The Birthday List

The Birthday List

*expires August 21, 2010.

The inspiration behind this blog.

This is The List. It’s what will hold me accountable for the next 12-months before I turn 30. Even though I do a list every year on my birthday, my gut tells me this will be the most significant. (It effing better be.)

I have been 20-something for a long time now and it’s grown on me. This 30-ish business is unknown territory. Whatever it is, I want to be ready for it and make it a year of reinvention.

This blog will track it all.

Here’s what’s cooking for the next 365 days (in no particular order):

1. Sky dive
Cliche, sure, but it’s on here! In fact, it’s been on my list since age 25. No kidding. I most definitely want to be part of the club that’s jumped out of a small airplane, 3,000 feet in the air, with nothing more than a thin layer of synthetic material ushering me safely to the ground. Ya, sign me up.

2. Get my motorcycle license (the “M1″)
I love riding around on scooters on vacation. It’s time to bring a little of that back home. I really want to boot around the city in a shiny new Vespa.

3. Finish my screenplay
I’m taking a screenplay writing course to keep on track and have a solid start. Lord only knows how off-track I can get with writing projects.

4. Visit a Canadian city that’s not Montreal
With so many beautiful cities just a car ride away there is no reason not to see a city in my own backyard. And no, Montreal does not count. (I lived there very briefly one summer).

5. Shape up…more
I  work out on the regular, but I want to stand naked in front of a mirror on my thirtieth birthday and say, “damn girl, nice ass!” and really, really mean it. I was a competitive figure skater as a teenager and know what being “in shape” feels like. But I want to top that.

6. Ice, ice baby
With all this working out will come a step back on to the ice and challenge my former figure-skating self. I want to jump, spin, and skate again, even if it means falling on my ass a lot.

7. Finish “chapter one”
I’ve written a version of “chapter one” a dozen times, but have never finished. I’m addicted to multi-tasking. What I really need to do is just sit, turn off my BlackBerry, put the kybosh on Facebook, and write. (Wow, I almost didn’t finish this paragraph.)

8. This blog
I want it to inspire others but most of all I want it to inspire me. Everyday. The “end date” is August 21, 2010.

9. Reinvent dinner
Take greasy, nasty, fatty, sloppy meals and “Cinderella” them. Once a week make over my favorite recipes into cleaner, healthier versions. I love doing this but have stopped since the move to the new apartment. Need to rekindle this love.

10. Love my skin
Once a week do something fabulous for my dermis. I hear my 30’s are the make or break decade for your skin. Buff it, exfoliate it, moisturize it, love it – it’s the only one I get.

11. Eat green everyday
Green foods are amazing. My research at my day job (I work as an editor for a fitness magazine. Seriously) reminds of this every day. I skip out on veggies way more than I know I should. For the next year eating ‘green’ will be a habit, even on the weekends.

12. Say what I mean

I’ll say what’s really on my mind, even if it means having to get a little uncomfortable from time to time. I’m overdue for a few growing pains. I think this will be the hardest for me (yep, even harder then jumping out of plane – at least you get instructions on how to do that) but I think it will be way up there with “most rewarding.”

13. Jazzercise

After this post I decided that Jazzercising is something I should dip my sequins shoes into this year. Even after 10 years of instructing more fitness classes than the Caribbean workout, I never ventured into Jazzercise territory. Turns out this dance-aerobics pioneer is turning 40 this year and going through a reinvention of itself. What a match. Jazz hands.

14. Nude Beach-it

I’ll only be 29 once, so I’m going all out- and being literal about it. This year I will dabble in Full On Frontal at a nude beach in Portugal while vacationing. My husband will not take pictures.

15. Everyday, I will give my awesomeness away. I will remind my friends why I chose to love them; I will buy coffee for the person behind me at Starbucks; I will give my time and expect nothing in return; I will call my mom for no reason other than just because I know it makes her day; I will personally compliment the chef and not just tell the waiter; I will tell the girl at the checkout that her hair is totally bitchin; I will trade a criticism for a compliment; I will ask about your day, instead of telling you about mine. I will give, not to get.

16. A birthday gift. After 15-years of working my little fingers to the bone and earning no-so-great-but-ok money, I’m going to buy myself a 30th birthday gift to lift my spirits and show off the calves  I work so hard on: An expensive pair of shoes. I deserve it.

17. Run my first 10k marathon. Why? Because I never have, but have always wanted to, but then got busy doing other things like teaching yoga, and traveling, and analyzing life, and working too much. Time to push the limits and run. Like. The. Wind. This spring, I will tear it up with my first 10k run. (watch my vlog about it here!)

18. Be a closer on one big idea. You’ve felt this before, right? Click here to get the back story on why I’ve added this to my List.

19. Go to the movies… alone. For years, I’ve wanted to take myself to the movies alone. I know, I know, no big deal, right? People do it like, all the time. Ya, sure, but I haven’t. Being in a relationship as long as I have (and no, I’m not complaining, ya’ll) you sometimes forget to take time to do things alone, which, like I’ve learned a lot lately, holds a lot of value.

#20. Ink it. Not the usual existential, panicked act of preserving a moment in my personal history, but rather a simple love note… to me. Just easier to read about it here.

#21. Return to the passion of entrepreneurship once again. I don’t know how or when or what, but it’s happening ya’ll, once again.

#22 When it comes to art, be the subject, just one more time. Read the experience that inspired this insatiable, vain and totally incessant need here!

#23. Get a Bangin’ Birthday Cake. My wedding was mediocre at best. So I want a birthday cake to top all wedding cakes. In vanilla. No sugar-paste flowers.