I'm back again, one day later, doing my best to get another roundup done so I won't be behind anymore! Without further ado, here's how I kicked off 2025 🎊✨
Patreon Rewards
I completed another Maginaturalist's Sketchbook piece in January, featuring Fafnir, the dwarf-dragon of Norse legend. He slithered out to warm patrons' mailboxes soon after!
Please join my Patreon to get cool, illustrated rewards like this and to help keep my creative career flowing 💖 As a patron, you get digital rewards like coloring pages and Discord access, and you can chose from physical rewards including postcards, prints, or both! Every member not only helps by providing funds for things like art supplies and equipment upgrades, but also gives me a huge emotional boost and social proof to anyone who may be on the fence about supporting me. Thank you so much 🥰
deviantART
I uploaded several new pieces in January, but the one I have decided to feature here is a chibi caricature of Steve the Otter, which was made as a birthday gift for my mother-in-law 💐💕
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View, fave, and comment on deviantART. |
You can commission me for a chibi caricature like this! I can chibify animals of all kinds, including humans, so long as I have a high-quality, full-body photo reference to work from 🎨 There are two places to commission me, just choose the platform you prefer: deviantART or Square.
Livestreaming
After taking the first two (partial) weeks of January off for the holidays, I returned to livestreaming like usual, sharing my artmaking process on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for the remaining three weeks of the month. January's final artstream had me finishing another chibi caricature, this time Tiger the Cat, as a birthday gift for my sister 🐈
Consider subscribing to my Twitch channel as another way to support my storytelling career! You get fun perks like custom subscriber badges and emotes that can be used all across Twitch, and I get your financial, emotional, and social backing 🥰 Thank you!
Charity Fundraising
Our Charity of the Month for January was Veganuary again this year 😄 We had 20 unique viewers that month, which is how I calculate what my end-of-month donation will be.
My formula is to donate $0.10 USD per unique viewer, with a minimum of $10 and a maximum of $100, so I just sent Veganuary $10!
As you can see in my email receipt, they have a match going on, which meant that we helped raise $20! But that's not all! My wonderful subscriber, Wolfaxe2, stepped up at the last minute, and donated the full £10 goal to our Twitch fundraiser!
So together we raised over $30 for Veganuary in January!!! 🎊✨🎊✨🎊 Thank you to everyone who watches my streams and donates to these fundraisers. You help make my storytelling work so much more meaningful 💖
Gryphia Progress
I'm going to talk more about my 2025 goals a bit farther down in this post, but one of them is to work on my novel every workday. I'm stoked to report that I achieved that for January!
I'm using this freebie planner to keep track of the days that I work on Gryphia (and the days that are scheduled vacation) so it feels great to have the January spread completely filled out like this ✨
I've continued to work on writing and editing my second draft using Scrivener. It's rather slow going, in a way, but I am constantly coming up with new ideas and refinements, so I am moving forward, even if the word count doesn't always reflect it. Editing has always been my favorite part of a writing project, so I'm having a blast every day!
Other News: 2024 Goals, 2025 Goals
As I did last year, I would like to take some time to reflect on the goals I set for myself and how I did. Here are the goals that I set at the beginning of 2024:
- Career ✒️ I will spend 50+ minutes each workday on Gryphia writing.
- Education 💮 I will spend 20+ minutes studying Japanese every day.
- Finances 💳 I will pay off all credit cards.
- Health 😌 I will meditate every day.
- Hobbies 🎮 I will play a Nintendo Switch game every day.
- Travel 🐮 I will visit a Farm Sanctuary location.
- Family 🕊️ I will do my pet care routine every day before breakfast.
- Relationships 💌 I will write a letter every day.
- Reading 📚 I will read at least one page every day.
Many of my goals evolved as the year went by. Circumstances change, emergencies occur, but instead of giving up, I adapted so that I could keep working toward my greater aims even if it was different to how I first imagined it. Here are my goals at the end of the year, and my thoughts about them:
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Career ✒️ I will work on Gryphia writing every workday.
I had to remove the time requirement for this goal, which worked great because then I no longer wrestled with thoughts like, "Why bother working on it at all today, since I can't achieve the full time anymore?" So I continued to make steady progress throughout the year! -
Education 💮 I will complete a Duolingo Japanese lesson every day.
My streak remains intact at an astounding 1,678 days! -
Finances 💳 I will pay off all credit cards.
I achieved this and, in doing so, completely revamped my spending habits and overall financial hygiene. This is one of the toughest yearly goals I've ever accomplished but I'm so glad I chose to tackle it, because it came with far more rewards than I expected. My relationship with money is completely different and I'm no longer interested in the impulse purchases that used to tempt (and trap!) me. I'm free now to use any disposable income for things that REALLY matter to me, like increasing monthly charitable donations, saving up for epic vacations, and paying down other debt, like my student loans 🤑 -
Health 🚿 I will shower every day.
I changed this goal because I found myself really struggling to fit in all elements of basic self-care. It may sound like a no-brainer, but I shower at the end of the day so that I can get into bed feeling warm and clean, which means it can be tough when I'm depleted after a busy day, and having to make the decision between showering or getting enough sleep. It's something I'm still working on, but has definitely improved with practice! -
Hobbies 🎮 I will play a Nintendo Switch game every day.
While I didn't fit this in every day, I'd say I played a game at least 90% of the days, which is still an A grade! -
Reading 📚 I will read a page a day.
Sometimes I gave myself a bye and just read two pages the next day, but overall I was successful here. I ended up reading a total 7,233 pages, because I'd often read much more than the single page that my goal required! -
Family 🕊️ I will do my pet care routine every day before breakfast.
Again, I didn't do this every single day, but it was even more frequently achieved than my hobbies goal. This is an important task because the pet care chores can be unpleasant (scooping poops, especially!) so I tie it to breakfast to keep me really motivated to get it done early! -
Relationships 🍻 I will host seasonal family dinners and Sunday
Friends Lunch.
I had to change this goal because writing a letter stopped being fun and started being a chore. I decided to find a different way to stay in regular touch with my most precious people, and it worked! -
Wellness 😌 I will meditate every day.
This replaced my travel goal because I realized I couldn't save up for a road trip AND pay off my credit cards, all in the same year. I switched from Headspace to Insight Timer partway through the year, which I like much better! My daily meditation streak there remains intact at 170 days.
For fun, I also wanted to share photos of last year's reading calendar, which I got from Half Price Books, and this year's calendar.
I use these calendars to track my daily reading streak and to mark down what books I finished, which makes for a fun, interactive decoration and a nice memento at the end of the year.
Finally, I want to share the goals I set for this year. They may evolve, as last year's did, but so far they are working well for me, giving structure to my daily life, and supporting my health and wellbeing.
In list form, they are:
- Career ✒️ I will work on my first Gryphia novel every workday.
- Education 💮 I will complete a Duolingo Japanese lesson every day.
- Finances 🏦 I will save up at least $4,000 for my 2026 Caribbean cruise.
- Health 😴 I will go to bed, eyes closed, by 21:50 every night.
- Hobbies 🎮 I will play a Nintendo Switch game every day.
- Wellness 🔋 I will take a monthly rest week from livestreaming and high intensity workouts.
- Family 🕊️ I will do my pet care routine every day before breakfast.
- Relationships 🥂 I will host Friends Lunch and attend Vegan Toastmasters on Sundays.
- Fitness ⚖️ I will reach 120 lb body weight or 22% body fat by July.
Wish me luck! I have crafted all these goals with the knowledge of how previous years went, what changes needed to be made, and what works best with my circumstances. I'm feeling excited to achieve all these things and more in 2025 🤩
That's all for now, thank you for reading until the end. I'll be back with another roundup post next month, and maybe with a Japan Adventure post in the meantime! Until then, please stay happy, healthy, and safe ❤️
