OK, apparently a couple of you want to see this too. This is long, I’m afraid, since I don’t know off any way to make cuts in Wordpress.

Edited to add: Sorry about the weirdness at number 8, I’m not especially happy about that task, it’s just a weird Wordpress formatting thing but there’s no way that I’m going to change the numbering on the other 100 just to get rid of it.

101 THINGS LIST

1) Apply to Axis
2) Assemble garden bench and chain to railings in garden
3) Assemble new wheelbarrow
4) Be mentioned in [AN] Magazine
5) Buy a digital SLR
6) Buy and put up nesting boxes
7) Buy binoculars
Clear out and organise shed
9) Complete 4 thread drawings
10) Complete 8 UFO’s for the L&V Finish-a-thon
11) Complete the Paying It Forward Exchange
12) Create a promotional pack for Pin Ritual
13) Declutter and re-organise Cupboard of Doom
14) Declutter laundry room
15) Decorate middle floor hallway
16) Develop and perform Red Thread
17) Do 50 drawings to sell
18) Donate £100 to British Heart Foundation
19) Exhibit in London
20) Exhibit The Diary Project
21) Finish & post Mart’s box
22) Finish Gemma’s jewellery
23) Finish organising study
24) Finish Pelt
25) Finish re-organising studio
26) Finish shoalwater shawl in time for wedding
27) Finish the research on the house
28) Finish watching Farscape
29) Finish watching Nowhere Man
30) Fix email problem
31) Frame and post Jeanne’s picture
32) Frame and post Mart’s picture
33) Get big bedroom decorated
34) Get damaged corner in library fixed
35) Get front door painted
36) Get more Moo cards
37) Get my hallmark
38) Get new coil fitted
39) Get notecards made from my art
40) Get over 100 in my Technorati rank
41) Get spinning wheel fixed
42) Get windows renovated
43) Go and see a ballet
44) Go on a picnic
45) Go whalewatching
46) Hem grey trousers
47) Host a tea party
48) Install hanging rail or brackets in studio
49) Invent a new cake
50) Keep a daily log for a year
51) Knit Cat’s jumper
52) Learn how to do the more complicated polaroid transfers
53) Learn how to use my medium format camera
54) Learn to follow crochet patterns
55) Learn to spin
56) Lose a stone
57) Make a ‘where things are stored’ database
58) Make a book of The Diary Project
59) Make a limited edition artist’s book
60) Make a new will
61) Make and send CD of wedding photos to Z. and G.
62) Make Butterfly Mind
63) Meet up with Siobhan
64) Organise Australia trip
65) Organise registration info
66) Paint outside of study door
67) Paint railings
68) Pay back J.
69) Perform Pin Ritual again
70) Plant a border with bulbs
71) Put £500 in my savings account
72) Remake and photograph ‘Annunciation’
73) Renew passport
74) Reorganise the kitchen cupboards
75) Replant my herb pots
76) Rescan the earlier envelopes at high res
77) Save up £1000 for a new computer
78) Sell 5 pieces of artwork
79) Sell a piece of jewellery
80) Simplify my email folders
81) Sort out family lawyer stuff
82) Sort out Irene’s picture
83) Submit my work to Fiberarts Magazine
84) Swim in the sea
85) Take or pay someone to take good photos of my recent artwork
86) Take part in 6 exhibitions
87) Test the plastic etching process
88) Tidy and clean under kitchen sink
89) Update descriptions on Flickr
90) Update my art archive
91) Use or get rid of the pile of slate in the garden
92) Visit a waterfall
93) Visit Achnahaird
94) Visit Hay-on-Wye
95) Visit Ireland
96) Visit Red in Amsterdam
97) Visit Roslin Chapel
98) Visit The Bath Museum of Costume
99) Visit the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford
100) Watch Season 3 of Veronica Mars
101) Write up the knitted brick pattern

……….

I was most amused to discover yesterday that I’d apparently started a 101 Things list last May. I didn’t remember ever having seen the meme before, let alone writing a list with 50 things on it. It was fascinating to see how many things I’ve already done (only 7 unfortunately), what made it to the final list and what I no longer feel the need to do. It’s obvious already that these lists can change in quite a short time, so you need to stay fluid during the process.

It was especially interesting to notice that a couple of things that I thought were completely off the wall when I wrote them on the final list were also on the earlier one - apparently I have a much deeper desire to go swimming in the sea than I realised.

Well, that’s it for goals for the time being but I’ll probably do monthly updates on how I’m doing, just to keep myself on track. Oh, and if you can help out with any of these goals - especially the exhibition related ones - please do feel free. Indeed, I’m entirely reliant on you all linking to me in order to achieve No. 40 (Get over 100 in my Technorati rank) - but don’t worry, I won’t be asking you to come round and clear out my cupboards!

So, the quest for a final list of goals is continuing apace. I’ve given myself until the end of the week to finalise it because for some bizarre reason, next week feels like the proper start of January to me. Don’t even ask, I have no idea why, I just know that I’m still mentally in an ‘in-between’ sort of space.

One thing I’ve definitely decided to do is 101 Things in 1001 Days. This online project involves making a commitment to complete 101 preset tasks in 1001 days, which is about 2.75 years. If you want to take part, there’s a list of criteria and suggestions here.

When I read about this on Eliza’s Back Yard blog, it totally freaked me out. I wasn’t sure why because I undoubtedly already have more than 101 things on my various to-do lists. After some thought, I realised that it was the time-scale that bothered me.

Now, I have no problem with the concept of doing something for a year, as The Diary Project amply shows, but the idea of publicly admitting that it might take me the best part of three years to complete things seriously bothered me. I’m not exactly your Go-To Girl when it comes to delayed gratification: when I have an idea, I want to do it right now. Actually, I generally want to do it yesterday but even I accept that this breaks the laws of physics because I don’t have one of these…

Yet conversely, I’m also The Queen of Procrastination and many of the things on my to-do lists have been lurking there for so long that they’ve become seriously embarrassing to me. This happens partly because I take on too much or commit to things out of a sense of obligation rather than a real desire to do them but also because my energy levels simply can’t keep up with the relentless slew of ideas that pepper my poor defenceless brain. My family have come to live in fear of the words, “hey, you know what would be a really great idea…”

But the fact that I was a bit afraid of the 101 Things meme made me think that it was probably an excellent idea to try it. Then it occurred to me that it could also act as a handy dandy place to hide all my ’shoulds’, so that they weren’t on my official goal list. Hmm, perhaps I haven’t completely integrated that whole ‘only having positive goals’ thing yet!

Anyway, for both these reasons, I decided to go for it and enthusiastically started yet another database. However, after several days, I still only have about 75 things and I’ve utterly run out of inspiration. I could probably plump up the list with more things from my to-do lists but a lot of those are quick, small, one-off or rather boring tasks and I’m not sure they deserve to be on this big list. Plus, I’m still trying to stay mostly positive and only commit to things that I feel are worth doing or that are bothering me enough that I need them out of my life.

So I’m wondering if it’s acceptable to start with just 75 things and add the other 26 at some point in the next 2.75 years. Sigh, I suspect this means that I’m still having trouble with the time-scale thing - after all, how can I possibly know what I’ll want next year, let alone in nearly three? As you can see, I’ve never been one for Soviet style Five Year Plans but perhaps learning to think more long term is part of the reason for doing this.