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It's that time of year when we take a hard look at what we've done and assess how we want to improve and move forward. This is something I'm doing constantly, but it does seem important to take a moment to write it all down, especially since I feel like I have learned a lot about myself this year, and especially this past month or two.

I started out 2012 miserable and full of self-doubt. It was a long-time coming. These feelings had been building for a couple of years, so I declared 2012, the year of re-evaluation. I had to figure out what made me happy. More specifically, I had to figure out if writing still made me happy or if I was done, ready for a complete change of career and life focus.

I went back and forth, up and down about this. I'd spend a month deeply in love with storytelling and then three months hating every word I wrote or hating myself for writing. I felt like I'd finally gotten on the right track again in September and then had an absolute breakdown, my biggest crisis of faith yet in November, which I documented in this piece for Rookie--possibly the best, most honest, real and in-the-moment piece I've written for Rookie.

In July, I decided to go back to therapy for the first time in roughly nine or ten years. I was deeply depressed and anxious, especially about writing, and I couldn't do the re-evaluation thing on my own. It was one of the best decisions I've ever made. Not only did I benefit personally, I figured out a lot about my own writing. I put all the writing tips I gleaned from my therapist in this YA Outside the Lines post.

Perhaps the most important of those tips was be grateful for and recognize my accomplishments, big and small. So here's what I've done in 2012

• Knitted one hat and one scarf for my mother, and one hooded baby blanket for my friend's first child. Started my first knitting project for myself, a skirt.



• Taught 16 students in a Young Adult Fiction class at Columbia College and read well over 1000 pages of their work.
• Grew lettuce, strawberries, tomatoes, green beans, many varieties of peppers, many types of herbs, quite a few flowers.



• Made countless vegan meals, tried and even invented several new recipes.
• Got my eleventh tattoo. (It's Latin for "breathe.")

• Joined my local library board.
• Tended bar three nights a week and briefly made a tumblr about my adventures.
• Visited my favorite place on earth, Seattle.



• Saw (and met!) Mark Lanegan (whose music inspires my writing big-time), as well Garbage, Social Distortion, and several amazing bands (and legends like Iggy Pop!) at Riot Fest.
• Hosted a college friend for about half the year and went on adventures with her like to my first Renaissance Faire.



• Visited with several other friends from out of town, reconnected with my childhood best friend/sister after she moved back, spent as much time as I could with my amazing teenage niece who is my heroine, and made the ultimate birthday package for my BFF to celebrate eighteen years of friendship.
• Went to my first Comic Con where I met people like the stars of one of my all-time favorite shows, Twin Peaks.



• Went to my first RT convention, participated in a panel about boundaries in YA and in Teen Day. Met Francine Pascal, author of the Sweet Valley series that ruled my childhood.





• Watched the last five seasons of Buffy for the first time, all five seasons of Angel for the first time, and most recently, watched all of the first season of Game of Thrones in 3 days.
• Turned old t-shirts into new shirts, and in one case, a dress.



• Celebrated my third wedding anniversary in Portland, Oregon. We also visited the gorgeous Oregon coast and met up with one of my best writing buds, Tara Kelly, who took this photo of us.

• Nursed my elderly cat/best friend of 17 years, Sid, for several months and then said a sad but beautiful farewell to him the weekend after Thanksgiving and wrote him a tribute.
  
• Wrote 17 columns for my local newspaper, the Forest Park Review.
• Wrote 20 essays, some deeply personal, others pure fun, for Rookie as well as countless reviews of books, movies, TV shows, music, hot chocolate, candy, and electronic items that do and should exist.
• Wrote my first essay for Ms. Fit Magazine, a real world feminist fitness magazine that will debut in January of 2013.
• Made zines with my niece and her BFF at a Rookie Road Trip event.

• Took part in an amazing reading to celebrate the release of ROOKIE YEARBOOK ONE.
• Did a vlog to celebrate the release of the DEAR TEEN ME anthology, which features my letter to my teenage self about an abusive relationship.
• Researched (both by visiting the library and sneaking into a cemetery after hours) and wrote my first short story in umm... eight years? It's a ghost story--my personal twist on a local urban legend about a hitchhiking phantom flapper--which will come out next October in an anthology called VERY SUPERSTITIOUS published by Month9Books.
• Went on a writing retreat in Arizona.



• Wrote about 50,000 words of one YA novel (ie. the Modern Myth YA)
• Wrote about 60,000 words of another YA novel (ie. the Contemporary YA)

I love writing about the things that matter most to me, whether that be writing fiction about female musicians or teenagers struggling with depression, self-injury and addiction, or writing nonfiction about my own experiences with self-injury, grief, addiction, abuse and bullying. Over the past year, writing for Rookie has literally changed my life and my perspective on writing. I've struggled with the ups and downs (okay, mainly the downs) of my fiction career, but my regular contributions of personal essays and goofy things like my glowing review of my DVR have kept me balanced and happy as a writer.