How did 2017 go? What are your 2018 goals? Dogs, dog sports and otherwise...
What are your 2018 goals?
Here is this same post from last year. Did you meet your 2017 goals?
2017 Review and 2018 Goals
Work: It was a good year. We almost reached our goal and I received two promotions and a big bump in pay. I definitely tried hard to look at people positively and with empathy and compassion and I got super involved this year with mentoring, leadership, reward and recognition stuff. My work goal for 2018, in short, is to make a positive impact in my company and put our plan in place to get closer to our financial goal.
Health: No big changes, both unfortunately and fortunately. My vacation helped my back and jaw issues (stress). I managed to get really sick in November and am fighting walking pneumonia. Two weeks ago, I got the flu on top of it. Things are finally on the upswing! I freed up more time for myself and set better boundaries so I have more me time. My health goals involve moving more and eating better and continuing to set boundaries when it comes to my time.
House: My house is almost done! I have a few finishing touches on the inside and I have some finishing touches in the back and the front, that I had completely re-landscaped professionally. My house goal is to finish everything inside and out, but not stress about the stupid fence this year.
Random: I got the new car and dog crates that I planned on. I purged more stuff, I did a better job of keeping up with friends, and I traveled to Iceland and Paris. Financially I saved some and spent a lot because the landscaping and help from my contractor wasn't cheap! I did keep a 2017 budget to see where my money was going (holy cow do I spend a lot on dogs!) and in a couple weeks will be analyzing things (with a glass of wine). I added more to my retirement plan. Random goals for 2018 is to be mindful of spending, continue to keep up with friends, and I will be traveling and taking time for myself again in 2018. The fact that I just bought a Costco membership yesterday is not boding well for the finances!
Dogs: The boys are happy and healthy! No one gained any weight despite a long winter, a hot summer and my vacation. It was a big year for dog stuff in many ways, but no major titles, only tricks and a barn hunt success. I did train more at home and I made my yard an obedience ring (replaced grass with chips, added jumps and baby-gates and took out a tree). My obedience club never got a new building for ring rentals, but my weekly training group is still going strong and made it work between the ring rentals we do have access to and my friend's training building and my other friend's giant flat yard. The club got creative and had matches in new places, mostly private buildings, and several people took hosting matches into their own hands. I did not try for our CD this year and my trainer went from "it's time to pick a trial" to "if you don't get in the ring now your dog could die before you get your UD; how would that make you feel?" OK, OK, point taken! I'm hoping I'll care more about the titles when I start entering trials again. I took some great classes including Bridging the Gap and an Open/Utility problem solving class in addition to my lessons and in person classes and attended the FDSA camp here in Oregon. We have all of the exercises through Utility in novel locations and no props/targets, including the new Open A exercises, and I'm polishing and proofing now and fixing things that break as they are prone to do. Most importantly, my boy is confident and happy in the ring most of the time! I'd like better heeling, but I might just have to let go of perfect and do with good enough and get in there. We also started back in Agility which Linus loves and is really great at. I'm learning a lot and it's just a blast. We did go to a fantastic (and HOT) Hunt seminar down in California, but we did next to zero field work this year. Sad. I did not get a puppy, but will continue to follow this breeder and get one when the time and the breeding is right. In 2018 we'll continue our Obedience journey and get our CDX. We have a working spot at the Janice Gunn training camp in Canada this summer and I'm not sure if I'll be going to FDSA camp in Ohio as an auditor or not. I need to re-evaluate field work and figure out what I'm going to do there. I think we'll continue taking Agility classes. Our Agility trainer says we'll be trialing by the spring but I want to focus on Obedience, so not sure where we'll stand on that.