2020 Upcoming Plans!

2020 is already among us!

For new readers, welcome to Tranquil Dreams. I’m a blog that doesn’t quite follow the successful route of blogging (meaning to focus on one topic), instead I’m a fan of doing what I like and just using this as an outlet of doing the things I love. They primarily make up 4 categories: Movies, TV, Books and Food. There are weekly and monthly segments and a whole bunch of random spontaneous things going on. Now that the introduction is done for anyone new here!

Let’s check out plans for 2020! Note that a few little changes but not too many. I’ve indicated where the main changes are. 🙂

READING

2020 Goodreads Reading Challenge: 25 books

Last year, I set a bunch of books that I wanted to read and then didn’t get around to reading 90% of them, I’d say. Its probably because I forgot about it at one point being busy with everything else. This year, I already have about 5 books set for the first 3 months which is a great start as it all goes towards blog tours and such. I’m not going to say which one and will leave it as a surprise. The goal is to participate in blog tours and then work through a ton of TBR books on my bookshelves and Kindle. I won’t change the 25 books this year and if I exceed, then so be it. In general, its been a struggle to find reading time especially in the second half of the year.

MOVIES

Movies are staying relatively the same. I’m hoping that I will still be able to get the media accreditation for film festivals like in 2019 as that is always a lot of fun and brings in some really nice film discoveries. It might not be everyone’s cup of tea but it always brings in a nice refreshing change to the normal fare on Netflix.  Fingers crossed on that, right? 😉

As for movies, we will be keeping the double feature usually around 1-2 per week, depending on time. Full single reviews are for theatre viewings and festival screenings. The normal themed months still apply:

• February: Valentine’s Romance
• October: Halloween Horror
• December: Holiday Films

This year, I’m thinking of doing some themed months randomly so that I can catch up on various genre of films. Its still in the air whether I’ll do it as A-Z or simply as random screenings.

As for any other things, I’ve neglected my Sunday Lists in general and will hopefully be aiming to get one a month. I’ll set a Sunday per month for that.

TV

TV has really turned into a Chinese drama series deal since middle of 2018 and that will continue this year. I’m hoping to get a few of the TV binges that I didn’t do last year done this year as I didn’t do any for my Top 5 shows last year and that seems sad as they were all very accessible on Youtube and/or Netflix.

Aside from that, Netflix series are the other focus and perhaps Shudder depending how long I keep the subscription. A short little no change section at all: TV binge for Chinese dramas will keep the normal format I have and may actually use a part of that format for any other series I watch as well.

OTHER RANDOMNESS

After getting through the top 3 categories of focus here, its time to take a look at the random other segments at weekly or monthly frequency.

• [change] Wine Recap will wrap up with its final one with December 2019 and it will be over. I’m no wine connoisseur and the whole 2 year experiment of doing it has really helped me appreciate wine better but its becoming more of a chore to write it up. I’ll share some of it on Instagram instead so feel free to follow me over HERE.
• My Adventures: I’ve already changed it to a monthly segment in the middle of 2019 and it will remain that way. I’m finally happy with the structure so we’re keeping this as the fun and more personal post.
• What’s Up 2020: will remain a weekly segment set on every Wednesday to recap the previous week.
• [change] Baking Through Disney: has been a neglected segment over here that I’ve tucked away but never forgot about. As I aim to get back into baking, its the project that will hopefully be revived on a monthly basis. One baking day a month seems fairly reasonable.
• [change] Goodfood recaps: have been no more since the middle of 2019. It was due to a few bad experiences that Goodfood has finally fixed on their end. I didn’t talk about it at the time and won’t go deeper into it. As I’m not paid to do this and I have to pay for the experience, its becoming a convenience choice for our life so its become less frequent as well. I’ll share some of the meals on Instagram whenever we do order.
• Battle of Ingredients: has changed its structure since its beginning. We’ve been talking about how to get things back on track to fit its name but we are also enjoying taking the time to highlight some recipe trials as well as using local Quebec products in our cooking. This one is really supposed to be monthly but we have random hiatus due to our busy schedules.
• Ultimate Decades Blogathon is coming back in 2020. We are currently in production phase of getting things together. If you are interested, remember to check back here. We should be announcing it soon.
• Music Obsessions: almost got cut but this segment was saved by a recent comment. I enjoy the segment but its the one that does the least well out of everything here BUT at least its a fairly fun and easy post to put together. So its staying without any change, on a monthly basis on the first weekend of the month.

I know we cover a ton of stuff here including Restaurant recaps and other event coverage including shopping hauls and such. It shouldn’t change much on that front. I’m hoping to get some more DIY going on and other things, if possible. However, time is scarce so I’ll do what I can.

I think that generally covers everything for 2020 plans!
Its not a ton of changes but I will work on being more organized this year!
Happy 2020 and all the best to all of you lovely people!

We’re 5!

Can you believe 5 years went by already?

So much has changed in my life from when I first started blogging till today.  There are days I think, “Maybe its time I go do something else”, but then, I just love blogging and all of you lovely awesome friends that I’ve met here.  Its a journey all on its own.  If anything, I’ve learned a lot from this experience and it has been an amazing and awesome one!

The New Year’s was just two weeks ago so I’ve pretty much done all the announcements that I need. You can go check it out HERE! Pretty much everything is staying the same.  Except last year was highly unproductive in meeting any of my goals from long-term projects like Baking Through Disney and The Classics Adventure, even my Reading Challenge was one short and lets not even talk about the PopSugar Reading Challenge that I totally forgot about.  I’m not perfect and that’s okay.  A lot of things happened last year and while not much happened, a lot also did happen.  I’m trying to be more involved and this year, I’m trying to comment more.  I’m still working super hard on catching up with all of your posts. Its a work in progress but one that I try to take my time to do as much as I can.

However, this post was supposed to be a vlog (like I say every year).  Five years is a milestone.  One that I’m extremely proud of.  The versatility and diversity of the content has really grown from that first year when I was writing in my little corner and struggling to write up one post a week to now where I try to get on average on post a day and finally learned how to plan in advance and be more organized.  All very great accomplishments that are useful not only for here but for my life in general.

Tranquil Dreams has always been about staying positive and experiencing new things, trying something different and all that lovely stuff.  Its about living life and even though, I go through surges of talking about movie, I’m working hard this year to balance out the things I enjoy and talk about that.  The last two years have been a little crazy with adapting to being a new homeowner (and the renovations) and then wedding planning and getting back energy after the big day.  Its all done and things have settled down so I’m ready to take on this year heading into Year 6 with much more energy and many more fun things that I plan on doing.

I was trying to get something special regarding upcoming changes for this post but after some debate, I’m giving it a little more thought so I’ll do another reveal soon.  I want to really take my time in making sure that its going to be exactly how I like it.  For now, its a secret 😉

I never really know how to approach these blogiversary posts. What I really do want to say in short (since this is already kind of long) is that…

THANK YOU! Thank you so much for being here, stopping by and doing everything you do.  I appreciate it so so much! Meeting new bloggers, making friends, joining in to blogathons, being a part of The Random Chat Show and That Moment In, etc: its all a great experience and I wouldn’t trade it for anything.  If anything, I’m working hard to make here better every single day! 🙂

Thank you again and stay awesome! 🙂