Resolutions: Dreaming great dreams for 2014

What New Year's resolutions did you make last year? Did you keep them? Last year, I made a complicated list of resolutions with short-term and long-term goals. I didn't fulfill any of them.

If I learned anything in 2013, it's the KISS principle: Keep It Simple, Stupid. Here are my 2014 resolutions, which will be much easier to keep:

• Get more exercise.
• Eat healthier food.
• Spend more time with family and friends.
• Don't sweat the small stuff.
• Don't let the past prevent me from living fully in the present.
• Have more fun.

2013 adventures I don't want to repeat: moving three times in three months and downsizing to 540 square feet with no bathroom, kitchen or heat. Despite those challenges, I had an amazing year.

Here are highlights of my 2013 adventures:

Getting a tattoo--a paddling dragon!
Now I carry my dragon boat paddle everywhere!

 

Facing a wall of mirrors in a belly dancing studio,
 and enjoying learning to move my body--
and to love my body.

Pushing myself to my physical limits while
paddling a dragon boat with the Mighty Women.





Trying downhill skiing again after age 50.
My only other experience, at age 19,
was scary and a disastrous blow to my confidence.

Learning to shoot a bow like Katniss of "The Hunger Games."





Paddling a handmade skin-on-frame kayak with Kirby and
other paddlers on the Colville River near where I grew up.

Sleeping in a teepee!

Convincing fellow Columbian reporters to paddle with me in
dragon boat races on Vancouver Lake. 

Having adventures with my daughter, Katie, including meeting
Spock, Kirk and tribbles at Trek in the Park with Holly and Charlie.
 





Playing an African djembe drum in many gatherings, including
around a campfire and under a full moon with other musicians. 

Learning to swing dance with Kirby at a crowded pub,
We were the only couple dancing--and people applauded!





 

Paddling a kayak on a blue-sky day
with my pal Patty Ingraham.