2015 Year in Review

First of all -- wow I did not blog much. My 2015 resolutions was basically my last post. Anyway, let's talk about how I did on my resolutions!

I did do:

1. Get better at my job
   * Transferred teams (Home --> Moments)
   * Won at Hackweek with Abusefighter project (and presented at Tea Time)
   * A year ago I could hardly fix small bugs on my own. Now I work on larger features. Last year I worked on Quote Tweet, Conversations, and I just shipped the native Moment card.
2. Write More
   In May and June, I did the 750 words a day challenge, writing 50k words (or a 200-page book)
3. Apply to speak at five conferences
   I applied to four, got rejected by two (Self and Strangeloop), accepted at two (EmpireJS and Nodevember), and then invited to speak at two more (jQuerySF and NOLA Tech Week)
4. Put money into retirement
   $15k into retirement this year :)
5. Get out of my non-student-loan debt
   ✅
6. Get more involved with women in tech initiatives
   * Started Write/Speak/Code SF and hosted six big events (some better than others)
   * Attended Write/Speak/Code national conference
   * Started organizing WaffleJS where I help source female speakers
7. Contribute to an open source project
   Submitted a pull request to RevealJS

I did NOT do:

1. Get into a regular fitness routine
2. Take a dance lesson
3. Break 130 pounds
4. Read ten books
5. Get a tattoo
6. Keep a photo-a-day blog
7. Follow up on physical therapy for hip pains

Beyond resolutions, I did a lot of cool things this year. 

Highlights

I traveled a ton, including places I had never been: Milwaukee, Las Vegas, New Orleans, Nashville and London. I went on a road trip across the country and drove through new states -- Utah, Wyoming and Iowa. I worked on my career by organizing Write/Speak/Code, speaking at conferences, and working with new people at work (two hack week projects and a new team). I met Felicia Day and John Resig. I saw Bill Murray and Kevin Hart speak at a Twitter. I spent a week in Wisconsin with my sisters where we went to a big music festival. I lost five pounds and dropped a pant size (I'm now a 6). I'm doing well financially, and put money in to retirement this year!

Misses

I did not follow through on a lot of projects I started this year. (Guitar lessons, tennis lessons, photo blog, and book club). I spent too much energy on professional stuff, and too much of that energy on organizing and branding instead of technical expertise. I spent too much time on Write/Speak/Code but don't feel like I made an impact on anybody's life. I let other areas of my own life fall way behind. I want to be thinner and more active, and work on skills other than tech, like music and writing. I miss my family (Caitlin's kids barely know me at all) and I don't have many close friendships. Most importantly, I haven't been very deliberate about my life and what I'm working toward. This has been true my whole life, and it's something I'd like to start being better about in 2016.