2019 Reflections + 2020 New Year Goals

Today I’m sharing my 2019 Reflections and 2020 New Year Goals, including my best posts of 2019, accomplishments, and what I hope to achieve in 2020! 

2019 Reflections + 2020 New Year Goals

Happy New Year and new decade everyone! For today’s post I’m sharing my 2019 reflections and 2020 new year goals, including all the things I accomplished in the past year and what I hope to achieve in 2020.

I’m officially back from my 2 week winter/Christmas break that I always take the last couple weeks of the year, and I’m feeling so happy and refreshed.

Leading up to the holidays is the most exhausting time in the blogging/influencer space, so I’m super glad I got to take a breather and spend a couple weeks of fun, quality time with my kids and husband. We watched all the movies, played a ton of board games, went to the park and spent time outdoors, and fully embraced the word relaxing. We also had an amazing Christmas with our family.

I also did a little social media detox and didn’t post or log on to my business accounts from Christmas day on and it was awesome! If you’re a blogger or self-employed I highly highly recommend scheduling out a little vacation at the end of the year, and allowing yourself time to relax, reset, and plan for the year ahead.

2019 + Past Decade Reflections

When I look back on the past year and even the past decade, I’m honestly in awe of how much I’ve changed and grew as a person, and I’m truly so thankful for all the blessings I have.

Over the last decade, I became a mom twice to the two sweetest boys, bought our first home in Virginia, graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree and then a Master’s Degree in Communications & Marketing, and worked in Workforce Development for 5 years only to realize my true passion was elsewhere. I started my own blog 4 years ago as a hobby and it eventually became my FULL TIME JOB, moved to Georgia and bought our second home, celebrated 10 years of marriage to my amazing husband, and most recently on December 22nd turned 30 years old!

I am not the same girl that I was 10 years ago and I’m so thankful for that. I’ve gained so much confidence and self-clarity over the last several years, and things I used to only dream about having and coming true, have now became a reality in my life. Life is good and although I’m constantly thinking up new ideas and goals for both me and my family, I can honestly say I’m learning to be more content with where I am and worrying less about the next big thing.

2019 Goal Recap + Accomplishments

2019 Goal: Create more makeup roundups, makeup tutorials, and more video content – Yes! This was high on my priority list in 2019 and although I still need to be better about consistently creating video content on Youtube and IG, I definitely achieved this goal.

Makeup roundups for whatever reason are really successful on my blog and my Best Drugstore Makeup and Best High End Makeup consistently bring in a ton of traffic. I also focused on creating more makeup tutorials and of course had a blast doing a ton of fun Halloween makeup creations. You can check those out over here.

2019 Goal: Create a better work schedule that allows me more time with my family – Yes! I talked a little more about the reasoning behind this decision in this post, but basically I struggle with being a workaholic and in the past I would work 60 hours or more a week. That not only was super draining and unhealthy, but I quickly realized all the quality family time I was missing out on.

This year I completely switched up my schedule to work less hours and even set aside 1-2 days a week to take off from the blog. Evenings and weekends are now spent with my family and my stress-levels this past year have went way down. I also use a block schedule and do batch days where I’ll focus solely on content creation, pitching, or taking photos. This has helped so much in getting more tasks done more quickly, as opposed to trying to do 27 million things in one day and accomplishing very little.

Travel more places – Yes! Although we didn’t go to 5 new places like my original goal said, we went on our first family cruise to the Bahamas and had the most amazing beach trip to Seagrove Beach, FL. We also had several trips back to Virginia throughout the year to see family, which is always nice. We’re currently planning out a couple big vacations this year and hoping to take a few weekend getaways in between to some surrounding states. Our family really enjoys traveling and once the boys get a little older, we’ll definitely be planning some fun international vacays.

Kindly Unspoken Top 10 of 2019

10. Makeup Revolution Concealer Review – This makeup review where I compare the Makeup Revolution concealer to fan favorite Tarte Shape Tape was a hit!

9. 40 Cute + Creative Halloween Costume Ideas – This Halloween Costume roundup was so fun to put together and was one of my top performers for quarter 4!

8. 65 Best Super Bowl Recipes for Game Day – It’s hard to resist 65 Delicious Super Bowl Recipes, am I right?! Check this post out if you need snack ideas for this year!

7. 10 Busy Mom Hacks – I was so happy to see that you all loved this post full of helpful mom hacks! These tips have been life changing for me and my family.

6. Almay Lipstick Lip Vibes Swatches – This gorgeous lipstick collection from Almay was too good not to share, and currently ranks in at #2 on Google.

5. Best High End Makeup Worth the Splurge – Following the success of my drugstore makeup roundup, I put together this awesome roundup of the best high end makeup recommendations from beauty bloggers and makeup artists.

4. 30 Delicious No Bake Summer Desserts – No Bake recipes are THE best, and this summer dessert roundup was a huge success! Save it for later, if you need ideas.

3. Best Drugstore Makeup 2018 – My best drugstore makeup posts are always widely popular and last year’s annual best of beauty post was no exception.

2. Under Eye Fillers – My Experience + Before & After – I was initially so scared to post this, but it ended up being one of my most popular posts to date! Under eye fillers was one of the best personal decisions I could make for myself and I’ve been over the moon happy with my results.

1. Triple Peanut Butter Oatmeal Bars – Ranking in at number one is my incredibly delicious Triple PB Oatmeal Bars that I created in partnership with the National Peanut Board. If you’re a peanut butter lover, you NEED to make these.

2020 New Year Goals

Grow my Organic Pageviews by 75%– Pinterest and SEO have been my main focus over the last couple years and in 2018 I increased my pageviews by 76% and last year I increased them by 77%. Continuing on with that trend would mean I’ll be super close to reaching my annual pageviews goal of 1 million views. It’s a big goal, but I’m going to work really hard and know that I’ll be there either this year or next.

Reach 25,000 Followers on Pinterest – My goal for 2019 was to reach 10K on Pinterest, which I surpassed in July of last year. I’ve now set an even bigger goal for myself of 25K! Follow me here, if you aren’t already. 🙂

Create More Beauty, Family, & Recipes Content – As I’ve now been at this blogging thing for over 4 years, I’ve finally figured out the topics I really enjoy posting about, and the topics that I don’t enjoy as much. This year I plan to shift my blog’s focus to be about more beauty + makeup, baking + recipes, and family life as those are what bring me the most joy.

If you couldn’t tell from my recent Christmas Cookie Countdown, baking is such a passion of mine and moving forward I’ll be sharing lots of easy and delicious recipes. I’m continuing on this year with my Tasty Tuesday schedule, so each week I’ll share a new recipe – starting tomorrow with a healthy and delicious one!

Improve My Photography – With creating more makeup and food content, I really want to step up my photography game this year and keep learning how to further improve my skills. I plan to take a class or course for this and am also going to buy some new equipment for my camera.

Downsize Our “Stuff” For a More Minimalistic Lifestyle – Over the past year I did a ton of purges in so many areas of my home. From purging my beauty/makeup collection, to my wardrobe, to excess clutter throughout, I’m on a journey to get rid of all the excess and the stress that comes with it. Our garage is currently overflowing with so much stuff that we don’t need and it has got to go. We’re currently planning a huge garage sale for early spring and I can’t wait. I’ve also been sorting through items to donate to local shelters.

Continue Saving Up For Our Dream Home/Land – It’s been our family’s dream for years now to either buy or build a dream home on our own private land, and now that we sold our home in Virginia, this year our main focus is to continue saving. Living in a subdivision is fine, but we both come from the country and really want to have our own land where we’re free to roam and don’t have neighbors right up on us or busy street traffic that the kids can’t play in.

That about wraps it up for today’s post on my 2019 Reflections and 2020 New Year Goals! I’m definitely ready for all the exciting changes up ahead and hope you’ll continue to follow along in 2020. What are some of your goals for this year? Let me know in the comments below!

Thanks for stopping by! – Cara