to take you to the original post.)

I was going through some older posts and read this 2012 year in review, and it was so fun to read about us starting the adoption process. Little M came along, and I notice my 2013 year in review was really short on words! LOL!

Before I get into the review, thank y’all so much for all of your support and love on Style of Sam (SOS). Thank you for allowing me to serve you in some kind of capacity, whether it’s style advice, comic relief (talking about the kids & some of my outfits are out there!), inspiration, or just trying to keep up with me as a friend. (You know who you are friends. I LOVE YOU!) I couldn’t and wouldn’t be doing this without Y’all and feel so honored that you would take any time to come visit my little part of the internet.

Here we go!

Happenings in 2017

BLOG LIFE

• SOS revived the From Grandma with Love series (more consistently, Ha!) and started What’s in My Bag, #ManicMomDay, and Luxe for Less. Those have been less consistent, but I have a new What’s in My Bag coming up for the New Year!
• The Chic at Every Age gals had an adventure in Florida shooting with Soma Intimates. The campaign is due out in April, and we can’t wait to share with you!
• I flew to California to visit the CABI Headquarters and meet some amazing bloggers on #CABIBLOGGERDAY! You can check out the recap HERE. They are one of my favorite brands, and I’ve worn their clothing for years (since 2004 kind of years)!
• You know about my love for Vintage so it was such a blast to do Facebook Live with Vintage Tex and Eyeopener TV about how to incorporate Vintage into your Wardrobe! BTW, EyeopenerTV is no longer, so I can’t get access to the video! If you know what happens to Facebook Live videos and what black hole they go into, then please let me know!
• I also had the opportunity to attend Alt Summit as a roundtable speaker on “Creating a Curated Instagram” which was a huge honor for me! I did a few outfit recaps HERE.

PERSONAL LIFE

• Every year, I try new ways to get organized, and I finally got a smartwatch last year! Hallelujah to technology that helps your life be better! For my daily routine, I’m never opposed to the regular pen and paper organizer. Here’s my review of the Erin Condren Lifeplanner.
• The kids have grown up so quickly, and we’ve had a lot of fun enjoying their stages of childhood. I started doing Kindergarten Previews for Little M this year, and Baby M is busy trying to do EVERYTHING that her big brother does! HERE, I share ten things I’ve learned from those sweet babes.
• I’m always trying to find “life hacks” as Mr. S calls them, and I swear by these four tips to help me get out of the house on time(ish)! LOL! #foreveraCLIP (CLIP stands for chronically late insane person – the article literally made me LOL, cry, and almost fall out of my chair!) I’ve continued to make my five tips for self-care a priority (but always working on the sleep portion)!
• I’ve been transitioning a lot of my beauty products to “clean” or natural products and starting sharing more publicly on the blog. THIS PAGE gives a little background on everything. My two favorite post are five clean beauty faves HERE and my Tata Harper skincare routine HERE. I can’t wait to share an upcoming post with y’all that I’ve been working on for months now!
• Franklin, our fur kid, is getting older and continues to tolerate the children and loves them most during meal time when he’s under their seat patiently waiting for them to drop food! He’s getting older and not moving quite as quickly. We think his hearing and vision are getting a little worse too. It makes us sad to think of him not being with the family.
• My BFF from first grade came to visit with her one year old! We had so much fun reminiscing about life before kids, and how it is to be an “older mom”. Yes, I said it! LOL! She’s in DC right now, and I’m trying to come up with any reason to visit her before she moves to Israel later this Summer.
• We spent Thanksgiving at my friend’s farm with her family and my other BFF. It was the most memorable Thanksgiving we’ve ever had! Cheers to lots more amazing memories!

Hopeful for 2018

• As mentioned earlier, I want to be more intentional with everything that I do IN LIFE – kids, husband, life, work, and blog. I recently read the book, A Simplified Life by Emily Ley, and it has inspired me to simplify in so many ways. I’m excited to continue my process of “organizing”! One of my friends suggesting hiring a professional organizer to help, and I am going to do it!
• I’ve also started The Five Minute Journal as a way to start and end the day with gratitude. Gratitude is very important to me, and it’s been stated to be an easy “happy pill”. I’m all for that! I’m also trying to keep up with my daily reading from the Bible.
• Regarding the blog, I would like to be more consistent -either with posting days or times or both. Again, this goes back to number one and “simplifying” everything.
• Of course, I want to start incorporating more intentional exercise in my life. I’m hoping for this cause and effect. Get to sleep earlier, wake up earlier at 4:30am –> work out, get ready, blog –> before the kids wake up at 6:30am. Think this is impossible? You haven’t seen Jocko Willink. Sure, he is a Navy Seal, but moms are tough right? Kidding, he is definitely a bad ass, and I’m hoping his discipline can motivate me.

What are your hopes and goals for 2018? I’ve started using the word goal instead of resolution because I want these things to stick with me for LIFE and not just a year.