Here's a little look at some of the drawings.
Little did she know she would be cooking and baking a lot.
A really long time career goal that came true. Bought a beautiful watercolour notebook.
The more I look into it,
the more I know I'm going to have to take a lot more time to be able to do this book.
But that's fine.
Hi,
I'm Sanne and get ready to travel with me through space and time as I
look back at some of my resolutions over the past years,
the last few years have been unpredictable,
to say in the nicest way.
I used to make a resolutions video every year.
It's a really nice way to keep yourself accountable to check in. The kind of resolutions have
made over the years have really changed.
And in this video,
I want to take a look back at some of my past resolutions that I never
actually posted about online.
Starting a few months before Covid started,
right up to now to 2022 were also I've made resolutions at the beginning of this year,
and I want check in on those and see how I'm doing. And just maybe laugh at my past self
for some hilarious resolutions I came up with which were obviously
entirely impossible
once Covid started,
so roll the clips.
Welcome to 2021 now,
usually a few months before the end of the year.
I take another look at my goals list or I even write them out and put them on the wall so I can see
them throughout the year for obviously reasons.
I did not do that this year,
and while I was writing my new goals for 2021 I thought,
Okay,
I should rewatch my old video to see how I did and just
remind myself of what my resolutions were,
and I have it here on my laptop.
Number one.
No surprise.
Read 100 books. For lots of previous years.
I would do the 50 Book Challenge,
and then I think that was quite a hard challenge for me to reach.
It's definitely become a little bit easier to hit every year,
so I thought,
Okay,
I'm going to do 100 with 50 kind of being the minimum and 100 being the
ideal,
but I think because I was really busy with work.
I kind of took on as much work as I could this year because of obviously how
precarious work situations work did not get as much reading done as I would have liked.
One full day of creating a week.
I'm going to block it out in my calendar.
I think this was the year where I had some points where I think I did really well in
balancing the freelance work in the creative and some months the creative stuff just went out of the window.
And I think it's a bit of a learning curve of,
like,
when should you be available as a freelancer and things like that and I definitely throughout points in the year kind of
set different boundaries,
and that's something I really want to continue working on in the new year.
Draw a little bit,
even if it's 10 minutes every day.
Okay,
I definitely have done more creative pursuits this year when it comes to
like some drawing some digital drawing,
some water colour,
some lino cutting things like that.
But it definitely did not do it every day.
I would love to learn some Irish,
as some of you might know.
My boyfriend is Irish and Dutch.
I would like to teach him some Dutch.
We've kind of been like exchanging words.
And I taught him the Dutch alphabet recently,
so I think that would be a really fun way to learn.
I haven't even been to Ireland in probably a year and a half again.
We had plans to go this year.
That didn't happen.
I've really figured out that I am a visual learner and especially with,
like,
the pronunciation and how different,
like written Irish is I need to see things written down.
So while for him I can,
like,
say,
the days of the week and he repeats them and then he remembers them.
I really cannot do that.
Are there any words?
I remember very little,
uh,
"mála scoile" backpack.
That's it.
That's all I've got.
Also this year,
I want to cook and bake as much as I can to reduce waste and also to save some
money.
Well,
well,
well.
Little did she know she would be cooking and baking a lot.
I mean the number of times I went to a restaurant this year,
it's very,
very small.
I've done some good baking and cooking this year.
I think it's also been really fun seeing other people bake and cook more on
Instagram,
and I think that's been really helpful to kind of get inspiration from there.
My brother,
who also lives in London,
has been baking,
and we've been exchanging recipes with my mom,
who is in the Netherlands.
I made a beautiful Christmas loaf,
but like the Dutch version,
I feel good about that. This year.
I want to keep a really close track of my savings.
I've opened different accounts.
I have a spreadsheet. I sat down about two weeks ago and drew up this full
spreadsheet of everything I want to do this year, really broke it down
to exactly how many day-rates I would have to work a month to keep up with
that.
That's an interesting one.
I did pretty well in the first months,
and then again when I was just sitting at home and only buying groceries,
I didn't really keep track of the
specific budget, but I just created a Notion account.
And so now I have a new budget spreadsheet on notion.
My savings account.
I had a spreadsheet where I was sort of saying like,
Oh,
this percentage of my savings that's in the account is actually for trips, hahaha.
This is for when I want to start my pension,
which I'm in the middle of doing right now.
I'd like to make a list of 25 things that I want to do in London,
places to visit, places
to eat, walks to go on,
just things that haven't done yet and do those last year,
right?
So 25 new things to do in London.
If one of them was just walking around my neighbourhood and
finding every alleyway that I hadn't explored yet,
I didn't even get around to making the list.
New things I did in London included cycling,
not taking any public transport for months,
months and months.
Let's have a look at my 2021 resolutions now,
which actually I never shared publicly.
It didn't really feel like the right time last year,
but I made them privately basically,
So let's have a look at those.
The first few are all failures,
but it gets better
after that.
There are few repeaters as well.
Number one was to keep one day a week for creating.
So I am a freelancer and I wanted to keep one day a week for my own projects,
things like YouTube. Again
I did not do that very successfully.
I think I just took on all the work I could get again because of
uncertainty and things like that.
So that is still a thing that obviously I haven't quite figured out yet.
Number two was to read 100 books in a year,
and I ended up with 59 which I'm pretty happy with again 50 being kind of the minimum I
wanted to do. This was quite interesting.
Number three was to draw twice a week or follow like a creative
tutorial every week.
I didn't do many tutorials or any courses,
but I did for quite a few weeks join The Fat Life drawing
sessions on Zoom.
I don't think I've ever done any proper life draw before,
but this was so fun.
You're on this big zoom room together,
and you can see everyone drawing.
But you can also totally keep your drawings private if you want to,
and it's just such a lovely welcoming community.
A lot of the profits go to charity and to the person that's posing themselves as well.
I've shown some of the drawings I did on Instagram Stories.
So here's a little look at some of the drawings.
I don't have a lot of them next to me right now,
but I want to show these one of my friends Pip joined as well a few times,
so we knew we were both like in the session.
I would highly recommend that, it was really fun,
and it felt like a really good challenge because I hadn't really done much like it before.
And it also was a really good way to discover what kind of medium I liked the most because I would
try different pencils and crayons and paint during some of the sessions.
And then very quickly,
I realised which ones I like and which ones I don't and also the quality of what I made with different tools
like varied,
significantly,
Number four was clear out and organise all my belongings,
which is too vague.
I did some of it,
and then number five was go on the site solo trip to the countryside.
Very uncertain year for travel,
obviously,
but at some point,
I met up with Rosianna
who was doing a cycling tour across England.
She's made some great videos about it as well,
which I will link in the description she went
literally all across England and Scotland,
and I managed to meet up with her when she was in Yorkshire.
And then,
as she continued on,
I stayed in Haworth by myself,
for I think it was three days,
which is the town where the Brontë sisters lived.
I went on a little hike by myself.
I visited the Brontë Parsonage.
It's a very,
very tiny towns.
It was an interesting experience,
like staying there by myself for three days.
But that was fantastic,
and I'd love to do something like it again,
and I'm definitely going to make a full video about my experience of staying there and recommendations for
when you're visiting yourself as well.
Then I wanted to create my Top 10 genre list video.
So,
like my top 10 fantasy books,
my top 10 sci-fi books.
Obviously,
as you know,
I did not do that.
The number seven was work with five brands from my 'companies I'd love to
work with' when it comes to freelance work or my channel or my instagram things like
that.
And I don't know if I made that much of a specific list.
But looking back at the year I worked with the YA Book Prize and the Dutch Literature
Foundation,
I feel like those are two big highlights.
Number 8 is quite funny
So I listen to the podcast,
My Favorite Murder,
and for a long time it is almost all I listened to.
I've listened to every episode about four times,
So one of my resolutions was to listen to some new podcasts.
I actually totally nailed this one.
So my favourites were You're Dead To Me,
The comedy and history podcast. Books Unbound,
which I was guest on,
actually,
So you can have a listen to that episode. Real Dictators,
which is a podcast about dictators.
The Dropout about Elizabeth Holmes,
which was fantastic And What Page Are You On?
Which is also a fantastic book podcast with recommendations that are very often books I
haven't heard about before bar totally something that I'm interested in so really
enjoyed that podcast.
I asked for recommendations from you a few months ago and I got loads and loads of them.
So I have all these podcasts to try out and hopefully I can do a video
recommending tonnes of them.
And then this is maybe my favourite one.
I wanted to self study the romantics and Gothic fiction,
and I think I made an okay.
start on it.
I am,
like,
200 pages into romantic outlaws.
About Mary Wollstonecraft and
Mary Shelley,
I read Carmilla,
one of the original vampire books.
Also the short story,
The Vampire,
Same thing.
And then I also started reading Charlotte Bronte:
A life, which I brought with me to Haworth.
I've made a start.
Have I completed all of these?
No,
there's much more to do.
And finally,
I wanted to organise more meet ups and make some new online friends and meet some fellow
BookTubers and creators.
So obviously like meet ups with lots of people were not the thing to do in 2021.
But I did manage to meet Joel from Fictional Fates and Leora from Books
with Leo,
who I met up with when I went to Rotterdam.
And so I feel like this is the semi success.
Finally,
I also like to write a short list of the year of things that were big achievements or
things that I'd like to remember because it's so easy to forget.
The year can just turn into a bit of a blur,
and I also have one big thing I learned so big things that happened that I was just
really excited about is I got to be a YA Book Prize judge,
which was such a fantastic process.
I read the 10 books on the short list.
I have a video that I'll link where I talked about all of the books,
but that just seems like such an honour.
And like a really long time career goal that came true then.
Also,
my Book Club Journal was published in May,
which was such a highlight of the year.
It still feels weird because I didn't get to do a launch party or do any events or
anything like that because of Covid,
and this feels like it's now like a lifetime away already.
But in this year,
I also started a book club with some of my friends,
and so I've been able to fill out the Journal myself,
and starting a book club is a highlight as well.
Finally,
did a freelancer thing I should have done a long time ago,
but I started an ethical pension that I'm now saving into doing the research,
for that was a very,
very long process.
But I feel like,
you know,
I've started and then I can only expand on my knowledge of personal finance
and things like that.
And then the big thing that I learned that I've had to admit to myself is that for me,
time blocking doesn't work unless I'm doing it in
at least section of half a day.
I've tried numerous times to block out different, a few hours here a few
hours here and fill up my whole week schedule and try and get my work done that way.
I think I might be the kind of person that needs to take,
a half day or a full day to complete a certain task or work on a project because I
get too distracted.
If there's too many things going on,
That was 2021.
Now let's talk about my 2022 resolutions.
Obviously,
once again,
we don't really we know what to expect.
So I planned lightly and I kind of wrote down some sentences that
of describe the theme that I used to make these resolutions.
What brings me joy?
How do I want to spend my time and what do I want to share with people?
And the sharing doesn't mean like,
Oh,
I think I'm over-sharing parts of my life.
It's more about what kind of topics do I want to talk
about and what,
like from my own experience,
do I then want to turn into videos?
Instagram post, things like that.
All right,
let's run through these 10 goals.
Number one.
I want to read 75 books.
Hundred's not going to happen.
We're doing 75.
Number two.
I want to go on a solo trip to the countryside again.
Haven't decided where yet.
Number three.
A continuation of a past one.
I want to read five like nonfiction or Gothic or Romantic classics.
That number four is one I've been thinking about for quite a long time.
I would love to start a discord for UK
book creatives and online creators like a place where
people can ask each other for advice and chat and organised collaborations
and become friends,
but also talk about the business side of it.
I am really,
really lucky that I have a lot of friends around me who are also online creators,
and I can talk to them about the nitty gritty and contracts and
contacts,
but also just like where to find inspiration and how to make new friends.
And I keep meeting people who don't really have a network like that.
So I would love to start this,
but I don't really want to run it by myself.
So if you happen to be watching this video and you are interested,
do you send me an email,
a DM,
whatever you like and number five is that I would like to visit five new to me historical
buildings in London.
Number six is quite a big one.
I want to write a proper pitch for a non-fiction book that I have an idea for.
I am not a fiction writer.
I do love non-fiction and practical guides and things like that,
and I have an idea for one.
So I want to write the pitch for that.
Number seven.
It is a returning one.
You might have heard me say this before,
but it's an idea that's still on my mind,
and I want to make it happen at some point.
And that is that I want to launch my sci-fi slash
apocalyptic podcast, book podcast.
I need to find the time to do this because it's something that even after a few years,
I'm still really passionate about,
and I really want to make it happen.
Number eight.
I want to regularly update who I follow on Instagram and on YouTube.
So I unfollowed about 300 people on Instagram in one week last year,
and it was great.
And it meant that I could interact more with the people that I was still following and I was getting to
see,
like I basically wanted to make sure that I was seeing the content by the people that I really want to follow.
And I'm hoping to keep doing that in 2020 to find new people that I'm
not watching yet and have a look through the people that I'm currently following and see who would like to see
more from. Then number nine again kind of a repeated from last year is to complete 10
courses or tutorials,
so it doesn't have to be a really long course.
I've already I bought a shorter course about,
fonts and typography,
but it could also be a single like water colouring tutorial.
And finally,
it's a YouTube resolution,
which is to create a series about literary travel in the UK,
and I'd like to make six episodes this year. For myself in an Notion doc
I also wrote a bunch of other lists,
which are like financial goals,
personal goals,
career goals, but also things like I want to go on
5 hikes were hopefully moving to a new flat,
and I I want to have a dining table so I can have a small dinner party.
At some point,
I want to do more wild swimming potentially in 2022.
Okay,
so we're back halfway through 2022 just a really quick
check up on how my resolutions are doing for this year.
So I think the best one so far have been the reading more Gothic classics.
I went to a workshop at my local bookshop.
I bought a Romantics and Gothic 'short introduction to'
I'm halfway through a bunch of classics,
So I think I'm on a roll, the start has been made.
We're slowly rolling along.
And then this week I did a big sort of working session
on the pitch for my non-fiction book.
Sometimes you can't make time for something specifically.
And then when the inspiration hits,
that's maybe even though you should be doing something else,
I just go with it.
I made a mood board I a few weeks ago when to Stanfords,
the Travel Bookshop in London,
and bought a bunch of books,
did some market research,
and I very much know that the more I look into it,
the more I know I'm going to have to take a lot more time to do the background reading and get some of
the experience that I need to be able to do this book.
But that's fine.
It's not a short term project.
Then I've also gone to a few lectures online and have started
some tutorials,
did some master classes,
so I feel like that sort of tutorial learning goal is doing pretty well,
too.
And even though this particular year the sort of drawing and painting wasn't part of
my official goals and resolutions again,
I think I've made a good start with it.
I bought a beautiful watercolour notebook.
I've really found,
like,
going to places and then just drawing what I see has been really good
motivation.
It means you don't really get stuck on,
you know,
What should I paint?
What should I draw?
And so I really enjoyed doing that on to go.
Feeling good about the resolutions,
I guess a slightly more positive ending to this very mixed
video.
So this is the official roundup. We're all up to date.
Thanks for coming on this journey with me.
I hope you're all doing OK and I'll talk to you soon,
Doei!