24 good things: a year in optimistic review

oh and hi, yes, I'm back

Hellooo, my long lost pen pals! It’s me, in your inbox for the first time since June! I did not at all intend to drop off the face of the newsletter planet, but like many of you, I’ve had A Year. The longer I went without sending a newsletter, the more intimidating it seemed to catch y’all up on everything that’d happened since the last one, and suddenly it was December, yknow? I’ve missed writing these updates, but also wanted to find a way to wrap up 2024 that wasn’t a comprehensive recap of everything that’s happened and how I’ve felt about it, because wow what a daunting task I’m still not ready for! So I landed on this—an incomplete list of little things that made my year brighter, even when other parts of life were difficult or scary. (As a side note, if this is the first email you’re ever receiving from me, hi! Thanks for signing up for my newsletter at a book festival this year! Sorry the news has been sparse!) Now without further ado…

24 good things

1. Glasses—I can feel everyone in my life getting tired of me being like “have you guys heard of optometry?? It’ll change your life!” But call me Cady Heron because I can’t shut up. I made an eye doctor appointment the first week of January on a whim, even though I thought my vision was ““fine,””” because I had some headaches and eye strain. Imagine my surprise to learn my vision was not fine! Got my glasses, promptly felt betrayed that all of you have just been going around seeing the world more clearly than me for all this time! I’ve also wanted glasses since I was a small child whose favorite American Girl doll was Molly, so dreams do come true if you actually make an effort to check on your own ocular health, or something like that.

2. The 30 Club—a group of my local friends has this tradition that started after I turned 30 last year, the 2nd in the crew to do so, and the other 30 year-old friend took me to dinner. Now when anyone else turns 30, we add them to our party and go out to another fancy dinner. We added 2 new members this year, a.k.a. 2 fancy dinners with people I love. I also love being in my 30s in general, so far.

3. Texts from my grandpa—this man has a ridiculous power to make me emotional through simple, straightforward words on a phone screen like no one else can. Wild About You is dedicated to him and my grandma, but I’m sure that did not influence his bias-free book review.

   

4. State parks—this spring, husband and I finally used a Kentucky State Parks gift card someone gave us for our wedding (…in 2022…) to spend a weekend at a cabin in Pine Mountain State Park. It was the most relaxing, lovely trip we’d taken together in the longest time (maybe also since 2022)! Now I want to go to every park in my home state so feel free to recommend your favorites 🥰

5. Hiker puppies—sweet baby Jolene also joined the Pine Mountain trip, where we took her hiking for the first time! She adored it and was so cute and probably has 10x the hiking stamina that I do. Since then, she’s hiked more with Dr. Mr. KHill & friends. Her next stop is probably the AT a la Natalie and Finn.

6. Paint by numbers—I continue to be on my crafting BS and finished 2 PBN sets this year…only to receive 3 more as Christmas gifts 😈 Two of which may or may not be custom sets made out of pictures of Jolene, meaning soon we will have a Jolene portrait gallery in our house. They are so pleasant and relaxing to my busy brain! And on a more sincere note, doing all my little creative non-writing hobbies since I finished a book draft this fall has been really good for me, reminding me that I am more than just Book Girl. So if you’re not on the PBN train yet, what are you doing, choo choo!!!

   

7. Getting dragged by Duolingo—I’ve been doing daily Italian lessons for over a year now. Do I feel like I can speak much Italian? No. Does Duo bully me? A little. Will I keep coming back for more? Sì, sempre!

8. Appetite mind-reading—is there anything better than someone knowing exactly what I need/want to eat or drink before I know I need/want it and providing it accordingly? Yes ok talking about my husband, who gets better at this all the time. A breakfast burrito after a long day of work, when I am tired & grumpy & prone on the couch. A London fog latte from his coffee shop run when I’d said I didn’t want anything because I was too scattered to make a decision. It’s magical. It’s not at all reciprocated. He likes me anyway somehow.

9. Traveling stickers—it always makes me so happy when people show me the places they’ve taken/put my bookish stickers, whether it be on a water bottle or laptop, down the street from me or across the world 🥲 A favorite sticker sighting this year came from friends in Italy (i miei besties italiani, if you will), who put some on their espresso machine, which I think in Italy is akin to getting someone’s name tattooed over your heart.

   

10. Normal Gossip—several folks recommended this podcast to me in the last year+ and while I rarely listen to podcasts nowadays, being an audiobook superfan, I’m SO glad I finally started this one! In each episode, host Kelsey and her guest tell the stories of low stakes, anonymized “morsels” of gossip from normal people like you or me or that especially unhinged member of that one Facebook group you lurk in. Can’t overstate how much I love it, and my big author goal now is to worm my way into being a guest.

11. Rompers—I had convinced myself years ago that as a tall-ish, long-torsoed gal, rompers were not my friend! But on another whim this year (I’m full of wild whims, you see), I decided to ~try one on for size~ and lo and behold, I did not look like a baby in a too-small onesie. As I fell deeper into the romp-it hole, I did at times look like a gentleman bathing by the shore in 1905. But the successes outweighed the failures overall, in my humble, one-piece-clad opinion.

12. Surprise baked goods—my brother-in-law, sometimes known as Brother Dr. Mr. KHill, is a gem and has done this thing a few times where he spontaneously drops off homemade cookies or other unexpected goodies on our porch. It’s like being visited by the world’s nicest ding-dong-ditcher, or perhaps a Keebler Elf who DoorDashes on the side. He and his equally lovely girlfriend do this for each other a lot, which is so cute it makes me almost as happy as when I receive the baked goods myself.

    

13. Sunsets—this might be the most #basic of all the items on my list, but some things are a classic for a reason!! While I still live my life by the Mindy Kaling quote, “There is no sunrise so beautiful that it is worth waking me up to see it,” I will f with sunsets any time. But usually at sunset time. I love how the most stunning sky you’ve ever seen can appear in a Kroger parking lot.

14. Domino’s emergency pizza—speaking of classics, am I rite?? This is a PSA that if you ever eat Domino’s, you should not be paying full price for it. Domino’s wants you to take their pizza and their money. I don’t know how they stay in business with the way they run their coupons and rewards program tbh but I will not be questioning it. They give you a free “emergency pizza” every other order! And you don’t even have to wait until a real emergency to use it! Say what you will about this capitalist hellscape we live in, but—no yeah you’re right I’ll stop there.

15. Book festivals—at the risk of getting too deep into the serious end-of-year reflection I’m not trying to write today, what a weird and wonderful world book festivals are. I had the opportunity to go to a lot of them for the first time this year with my third book, and each one was its own fun, overwhelming, exciting, chaotic whirlwind that I feel so lucky to have been a part of. The highlights were always always the people—readers, organizers, and fellow authors who became friends, all of whom made me even more appreciative of how cool it is to live this author dream 🥲

    

    one of these things is not like the others

16. Besties who show up—have I mentioned that the author gig can also be very ~humbling~ sometimes? Like when I did a workshop for teens to which zero teens showed up. But you know who did? My best gal Katie! Even if she didn’t think anything of it, it meant a lot to me and is one of many, many cases of her & other friends showing support for my author things even when they’re out of the way or relatively small-scale.

17. New used cars—this one was born from the very not happy event of getting rear-ended while I was stopped at a red light and having my old car totaled…but only a few days later, husband and I happened upon my Dream Prius at a used car lot! I know what you’re thinking—someone with whims of going to the eye doctor would have a “Dream Prius.” And you’re right, I yam who I yam: a girl with glasses the same color as her beloved hybrid vehicle.

18. Plane wifi—much like full-price Domino’s, you will never catch me paying for wifi on a plane. Have I not paid you people enough to be in your flying metal tube??But more and more, they’re offering it for free, and I take full advantage of not having to be alone with my thoughts. This came in especially handy this year when another of my dearest friends, Lee to the Kiefer, won her 2nd Olympic gold medal while I was mid-flight and I still got to watch in real time!! And probably make fellow passengers uncomfortable with my happy tears 🥹 Alright you caught me, Lee herself is more of the highlight than airplane wifi, but still grateful to the latter for its role in my seeing bestie shine.

    

19. Cross-stitching—this shares space in my heart with paint by numbers, in that it’s another craft I love to do while listening to an audiobook and dissociating from reality. A cross-stitch project is also easier to transport than a whole PBN setup, meaning you can do impossibly cool things like cross-stitch at a party or a bar or a doctor’s office while your husband gets shoulder surgery and an older man in the waiting room with you might remark, “I haven’t seen anyone doing that since the ‘60s!” thus exemplifying how impossibly cool and youthful you are. I’ve been cross-stitching my book covers after making patterns out of them online—Wild About You is done and I’m about halfway through Not Here to Stay Friends!

20. Late bloomers—I literally mean the hydrangea in my garden that didn’t start to bloom until September! Just when I’d given up hope of seeing any flowers til next summer, there she went, proving me wrong and looking all pretty, there for a good time not a long time, etc. Lots of metaphors to be made there, I’m sure, but what do I look like, a writer?

21. Dr. Mr. KHill on a dance floor—must be seen to be truly believed, so find us at a wedding sometime.

    

22. Quotes from yourself—still very surreal to see when they pop up in my instagram tags or similar places, and can make me feel like hiding under a blanket until I forget the sheer volume of people around the world who are just out there perceiving me through these lil stories I wrote and decided to share. But they also make me feel honored and grateful and happy that any group of words I put together resonated with even one other human.

23. Vermont in the fall—those leaf peepers are onto something! But the colorful leafy scenery isn’t even close to as beautiful as ~the friends we met along the way~ a.k.a. the ones we went intentionally to visit this fall, who picked honeycrisp apples with us and introduced us to maple creemees, the finest Vermont delicacy. I would do it again every year!!

    

24. Jolene—look, it’s quite the achievement that I thought of a 24 item list of the year’s good things in which at least 23 of them were not Jolene. She is still my pride and joy, and in my first full year as her mom, she made every day more fun and funny and sweet just by being her little weirdo alien cutie baby self.

    

    a head start on the Jolene portrait gallery

🗣️ DJ play some Auld Lang Syne 🗣️ Meanwhile, Substack is about to play me off the stage with Oscars music, so I’ll conclude here by wishing you and yours many little joys—and big ones—in 2025. Experiences, interactions, small moments that may seem inconsequential on their own can actually add up to a pretty beautiful life. Thank you for being part of this beautiful life of mine, & for your love and support in this challenging year. Love you more than I love my craft projects! 🩷

xoxo,

Kaitlyn