Ambitions and Realities: My 2025 Update Part 1

A candid update and reflection on my success and challenges so far

Feb 27, 2025

If you’ve been a subscriber for a while, you may remember my “Resolutions: Breaking the Routine to Embrace a More Purposeful Life” post to break in the new year where I shared my ambitious stretch goals.

As promised, in an effort to be fully transparent, build loyalty with my readers, and hold myself accountable, I’m here to share an update on how the first two months of 2025 are going.

Financial Stability

I’ll start off by saying I’m not where I hoped I’d be, and that’s on me. However, achieving financial stability takes time and dedication. That being said, I’m ambitious with some of the changes we’ve made, including:

Reducing daycare costs: If you have children, you know how daycare costs are more than the price of a mortgage payment and an arm. With my previous job requiring so much time and focus, especially due to my days consisting of 80%+ of meetings, there was no choice but to put my kids in daycare full-time if I wanted to build my career. Thankfully, with my current role, I’ve had much more flexibility, giving me the confidence to reduce my children's schedule, saving us several hundred dollars each month while also preparing us for a true school day schedule, and allowing me more time with them while they are young.
Adjusting my withholdings: Knowing that most of my readers are tax pros, I expect a few who may roll their eyes when I say I have always been one who goes for the highest refund possible to help me save money and then make major purchases or pay off debt come tax time. I’m changing my mindset this year to have more money in my pocket each month to pay monthly expenses and updated my W-4. I encourage you to do the same.
Snowball method: This seems to work the best for us to pay off our smallest debts and/or highest interest first, as I’m driven by seeing progress. We paid off a large portion (thanks to that tax refund).
Started home loan process: This feels very contradictory to my goal for stability, but as one of our goals for 2025, we’ve felt a huge push to sell our current home and move. I’ll share more on this subject later in this post, but my point here is we’re being intentional about not borrowing at the top of our budget, using the profit from selling this house for a down payment, and paying off other debts. Yes, this is still not the greatest time to buy with the market and interest rates the way they are, but will it ever be?

While I didn’t make tremendous progress, I feel confident that our intentional decisions set us on a path to living a more comfortable lifestyle that hopefully will allow us to travel more in the future. That being said, I think setting a goal for “financial stability” may have been too much of a stretch, and this year may be more about “financial progress or awareness.”

New Home

This area has been taking most of my attention this past month, but I’m excited about it.

Preparing to sell: Yes, we’re buying and selling at the same time. We’ve met with our realtor and have been making improvements to the house and purging our items into a storage unit to help with the transition. We’re on track to have our house on the market by the first or second week of April.
Pre-approval received: We’re ready to start the house-hunting process (in tax season, yes I’m crazy).

Since I’m being fully honest, I’ll say that this has been a lot more emotional than I thought. This is our first home, where we brought both babies home, where we’ve built the best friendships with our neighbors and have so many memories. But it’s time, and I know the best decision for our family. I’m excited to share an update in the coming months.

Spiritual Growth

I started a 365-day bible plan on January 1st, and if I’m honest, I didn’t make it to the end of January. I wasn’t fully committed, I couldn’t focus as much as I wanted. It wasn’t speaking to me, and where I am in my life so instead, I’ve been focusing on:

Devotionals around what is going on in my life such as parenting and building character in my children
Integrating habits in my day-to-day life
Influencing where I can through my actions, whether in my work life or social life

Blog Growth

My goal is to reach 100 subscribers by the end of the year. 100 may seem small, but for a normal, boring working mom like me, it's a huge goal. I’m excited to say I’m already more than halfway there, with 10 more months to spare.

What I’m learning;

Post often and consistently. Sure, I feel awkward self-promoting my work, especially as a beginner, but the more I do, the more reach I get and the better my writing becomes.
Finding a niche is great, but also, branching out from time to time to write about other matters that are relatable to various audiences goes a long way.
Networking, in many aspects, can be your biggest catapult to leverage you to reach new people all around. I did my first collaboration and received my first two recommendations. Shout out to Tom Talks Taxes and Financial Guardians!

If you are a subscriber - thank you! Thank you for being a founding member and joining me on this journey from the beginning. I truly hope something I’ve shared has inspired or entertained you in some way.

Professional Growth

Not a ton to report here on staying ahead of CE other than I’ve registered for several courses through Compass Tax Educators. They offer top-notch technical and practice management content from top industry leaders.

Most of my professional time has been focused on getting back into the groove of tax preparation (having not done this since 2020), while also improving the way we work and how to better serve our customers across various business lines. For example, I have attended member-exclusive events with InCite as well as events from TaxDome, Circle, and ADP Accountant Connect and doing demos with various tools.

I anticipate the next few months will be focused on continuing to capture learnings while also building marketing skillsets due to the projects I’m taking on.

Self Care

This leads me to self-care… The item that many fail to make time for, especially during the season.

In January, I started off strong, visiting two state parks in the first week (30% of my goal). We took a weekend trip to Dallas with our family. We even enjoyed a snow day!
I got my hair done (beyond the quick trim I typically do at a well-known franchise), which is unheard of for me.
We weaned my daughter from the pacifier. Okay, maybe this isn’t self-care for me necessarily, but if you’ve ever had a baby or toddler on a pacifier, you know this is worthy of a celebration. Next stop: potty training.
I have worked at a coffee shop several times. The change of scenery and people-watching are such a vibe, and I look forward to my Fridays there! I encourage you to block off time to do the same. If you’re working on confidential matters, just be cautious of your surroundings. I typically will work on items that aren’t super sensitive and don’t require full focus.
Reading more. I’m simultaneously trying to read (note trying as finding time to read with toddlers, isn’t as easy as I’d like), both “Times Up by Paul Dunn and Ronald J. Baker and “Girl, Wash Your Face” by Rachel Hollis.

And here’s where I get vulnerable and share my deepest darkest secrets - okay, not really, but I will make some confessions.

Reducing coffee intake - hasn’t happened beyond skipping a few days, but it’s just too good to pass up.

We’ve ordered takeout too many times and have had a lapse in our workout routines. Much of this was due to our entire family coming down with Flu A in January and me getting a tonsillectomy at the beginning of February. Oh, I didn’t mention that… I would not recommend it for an adult. I’m still in recovery mode but hopeful it will solve many of the other issues I was having.

Summary:

So there you have it. I’ve exposed myself to the world in more ways than I ever imagined I would in hopes of accountability and relatability. I’ve made strides in some areas and stumbled or fell short in others. However, I am choosing to give myself grace because there are still ten months left in the year, and sometimes, we have to focus on progress, not perfection.

As we emerge from the winter (or seasonal depression) season, I’m filled with a sense of ambition and hope for the rest of this year. I hope this article encourages you to embrace your unique journey with the same determination and grace.

How is your year unfolding? What victories have you achieved, or where do you see room for growth? I’d love to hear from you!