As another year winds down, so comes the time for another self-reflection. I've enjoyed re-reading 2013's with a mixture of surprise (completely forgot I had made a resolution) and laughter.

- If 2013 was the year of shoes, 2014 is the year of outerwear. Excluding blazers and vests, I pretty much doubled my stash in one year. I counted 7 (!) new ones this year: dark red anorak, sage green swing trench, pink trench cape, plaid short trench, green military jacket, lilac moto leather jacket, and gray toggled coat. Craziness. Only two (toggled coat and trench cape) were really on my wishlist; the rest were victims of window shopping -- but how pretty the victims were! I'm going to sheepishly admit that I may not be done yet as I have my eyes on a dark red puffer jacket.

- My favorite purchase this year is a tossup between the RED Valentino wildflower dress [left] and the Stella McCartney trench cape [center]. I relied on a combination of effort and luck to buy both, so I'm sure that played a role in how dear both items are to me. The surprise purchase of the year (in the best way possible!) is the J.Crew Downing brown tote [right]. It was a semi-impulse buy, one that I'm chuckling at now because I actually thought I didn't need a brown colored bag in my life. Welp, that mentality lasted about five months. The neutral color is great, the casual style fits me perfectly. How wrong was I?!

- Speaking of bags, a few new purchases this year upped my tally to 14. A few year ago, I randomly decided that 8 is the magic number for me to be happy and feel like I can cover all types of social situations. One new purchase would mean one old bag will have to go. The thing with these arbitrary rules is that I'd like to think I have the discipline to carry them out... but I really don't, lol. Should I just do away with this "rule"? Be flexible because one of these days I will be able to jump over the sentimental hurdle and donate a bunch? My New Year's resolution for the upcoming year will be to iron this out.

- My top 5 favorite outfits of the year are: [from L -> R] one / two / three / four / five

- I spent 13% of my salary on clothing/accessories/beauty this year. The percentage is much higher than in past years because a huge chunk was spent on a new Chanel reissue. The purchase was planned months in advance, so the hit on my budget didn't come as a surprise. I'm telling myself that this is my last Chanel ever -- so if my eyes start wandering, help keep me in check!

- Going back to New Year's resolutions real quick... apparently I had forgotten that this year's was to be better at oversharing on social media. If I were to evaluate myself, I'd say my activity on Facebook has remained steady, Twitter has taken a nosedive, and Instagram has seen a huge growth, but this blog is still my main source of online presence. Thank you for following via one (or more) of these different mediums!

- I've been experimenting with eliminating accompanying text on blog posts when I simply have nothing to say. I still put in the same (or more) effort to take and edit photos though... just words are harder to come by at times. So rather than bore y'all with the same ol' "Have a great day!", I'll let outfit photos speak for themselves. I'd love to hear your thoughts if you have strong opinions one way or the other.

- For the second year in a row, I made the trek out to SF to spend time with blogging friends. It was another too-short trip, but we managed to squeeze in a quick visit to Yosemite and still had time to eat our way around the city (thank you SPG for recapping!) My streak will increase to three in 2015 (time to consider making the move out west?!) because DH and I are stopping by SF on our way to visit Asia! Cannot.contain.my.excitement.

On a final note (I know I sound like a broken record each year), a big THANK YOU to everyone who peruses my blog. All your support, comments, and critiques mean so much. I'm coming up on my 6 year blogiversary next month (holy moly) and if there's one thing I've learned, it's that I may have started out blogging for myself, but the people aspect (reader interaction, friendships formed) is what makes this hobby worthwhile. Cheers to more fun and excitement in 2015! Have a happy new year!