2016 – a Recap

Happy New Year! Here we go for 2017, another year, 365 new opportunities for each and everyone of us.

I am very excited for the new year and I have sooo many plans and new years resolutions. Most of them are on an emotional and very pesonal level but there is at least one new years resolution that I will share with you here on the blog… wait for that 😀

Today, I want to take a look back at 2016. It was quite a year! One of the most intense years of my life, I think. I opened up my very own business, a whole new blog, I celebrated my baby girls first birthday, and I had to somehow learn how to balance out work, love, baby girl, blog, friends, etc. I came across more obstacles and difficulties than ever before in my life; and I conquered them all. I grew and learned and grew and learned even more. I am very happy with my 2016, however, I am looking forward to a new year with less stress.

Here we go with a little recap.

2016 started off with a challenge: My no empty calories challenge. For one year I decided not to eat any refined sugars, any white flour, anything artificial. Basically anything which is empty calories without any or without many nutrients. So in 2016 I ate a pretty strict whole food plant based diet meaning only whole foods, veggies, fruits, whole wheat breads, beans and legumes, etc. I will make a seperate post about how the challenge went by next week; however I will spoiler a litte: it was the best decision EVER!

I February I discoverd my love for PASTELS a love affair which ever grew since. I was still blogging on my old blog by the time and I was not sure wheter to continue blogging or not since I somehow was’nt really happy with my blog by the time. Also, I did not really have a topic for my blog and I felt lost in the bloggersphere and did not really know where to go.

In March I spent a week in Denmark which was really good to get some time off everything. I was already working for my own company by the time, but it was’nt really public yet. It was my last holiday in which I did not have to check work emails every day and I really enjoyed it.

In March I also shared a what I eat in a day  post which was actually my most popular post ever! I guess I should make another one of those sometime soon…

In April, finally, I made a decision concerning my blog and I launched Conscious Lifestyle of Mine. Choosing the name meant choosing a topic for my blog and all the blogger problems I had in the previous couple of months suddenly dissapeared. For the blog I wanted to concentrate on living a conscious lifestyle, meaning a more sustainable lifestyle. With just one click blogging was fun again and I enjoy it more than ever since I launched my new blog.

To me personally, my new blog was one of the most important decisions of the year – and one of the best 🙂

In May early Summer arrived and got excited about wearing a few of my favorite wardrove pieces, such as my culottes.

I also shared a post about how to get back in shape after pregnancy right after my little girls first birthday. Eating a whole food plant based diet, it was very easy for me to get back in shape. Even today, my weight is less than before pregnancy (62 kilo before pregnany, 59 kilo now). I easily ate around 3000 kalories a day when I was breastfeeding full time and I still eat A LOT (I know it is a lot because everyone keeps telling me that 😀 ) however, I eat healthy and no saturated fats (animals) and no oils – which makes it sooo easy to feel and look great.

In May I also spent a weekend in the Alpes to visit a yoga center there. I had a wonderful weekend and loads of time to relax, calm down and think about everything that happend in 2016 so far. I really enjoyed every of these small getaways where I got the chance to recap, to review, and to look back at what happend in the past few months – with my growing business, with my husband, my baby, my personality etc.

June was all about getting ready for Summer and also about reviewing the first 6 months of the year. I shared a post about how my no empty calories challenge went so far and I made plans for the next 6 months on the blog. I had quite a few topics ready that I wanted to share.

In July I extended the topic if my blog to a (to me) very important direction: avoiding plastics my household. Until then a conscious lifestyle to me was one in which I do eat a vegan diet (for the planet, for the animals, for the health) and in which I do not shop from bad brands which are exploiting their employees, such as H&M, ZARA, Sheinside etc.

However, that was not enough. Going zero plastic or rather less plastic was an important step to me, and I began sharing my thoughts and everything I learned on the blog starting in July.

In one of my first no plastic posts, I shared different options for organic plastic free sun screen and I am still so happy that I found the butterbean organics sunscreen at monomeer.de because it truely safed us during our stay in the Phillipines.

August was still all about how to avoid plastic and I was sooo excited about everything I learned during this time of the year.

Of course I also continued sharing my all second hand outfits to (hopefully) inspire others that you do not need new clothes all the time to look nice. Buying second hand is such a great way to reduce your carbon footprint!

In September I jumped all into FAIR FASHION. After having bought almost exclusively second hand for two years, I felt like I needed something new from time to time anyway. That was the moment where I began discovering all those awesome fair fashion brands out there. My very first fair fashion post featured a shirt from ThokkThokk which still is one of my favorite basic shirts.

In October I visited the Phillipines and spent a magical week on the island Boracay. We went there to celebrate my husband’s best friend’s wedding and we had a wonderful time. The trip was definetly of the highlights of 2016.

Before leaving to the Phillipines my husband and I got on a little getaway to the small town of Goslar to celebrate our 7 years anniversary. We had perfect weekend there.

November was all about Fair Fashion Fall looks. Personally, I felt more relaxed and comfortable from November on. Work went well, the big trip to the Phillipines was over (I was nervous about flying long distance with the little one beforehand…), I got more used to my new life as a working mum, got a good my work-life balance, and just pretty much everything ran smoother from November on 🙂

December, of course, was all about getting ready for Christmas. I shared my first ethical Christmas gift guide and a few other Christmas related posts. I was extremely busy with my business in December but somehow I rarely ever felt stressed. I felt like things were falling into place and I felt pretty great throughout the entire month.

For the last bit of the year, I took a small break from blogging and social media and enjoyed spending time with my family; we spent Christmas eve at our place and travelled to visit my husband’s family afterwards. I had the most beautiful, relaxing days!

Even though this year was busy and sometimes hectic, I felt as down to earth and balanced as probably never before towards the end of the year. I am super ready for 2017 and I cannot wait for all the adventures to come.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!