Checking off my list

Here I am again, which means I've been partially successful in keeping up with my blog. I've also completed all five of my monthly resolution items for the month of January. However, I can't be too proud because January is the easiest month - let's see where I am come fall!
Task 3: Have at least one culturally-enriching experience was checked off a few weeks ago at the Taft Museum of Art. The museum does monthly "house parties" with different themes each time for some adult fun. I checked out January's house party with three coworkers to see what it was all about and we were not disappointed! The theme was 90's game night. There were tons of board games available to play, a trivia night, DJ playing 90's hits and adult hot cocoa (yum!). There was also a food truck, but by the time we got out there they were closed. The event was free so being able to see the main gallery and special exhibit for no charge was a pretty nice perk. My favorite part of the night was that the museum challenged people to a "What Do You Meme" game. We drew a card and had to match the saying with a piece of art that best expressed it. Participants posted their memes on Instagram with a specific hashtag and one entry was picked as the winner. We did not win, but we enjoyed playing. Check out our selection and a selfie with former lady-of-the-house, Anna Stinton!

Task 5: Read 200 pages or watch a thought-provoking movie or documentary was accomplished, and then some. Not long after my initial post of this year, I went back and watched the first season of True Detective  on HBO. WOW. I had watched the second season live and was getting excited for season three with one of my favorites, Mahershala Ali, but I realized I had never gone back and watched season one. It was amazing. Completely worthy of all the praise it received when it originally came out. In addition, I also watched Won't You Be My Neighbor?, the documentary on Mister Rogers and Struggle: The Life and Art of Szukalski. Both were great. I especially loved learning about the eccentric Szukalski and his increasingly complex life.
When it comes to Task 4: Bake something from scratch, I took a little bit of liberty. A tiny bit. Instead of a dessert, I made pierogi , two kinds! One half was potato, bacon, cheddar, green onion, and the other was potato and herb goat cheese. I brought back a bunch of homemade kielbasa, so I can't wait to pull both out of the freezer one of these nights for a delicious, from scratch, Radzinski-made, Polish dinner. 

When it comes to Task 2: Spend at least 30 minutes doing something for myself, I think I did this in a few ways. One night I took the time to soak in a hot bath with some aromatherapy. Along those same lines, I have spent a lot of time relaxing. My free time at home is going to disappear soon, so I have made sure I have taken advantage of being able to be home with no plans. I've watched some shows (some noted above), read through some magazines and overall, not cared or felt guilty about just taking time to turn off my brain and work and be a couch potato for a little bit. It helped that we had some snowy weather on the weekends, so the view looking out was lovely and the birds visiting on my porch were fun to watch.

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This past three-day weekend, my friend came to visit so I got to explore a new coffee shop and then we splurged on some sweet potato dumpling with pork shoulder that was almost too pretty to eat!

This post has been long enough, so, even though the Oscar nominees were announced today, I'll save that until later - maybe this weekend!