All the “Best of” posts made me want to write one of my own, since apparently my wordless recap on my year is not enough…so here it is! :O (If you haven’t already entered my Santa Barbara Bars giveaway, head on over! :) This is a longgg post (but with lots of pictures?). You’ve been warned! <3

Best of Fairyburger (2014)

In April-ish of 2014, I kindasorta officially stepped out of my antisocial blogging bubble. At the time, I had two reasons for the antisocial-ness.

One was due to classic “It’s not you, it’s me” reasoning: being in medical school and all, I didn’t think I’d have the time to participate in blogging communities or to interact with the rest of the world. I’m generally the type of person to consider every aspect of situation/opportunity before I commit to it, and I don’t like to half-ass things, so I just…didn’t, until I was sure I could give what I was doing the time it deserved.

But, as I’ve found with most things (and people) in my life, you make time for what’s important to you.

I got accepted into The Recipe ReDux shortly before I left the country for my medical service trip to the Dominican Republic, and at the end of April, I became a Girls Gone Sporty Ambassador. :D It has definitely been a learning process for me in terms of social media and the like because I’ve always been a fairly private person (despite my broadcasting my life on my blog), but I like to think it’s been going rather well! :]

Busting outta my antisocial bubble was probably one of the best decisions I made last year (aside from moving into the cat shelter).

I can say without a doubt that I am super, super glad I did it, because the blogging community and the groups I’m a part of are absolutely wonderful. I’ve met so many inspiring and awesome bloggers because of it, and there are lots I’d love to meet because I think we would be super awesome friends IRL! :D I’ve been fairly isolated whilst out on rotations, and having all of you to virtually hang out with makes it better. Thank you for being there! <3

(Psst…There is a new addition to the above, but it deserves its own post, so I’m going to save it for the weekend! If you follow me on instagram, you shall find out shortly! ;P)

Recipes

Back when I used to go to Jamba Juice, my favorite drink was the Orange Berry Blitz, and while I was living at Please Save A Cat and studying for boards, I made myself a smoothie and inadvertently came up with a copycat recipe! Twas a happy accident! :]

I also ran my very first giveaway (*coughcough* staytunedforfutureupdates *coughcough*) for Venice Kitchen Silicone Baking Cups, along with a Shepherd’s Pie recipe!

During my weekly daily let’s-use-up-everything-in-the-fridge crusades, I came up with some seriously delicious + healthy Rice Cake Bars!

Over the summer, I happened upon a box of 45 peaches at a fruit stand off the side of the road one day, and decided to make a quick and easy snack when I got home!

I also discovered the joy that is popcorn for healthy (or healthified) snacking! :] This Cake Batter Popcorn was definitely a crowd favorite!

Other highlights include when I baked a birthday cake for my friend in my study-basement at school with…my rice cooker…and the vegan Walnut Oat Patties that I made for my very first Recipe Redux. :] The Tiramisu French Toast that my best friend and I made after an early morning hike was also one of my favorite creations!

Fitness

Hands down, the most popular fitness-related post on my blog this year was on fitness shaming, the stereotyping of different sports, and why all the negativity & fitshaming needs to stop.

For one of the Pole Dancing Bloggers Association monthly blog hops, I wrote a post on self-love and acceptance!

I started participating in Jill Conyers & Jessica Joy‘s The Fit Dish linkups! One of my absolute favorite themes was the one where we wrote a gratitude letter to our bodies and our health. It was so inspiring, and I loved how positive and encouraging everyone was. <3

I also wrote a piece earlier in the year that ties in with the sometimes-judgmental nature that shrouds certain sports/activities. This is actually the biggest reason as to why I kept this blog private for so long, but…you can’t bring change if you don’t speak up, right? So here we are:

I finally wrote up a post later on in the year on how I got started on my fitness journey!

Tips for Living

As a broke medical student (I’m expecting >$250k in loans by the time I graduate…and this doesn’t include interest), I shared some of my top 10 tips for saving money. This is what I go by to survive/thrive on $10k/year for all living expenses (rent, utilities, groceries, insurance, astronomically expensive exam fees, etc.!).

During the Elf 4 Health challenge, I also wrote up a post on easy meal prepping! (Yet another way that I save money.)

DIY

This Ti Leaf Hip Hei is my one and only DIY on the blog (hoping to change that this year!), and I keep meaning to make a more in-depth step-by-step tutorial for it, but I unfortunately still haven’t. I was teaching a Beginning Hula/Tahitian dance class at school and decided to be super-ambitious for International Festival and Follies. Since we used to make our own costumes back in the days of Na Keiki O’ Hawai’i (the UCD Hawai’i Club), I got us to do that for our performances here!

I’m going to stop now before I share my entire blog with you. :] I’m very much looking forward to this year, and all the things it’ll bring! <3

 

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• If you blog, what’s your favorite post that you’ve ever written? I’d love to read it! :]
• Whether or not you blog, what’s a great post/article/piece of internet-reading that you discovered in 2014 that you really enjoyed?