This year has turned out to be a good one, but it hasn’t been nearly as exciting as 2012. I did so much in 2012, and I haven’t been able to translate that over to 2013 yet.

I need a big personal accomplishment in 2013, but I just don’t know what yet. My goals are great, small personal accomplishments but I need to ramp it up.

In any case, this is how I did in the month of April:

Emergency Fund

I added exactly $620 to my emergency fund in April, but added much more than that to savings in general. For instance, I added $150 to my laptop savings account, $317 to my general savings (which will likely go toward an extra car payment), $410 for my insurance fund (which is for the next round of car insurance), and $50 to my travel fund for a total of $1547 in savings.

My January 1 goal was to add $10,000 to my EF by the end of the year, but then re-allocate it down to $5K when I got there, but I don’t want the $5k to just be sitting there doing nothing so as soon as I add $5K, I’m going to start re-routing the money. Almost there!

Extra Earnings

My original goal was to make an extra $1000/month, on top of my regular income. I, once again, hit it out of the ball park, for a total of $1137.54 in online earnings (commenting, staff writing, ghost writing and blogging) and an extra $800 babysitting (it was a busy month), for a total of:

$1937.54

I almost doubled my goal. This was great, because I had to pay for 6 months worth of car insurance this month too, which was $1200. I had budgeted for it, but it was nice not to have to use that money.

These aren’t earnings, but I also got a $1300+ tax refund. That was fun.

Lose 10 Lbs

I lose three pounds in April, and you can tell. My clothes are starting to feel loose and I feel great. I have been eating much better, and my skin shows it too (while I still break out from time to time like a tween, my skin has more of a glow). I also have a ton of energy.

Toward my ten pound goal, I’m officially down six. Not bad at all! I’m thinking ten just isn’t enough of a goal and I am going to raise it to fifteen, meaning nine more to go.

I have only purchased one article of clothing since the beginning of the year, but if I stay on this track I’ll have to buy more.

Travel

I didn’t go anywhere in April and I won’t be going anywhere in May. I added to my travel fund, so that’s the progress I made toward this goal. I also booked off some time to go to Manitoba with my mom to see my aunts and cousins. That should be fun! I’ve actually never been to Manitoba, so even though it’s within Canada, I’m counting that toward my travel goal.

Adding to My Goals

I’ve been doing really well with my yearly goals and don’t really think about them during the month, which shows me that I’m not challenging myself enough.

So, I’m adding to my goals:

Make An Extra $1500/month

Instead of working toward making an extra $1000/month, I’m going to step it up and work toward making an extra $1500 month. I’m hoping to ramp up my extra income online, but looking into affiliate income and finally launching my other site in May [announcement to come].

Be More Active on Personal Social Media

My 5 year plan involves making a career move, which will require more activity on personal social media accounts. I’ve never really liked being active on personal social media because I can be a pretty private person. I can’t just put it all out there on personal accounts like I can with my blogging accounts. But I’m going to start tweeting at least once per day, and in May I’ll have to find another platform to open an account with – maybe Instagram.