I turned 29 Saturday–which for me marks a new year much better than any drunken New Year’s Eve goings-on–and I made some birthday resolutions of things I’d like to have happen before I turn 30 and magically become a bona-fide adult. So here’s my list of 29 things I want to accomplish before I turn 30:

  1. Learn the names of the Wasatch mountain peaks–I only can point to Mt. Olympus
  2. Pay off the remaining debt
  3. Get a queen size mattress
  4. Make a queen-sized quilt
  5. Hike Bald Mountain in the Uintas again
  6. Finish reading The Silmarillion
  7. Knit Christmas stockings (starting with Toby’s, of course)
  8. Visit the north end of Zion National Park
  9. Be less wimpy about riding my bike on cooler days (80% of Copenhageners ride their bikes throughout the winter. So does my father. I’m shamed enough to try to be tougher in the spring and fall.)
  10. Eat at Red Iguana
  11. Eat at The Paris
  12. Chill a watermelon in a stream on a picnic in the mountains
  13. Knit at least one thing for charity using up yarn I have
  14. Get a new desk chair, if an affordable molded Eames chair exists
  15. Cook moules marnieres and frites
  16. Stop biting my nails. (God only knows how, since I’ve been wanting to stop biting my nails for about 20 years, but I’d like to have lovely grown-up hands now.)
  17. Learn how to sew knit fabric
  18. Drink an Old Fashioned at the bar at Bambara
  19. Learn how to apply eye makeup that doesn’t look scary or amateurish
  20. Go to the Oyster Bar one Monday a month after work for a half-priced appetizer
  21. Replace my Rubbermaid kitchen garbage can with a broken spring top with something nicer. Because a 30-year-old should not have duct tape on her garbage can.
  22. Knit an elaborate cabled sweater*
  23. Build my collection of Bach CDs
  24. Learn how to dance
  25. Stop getting plastic bags from the grocery store
  26. Have tea at The Grand America
  27. Make cloth napkins and use them for everyday meals
  28. Go out to breakfast one weekend a month
  29. Go to Moab for New Year’s Eve

*I think this is the one to knit–after I finish that cardigan and make an owl sweater and Christmas stockings and the charity thing, of course. Hey, I have a year.