Does anyone eat popcorn sadly? Is that even a possibility? I suppose you could eat it while watching a sad movie, but it’s not the popcorn making you sad. Also, you’re at the movies, sitting in a dark theater, munching away with strangers. I remember going to see the movie The Quiet Place in the theater, and the strange experience of watching the audience trying to eat their popcorn quietly, so high was the tension in the theater created by the possibility of alerting the sound-sensitive monsters.

My grandmother used to make popcorn for me all the time. She had an ancient airpopper that spat kernels into a huge wooden bowl. It was important to use the air popper, to save the calories from cooking it on the stove top with oil, which she quickly negated by dousing it all with butter. The process was fun, pour the kernels in, and wait for the swirling hot air to warm them up until they exploded out of the dark yellow plastic shoot. Obviously, we watched from a safe distance, lest a rogue unpopped kernel hit one of us in the eye, blinding my cousin or me for all eternity.

“What is it you miss” people ask me, and I say popcorn. It’s the easiest answer. Popcorn is the lightest thing. There is no weight to it.

2025 has been a pretty good one for me in terms of checking off goals. I’m well on my way to crossing a few off my list. And, if I may digress a minute, there are twelve goals that I set for myself that revolve around doing a thing for 30 days. Now, it is implied that will be 30 days in a row, but as I have been thinking about this year already and how to fit things in, it was stressing me out. Therefore, I am making the executive decision to just count instances of me doing things, hoping for a total of 30 over the course of the year. Bonus points if I get 30 in a row.

Here are some big ones: I knit 2 things:

I read 4 books: God of the Woods (Audio), The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, and Didion and Babitz. A couple of things, first - no I have never read the Dark Materials trilogy so I thought what the heck, might as well do it this year. I really love them! (Spoiler I have now finished all of them but the last one is a February book) The first book wasn’t as good as the second or third, but they were fun and I think there is a series on HBO or somewhere that I will check out. God of The Woods was a fantastic audiobook. I prefer to listen to thrillers and mysteries rather than read them, I don’t know why. I suppose it makes my chores easier. Anyhow this one was great, I listened to it on Spotify- it’s included with Premium. Now for Didion and Babitz. It’s been a long time since I hated a book as much as I hate this one. It made me angry. A friend knew I bought and and asked if she could borrow it and after I read it I said: “No, I care too much about you and respect your time, and this is a waste.” Here are my main problems with this book: 1) It doesn’t make good on what it promises to deliver 2) it shames the reader early on to cover for what it lacks. First - the whole “selling point” of this book is that the author uncovered “letters” between Joan Didion and Eve Babitz which hint at a long-standing frenemy situation between the women. Well, spoiler alert: she has one letter that she found in Eve Babitz’s personal items after her death that Eve had written to Joan. Best part? It appears to have never been sent. This is not correspondence. The entire book is built on the fragile foundation of the author trying to reverse engineer a feud based on one letter, which was unsent, and is mostly about how they disagreed about reading Virginia Woolf. To address the second issue, the author tells readers, “Don’t be a baby” when it comes to reading things that are unflattering about Joan Didion. Well, here’s the thing - I absolutely cannot stand it when an author tries to tell me how to feel a way about what they are writing. Sorry, dude, if you can’t convey what you want with your writing except to TELL me how to feel - that’s not my problem, and I don’t have strong opinions either way about Didion or Babitz, and you did them both dirty with this book. You can read other reviews about it online. NYT and Guardian are both pretty meh about it.

I have started a fairly regular mediation practice (again) and logged 19 days in January. My longest daily mediation streak was 323 days. I hope to get back there again.

My exercise regimen has been shit this month, but I did download a fun app, called “Fantasy Hike” which is a knock-off of Lord of the Rings. Every time I walk it records my progress towards “Mt. Fire” Aka Mt. Doom. I’d like to do it in a year -1777 miles. I’m 100 miles in so far and have a lot of catching up to do.

Finally, the last couple of posts I made here were before the inauguration. I do not plan on writing about politics here, but for the record, it has been deeply upsetting and scary the last few weeks. I feel back to the hopeless, helpless numbness of 2016-2020. It has greatly motivated me to cut back on social media as I can feel it sucking my soul.

Current Avg Goal Completion: 8.86%

Last year, The Yarn Harlot, aka Stephanie Pearl McPhee posted (I think on Instagram) that she was making herself a sock of the month box. I liked this idea a lot, and so decided to set one up myself. The premise is simple, a box filled with 12 self-curated knitting projects with yarn and patterns that you select from each month. What makes it extra fun, for me anyway, is that they are in a sealed paper bag, so you don’t know what you are selecting each month. Here’s how you do it.

You will need:

A printer
I mean, maybe not? But having the pattern and the yarn in the bag together is kind of a big deal. I guess if you prefer patterns on your phone or tablet you could just write the name of the pattern on a piece of paper and then you can download it later.

12 paper bags of various sizes - if you are doing only socks or small projects lunch bag size is perfect

Yarn needed for each project

A stapler

How To:

1. This is tricky because it depends on YOU the knitter. Last year, I wanted to use up the yarn I already had so my first step was: Logon to Ravelry and Select Patterns Based on Yarn I Already Had

   But! You don’t have to do it this way. You could definitely choose your patterns and then buy the yarn - but do it quickly - the whole idea is to put the yarn and pattern in a bag

2. Print out the pattern.

3. Find the corresponding yarn that you would like to use for the pattern.

4. Put the pattern and the yarn in a bag.

5. Staple the bag shut.

   

6. Repeat this 12 times -

   or however many you want. It’s up to you. How many mystery knitting bags do you want this year? Maybe you want to go wild and do 24 hats this year. Maybe 3 sweaters is more your style. Maybe you’re all over the place like me and mix and match. Go nuts.

7. Put the projects somewhere fairly easily accessible so you can grab one per month.

   or on your own timeline. It’s all up to you, man.

A note on needles - I did not put needles in each bag. That seems excessive but if you are lucky enough to have that many extra sets of needles - stick them in there! That said, I did make sure I had the correct needles for the projects I chose- because it would have been a major bummer otherwise.

How did this work out for me? Fairly well! I will admit to only pulling 4 projects this year. I got stuck on Sleeve Island and put a sweater aside for like 3 months. Look, it happens to the best of us. My projects included sweaters, socks, hats, leg warmers, and some fingerless mittens. Here’s the sweater I got stuck on:

How does this save money? A common dilemma with knitters, and by knitters I mean - me, is finding a pattern, buying the pattern and the yarn, working on some other pattern instead of the one you just bought, forgetting why you bought the yarn, using a bit of the yarn for something else, finding the pattern after you have used the yarn, shaking your fists at the sky and yelling WHHYYY, and repeat. I found that if I match the patterns to the yarn and put them in a bag, I don’t do that. It’s all together. Putting patterns in a sealed bag and pulling them out monthly or, for me, when I finished a project and needed a new one was like a treat - I totally forgot what I had put in each bag. I mean, I can kind of tell the sweaters from the smaller projects because they are in larger bags, but otherwise no. It sort of feels like shopping when I grab one. Bonus: I love what is in every bag because I picked it all out!

Since I didn’t use up all my fun projects last year, I am only adding a couple to this year’s pile. And yes, I still have excess yarn to use up.

This year, I am changing the list a bit. I went for 50 even though I’m on the eve of 47. I like round numbers, what can I say? I have added 12, 30-day challenges. You may think this seems like insanity, and I agree. However, many of these challenges are habits I would like to implement long term, and I think a great way to see what sticks is to try it for 30 days. This year I have a long-term goal/theme for the year that is not on the list: No Spend 2025. That means no new shit. I am allowing food, obviously, and I can replenish my face creams - but that’s it. Neo trying new brands of face stuff (sorry Goop) no new clothes, nothing. Because I am not entirely horrible to myself, I AM allowed to buy things from the thrift store, but only with cash.

I also have a secret goal this year. A goal that is just for me, that I am telling no one about. I think that in this age where telling everything about yourself to everyone all the time, like on Substack, for example, we need a good secret thing that we are striving for that is just for us. Will I share what it is at the end of the year? I don’t know. Stay tuned.

Finally, I am inviting you to join me. How will this work? I don’t know that either. I don’t know a lot of things. But, I do know many folks have talked to me about my unreasonable goals and would like to share in the fun. So, let’s do it here. If you subscribe to this substack, I can set up a chat for us, and we can talk about our unreasonable goals.

Here are my goals for the year:

1. 12 Bags of Donations

2. 12 Game Nights

3. 12 Knit Items

4. 12 Movies

5. 12 New Dishes

6. 12 Substack Posts

7. 30 Days 10k Steps *5 Mi

8. 30 Days Creating Art (non-Writing)

9. 30 Days Creative Writing (1 Page Min)

10. 30 Days Journaling

11. 30 Days Knitting 10 Rows

12. 30 Days Meditation

13. 30 Days No Social Media

14. 30 Days No Spending

15. 30 Days No Sugar

16. 30 Days No Weighing Self

17. 30 Days of Cleaning Challenge

18. 30 Items to Donation Bag

19. Attend an online class

20. Attend Reading/Book Signing

21. Bottles Back Regularly

22. Buy art - from artist

23. Dates With Mike

24. Day Trips

25. Finish Novel

26. Move: Cross Country Ski or Snowshoe

27. Move: Crow Pose

28. Move: Kayaking

29. Move: Walks With Friends

30. Move: Yoga

31. Get Energy Work

32. House: Backyard Landscaping

33. House: Clean Playroom

34. House: Clean the basement

35. House: Fill in Cement Crack-Garage

36. House: Get a land line

37. House: Get Gutters Cleaned

38. House: Paint Bedroom

39. House: Paint office

40. House: Paint small hallway

41. Make A Will

42. Out Of State

43. Publish in NYT

44. Read 52 Books

45. Read in Public

46. Save

47. Send 12 Cards

48. Stick To Monthly Budget

49. Vacation

50. Overnight at the Shop

I used to embed the link to my Google Sheets list on my blog, but now I get hacked so much through Google calendars, etc. that I’m not going to, which means you won’t be able to see my updates in real-time. This is devastating news, I’m sure. That said, if you are creating a huge goal list like this and want to keep track, I highly recommend setting up a google table, it makes it much easier. Here’s what mine looks like:

So, to recap:

50 Goals 1 (above)

1 Overarching goal (No Spending)

1 Secret Goal

What do you say? Want to join me? Don’t overthink it. The list is mostly a brain dump of things I need to do (paint my bedroom); physical, mental, and spiritual health goals, and some random aspirations. Do you need to do 50? Of course not. You can do more: (check out the uberlist from ye old LiveJournal) .

Last bits: 1) if you’re in leave a comment or drop me a line. I would love to start a community around this. 2) if you want me to figure out how to share my spreadsheet as a template also drop me a line.

Subscribe now

MommyK8 Resurrected.

Here I am again. Back at the blogging thing. Although, I’m sure I’m not supposed to call this blogging anymore. This is a SUBSTACK. Not a blog for God’s sake. What is wrong with me? This is not my first rodeo. This, in fact, is the anniversary of my first rodeo 17 years ago. Back then it was on Blogger. It was called the Klog, then I moved it and renamed it Mommyk8. (I still own that site, btw. Don’t try to steal it.) Mommyk8 was a WordPress site and it was mildly annoying to deal with. I have quit and come back and quit and come back for a long time.

Why did I quit? Why am I back? Thank you for asking. It’s nice to know you care. Mostly, I quit because the internet is an awful, terrifying, and confusing place, but I’ll get to that in a second.

First: I never figured out the “rules” to blogging. I always felt like I was doing it wrong. I was supposed to pick a subject and stick with that. Find my voice. Cross-promote. Have ads but not too many. Be on all of the social media. I couldn’t manage it. Especially the staying in my lane piece. I like a lot of things. I want to talk about a lot of things. I can’t just be a person writing about cooking or knitting or reading or parenting or humaning. I am doing all of those things all the time, and at various points have different levels of enthusiasm for each.

Second: I don’t like people being mean to me. I am not for all people. I have a weird sense of humor. I make up words. I am a middle-aged white woman. These are all things people strongly dislike. I get it. I’m fine with that. (Is it really fine with me? I’ll say it’s fine and deal with my real feelings in therapy). What I am not fine with is people being mean. Years ago I wrote a blog post about wearing yoga pants all the time. It was humor. I got some really, really mean comments on it. Like, “You are what is wrong with women today. Go get some exercise, fatty” that’s not exactly what it said but close enough. Haha! So funny! Let it roll off my back! Who cares? I mean, I do. Obviously. I’m still upset about it 15 years later. Anyhow, if you are reading this and you hate me, skip leaving me comments about it.

Third: Creeps. Recently, I have had some creepy shit (I also swear fairly regularly. Sorry) happen to me - Instagram and elsewhere that have led to me having to lock down all of my social media. I’m talking about stalker-type behavior. It scared me. It IS scary. Police are/were involved.

Fourth: I have a regular job and have had that job for 9 years and the whole time I have had it I have been scared about writing and posting and how people might perceive me. And maybe my two worlds shouldn’t collide. Never cross the streams and all that.

I was going to write about why I am back but, this is already too long. More to come.

TL:DR I have not been writing because I am afraid.