While remodeling Weekendlust and making all these plans to help you free up your weekends, I figured that being lost for a “year or so” doesn’t give me much credibility.
In other words, I feel I owe you an explanation on what I’ve been doing. The things that saving time and money helped me to accomplish.
The places I went
“You’re off to Great Places!
Today is your day!
Your mountain is waiting,
So… get on your way!”
― Dr. Seuss, Oh, The Places You’ll Go!
Home
Ugh! My good/bad habit of enjoying the moment too much! Although I enjoy every event to the fullest, which is good, I often forget to take pictures for memory.
Allow me to explain why I start with such kind of negative mood.
Before 2016 even started, I was trying to plan ahead a trip home to the Dominican Republic. I like traveling there late May since it’s around my father’s birthday and mother’s day. Kill 2 birds with one stone.
However, my mother told me to forget about it because they wanted to celebrate it here (US).
I didn’t want to forget about it because it was my father’s 50 birthday. I asked her several times during the previous months if the plans have somehow changed, but she kept saying no.
Getting closer to the date, let’s say 2 weeks prior his birthday, my brother decides to go home for medical purposes.
Guess what? My mother changed plans to make a party with just a week of anticipation!
I was hesitating about actually going because they were still coming and I could make it up to them here. Also, it was not good to book vacations with just days of notice to my boss.
But family come first to me. I bought a ticket on a Wednesday, took the risk to tell my boss on Thursday and travelled early morning on Saturday.
I made it to the PARTY!
Beautiful decoration, amazing food, and surprise “perico ripiao’ ” live music! My father had a blast, and my mother had a hangover for the 2nd time (1st was on my graduation day from college).
There’s not a problem with none of that, the problem is that nobody took pictures! NOBODY!
The very next day, when I was inquiring people for pictures and videos, I only received bad quality Snapchat videos because thankfully the 24 hours’ time frame didn’t pass yet.
Such a beautiful birthday and such a blast to have no memories from it. Understand my frustration now?
Anyway, here’s one of the videos I got from that day, starting mom and dad:
And the fun stops on my was back:
Laguna Dudu / Dudu Blue Lagoon
I found a video by Adam Grumbo so you can see better how is like 😉
Playa Arroyo Salado
Here you can see the natural process of the river flowing into the ocean. Check out this video by PedroBraulio Alvarez Muvdi, watch from minute 3:45 to see the river.
Canada
For the first time. My dad’s 2nd birthday party. Part of the original plan.
Massachusetts
2 times. Including the very 1st time.
Mostly a family visiting trips.
1st time I was able to visit the city of Boston, but not as I would like to. (I always find an excuse to go back to places)
2nd time for Christmas and to wait for 2017 with the family.
Secret Santas. My mom on picture on the left, looking beautiful.
Washington D.C.
2 times as well. Including the 1st time again. Did you think I was kidding when I said I always find an excuse to go back places?
I loved this place. So many things to see and for free! Highly recommend it.
I went 2 times, walked 6 hours two days (even under the rain like in the picture), and I still haven’t seen it all.
If you plan to ever go, these guides were very helpful from NomadicMatt.com:
Rhode Island
This one was a quick stop to see my cousin’s daughter perform gymnastics. At the end I couldn’t see her perform, but I got to do some sight seeing.
Woodstock NY
I loved this place so much! The Hippie environment, the colors, the antique but chic places, and just everything.
I went on a Sunday, so if you decide to go you’ll probably find in the center of the town people playing instruments and singing while making a circle around the ones dancing. Such a beautiful scene.
This place is very famous for a music and art fair or festival celebrated in 1969. It was billed as “An Aquarian Exposition: 3 Days of Peace & Music“. 400,000 people went to the event! Can you imagine all those people, mostly hippies, the peace & love environment and all that?
I got myself as a souvenir the poster of the event on a shirt.
There’s also a Tibetan Buddhist monastery called Karma Triyana Dharmachakra. I wanted to go so bad, but for some reason most of my adventurous cousins decided to get pregnant at the same time and they wouldn’t be able to make it. 
#MyWLlist: Activities Checked off
“You can, you should, and if you’re brave enough to start, you will.”
― Stephen King, On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
#9 Learn how to play a sport
I practiced Softball last year, the company I was working for organized it.
It is supposed to be in my blood to know how to play this sport, since so many good baseball players come from my half island, but it clearly didn’t come as natural to me lol.
I had a lot of fun though, and I’m seriously thinking on joining a league at Zogsports.com for the summer.
Some occasionally Ping-Pong and pool too:
Attempted to snowboard with no success, and took sky classes:
After a couple of visits I’m feel like a pro!
#10 Learn how to play an instrument
I took guitar lessons by the end of the year. The high school in my town, Kearny NJ, has amazing and inexpensive workshops at night. It was a 100 USD for 10 classes. Pretty good!
If you live close to this town I highly recommend it. The teacher was very good and patient.
10 classes were not enough to be an expert, but I got a pretty good idea. Now I understand the videos and articles online to continue the learning fro free.
Wait for a video of mi playing a song for you soon.
#38 Watch a Broadway Show
I saw Aladdin on Broadway.
♥ It was magical! The magic carpet looks so real.
I can’t wait to go back and see The Lion King!
#48 See Lianne La Havas live (My favorite) I saw my flavorist artist live!
I found this girl on a random playlist on Spotify, and since then the playlist and the artist became my favorite.
In case you want to check the playlist out, search for it as “Alternative R&B“, or just click here.
I like Lianne’s music to such a level, that if I have a headache her songs are my analgesics. For real, the headache disappears!
I’m not a concert type of person. Crowded places are not my style, but I had to see this girl live!
Goosebumps all night with every song I sang along with her.
#49 Watch a movie at a drive-in theatre (sort of)
For some reason I removed this from my list to go to a drive-in theatre, it should have been a mistake.
Anyway, a friend from college lives in NY and she saw on Facebook that I was interested in going to a movie night at Randal Island Park.
We started talking about it and catching up on our lives. Since we had the same interests, why not to go see the movie together?
So we did and had a blast watching Inside Out!
Almost #32: Visit at least one country of each continent
Even though I didn’t actually travel to a new continent, I wanted to share the mistake I made for you to avoid it.
I almost traveled to Europe, to go to two weddings in Macedonia that I was invited to. The plan was to land in Amsterdam first, The Netherlands, then cross to Germany and finish with the weddings. Maybe a Macedonian neighbor country if possible.
I needed to get an Schengen visa through the German embassy in order to be able to go since Germany was the country I was staying the longest time at.
What I didn’t know was that a month previous the trip I wouldn’t be able to get an appointment to request it on time! The first time available for me to go was the date we were leaving!
😥
#50 Teach something useful
I’m a big fan of online courses. I think they are so convenient and practical. My favorite websites by far are Skilshare.com and EDX.org.
One day I read on the Skillshare newsletter that it was really not that hard to be a teacher on this platform. Why not to try it?
They have a couple of inspiring ways to help you find what to teach, and one technique is to answer a question people ask to you a lot.
When I decided to give the Capsule Wardrobe a try and gave away around 75% of my stuff, my family and friend went crazy about it and the rain of questions poured.
That’s how “Minimalist/capsule wardrobe: the power of narrowing your choices” was born.
It’s a 24 minutes FREE online course where you will learn what a minimalist and capsule wardrobe is, it’s history, the study behind the many benefits of having one and how to create it, as well as be able to see real life examples.
If you haven’t yet, sing up and let me show you how successful people have taken advantage of this dress code, by narrowing their options and daily choices to focus on what their goal is or was.
Personal
“They wanna know where I’ll be in five, But what about today? What about tonight?”
― Song by AndersonPaak, Title: Am I wrong
Not everything is about having fun. I have a “live in the present” type of philosophy, but I also invest time on myself and my future.
RoselyRodriguez.com
I always wanted to get my name as a domain name. Not necessarily to create a website with it, but to reserve my name.
I did the website and created the e-mail because GoDaddy.com had a good offer by then and the price difference was minimum, so why not?
The reason why I think it’s important to buy your own name as a domain is because as advanced as technology is, you never know if in the future you’ll need. And even if you don’t, nobody will be able to use it for the wrong reasons.
It is not expensive, I’m renovating only the domain for just $14.99 for a year.
Got a new job
I guess I did good on this website and LinkedIn, since I got a new job.
Here are my new coworkers and I doing the mannequin challenge:
Became a vegetarian
After I saw Vegucated, my love for meat went to the drain.
The only thing that is keeping me for becoming a vegan is cheese.
Became an experientialist/minimalist
Blame it all on Stuffocation, by James Wallman.
This book was a game changer for me. I learned a lot about experientialism and it’s many benefits, plus many living examples that it works (adding myself later to this examples).
I realized, after reading this book, I was suffocated. It was not allowing me to move on and check off my list.
As the author explain on the Introduction of the book:
“Stuffocation is the story of one of today’s most acute, till now unnamed, afflictions. It is about how you, me, and society in general, instead of feeling enriched by the things we own, are feeling stifled by them. Instead of thinking of more in positive terms, as we once did, we now think more means more hassle, more to manage, and more to think about. In our busy, cluttered lives more is no longer better. It is worse. Overwhelmed, and suffocating from stuff, we are suffering from an anxiety that I call Stuffocation.”
Saw the miracle of life
That hand circled in green is mine.
I should have believed the counselor in high school when he said I had the capacity of studying any career.
I though I was not strong enough to be a doctor, to see blood, cut, stich, and all of that. I guess seeing that someone you love needs your help changes everything.
Remember I told you before my cousins decided to get pregnant at the same time? Well, one of them was due last December.
When she was in labor the pain was so strong that she needed someone to hold her legs and help her. I took one leg while the nurse held the other one and her husband helped with her head. I didn’t have to look down, but I saw the baby had a lot of hair and my cousin thought she was going to be bald lol. I got distracted and ended up seeing all of it.
I pushed with her and everything XD. Not kidding, as dumb as it is, I was pushing too. Lol
This is how the baby looks now.
“You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.”
― Mae West
I explained to you my picture problems already, so there are a bunch of other undocumented adventures I wont be able to tell you about.
However, I think this is more than enough to give you an idea of what you can accomplish if you organize your schedule and finances.
If is the case you haven’t yet, sing up for Weekendlust Newsletter and received the “7 Days Challenge to Have Completely Free Weekends“.
See you soon!
Belonging to the unknown
Rosely Rodriguez
Weekendlust 