Watching the sun set on 2025  Photo by Marta Sitkowska on Unsplash

’Tis the time of the yearly recap, the year-in-review post, and a look back at 2025’s highs and lows. Sort of the Christmas letter of the blogging world! Wait, don’t click away—I promise this won’t be a recitation of accomplishments that makes you feel bad about yourself. Quite the opposite.

Some people have long lists of goals and accomplishments to share in their recap posts. Not me, at least not this year. Mainly because I didn’t set any major goals in 2025. Basically, I just wanted to get unpacked and settled, and allow myself to recover from the multiple stresses of the past two years. At the beginning of 2025, I was simply too burned out to set any goals or take on any projects. It felt really, really weird. And it feels weird to not have much to show for 2025, which was mostly a quieter, less stressful year, with one big exception. 

Tending the soil

As I wrote in “You Cannot Always Be Harvesting”: “Just as in gardening, in writing, in other creative endeavors—even in life itself, there must be times of planting, feeding, nurturing, even lying fallow.” 

I would call 2025 a year of preparing the soil. Digging out the rocks, adding compost, and yes, allowing some areas to lie fallow. Much of my time and energy was consumed by unpacking and getting settled after our move, and organizing and supervising multiple home projects. I was also responsible for prepping and maintaining our old home while it was being shown.

While 2025’s harvest wasn’t particularly impressive, I can see a few tender shoots pushing through the soil. Smaller accomplishments I can build on in the coming year.

I didn’t take any big trips, but I did go on a beach weekend getaway with my husband, our first in literally years.

I didn’t immerse myself in art journaling, but I did resume regular sketching in my France sketchbook, in person and virtually.

I didn’t “get in shape,” but I did start a new at-home workout plan to get into the habit of doing something physical nearly every day. I wanted to get this habit in place before a new year started, and so far, I’ve been mostly sticking with it.

I tried to hold on to my word of the year, ease, through all the ups and downs of 2025, which was not easy, especially when I wound up immersed in grief, again, with the loss of my horse. 

I still pursued simple pleasures and everyday adventures, and I posted more regularly on Catching Happiness, which always makes me happy. Not a flashy year, 2025, but a solid one.

Hopes for 2026

What’s ahead for 2026? I feel more grounded, less scattered, and more capable of dreaming and planning. Grief is still with me (I suspect it always will be), but it’s a passenger—it’s not driving the bus. I do plan to set some specific goals for 2026, though I’m not completely sure what they are yet. I’m planning to use the time between Christmas and New Year’s Day to reflect and come up with some possibilities. I’ll likely turn to Susannah Conway’s Unravel Your Year or Jamie Varon’s Year in Review to continue reviewing 2025 and get a start on planning 2026. (Both are free, and I have no affiliation with them—I just appreciate their work.) 

As always, thank you for sharing another year with me and Catching Happiness. May the last week of 2025 be filled with much joy and fun plans for the future!

What have been some of the highlights of your year? Any special plans for 2026?

My dog is on the nice list...usually

Fall Fun List update: I did nearly everything on my list!

• Decorate the house for fall
• Burn fall-scented candles and diffuse fall scents in my essential oil diffuser
• Bake sourdough bread using my “mother”
• Write a letter to someone (friend or relative)
• Play cozy ambience music videos on YouTube (like this one) 
• Enjoy a pumpkin spice latte and other fall foods and drinks
• Eat pomegranates 
• Watch Barbie with a friend 
• Choose and order a 2024 planner
• Celebrate Thanksgiving with the family
• Take a trip to a local nursery and decide what, if anything, I want to plant for our fall/winter garden
• Attend the first three musicals of my Broadway series at the Straz Center in Tampa (The Choir of Man, Beetlejuice, and Funny Girl) 
• Sit outside and enjoy cooler weather—if we get some by Dec. 21
• Change out fall house decorations for winter (I usually do this around the beginning of December)

I probably won’t manage to make the bread or see Barbie before the 21^st, but that’s OK. Both of those things can move on to a Winter Fun List, which I’m still in the process of making. (Fun Lists are slightly different from lists of goals, and are good reminders that life is about more than work and chores and various other responsibilities.) 

I realize “winter” in Florida is quite different from winter in most other locations, so my winter fun list will not look like the winter fun list of someone who lives in Ohio (Hi, Debbie!) That’s one of the beauties of fun lists—they reflect your unique situation and personality. As Gretchen Rubin has pointed out in one of her Secrets of Adulthood, “What’s fun for other people may not be fun for you, and vice versa.”  

Maybe take some time this weekend to think about what’s fun for you. Then make plans to work that fun into your life more often. I’d love it if you’d come back here to share some of what’s on your winter fun list in the comments. We can all use a little fun inspiration!