30 Things #8: Go see at least 12 live music performances (includes both musicals and band concerts)

Hey, Homies!  We don't need no thugs, unless those thugs was giving out hugs!

Performance #1 is the Aquabats Super Show at Slim's, San Francisco.  The highlight of the evening had to be racing small children in inflatable sailboats.  Now that's what I call crowd surfing!

Not a great picture, but it was dark and with a crappy cell phone, so deal with it.

Performance #2 was the Bruno Mars and will.i.am concert in Vegas at the Google sales conference.  That was awesome.

Laura and I dancing it up

Performance #3 was Les Miserables at the Orpheum Theater in Minneapolis in June, 2013.  It was disappointing.  I was so psyched to see this show, only to find that the plot was dumb and you could barely follow it because the audio on most of the sing song dialogue was so terrible.  I still love the music, but not a show I will ever spend money to see again.

Performance #4: Wicked!  Finally!  And it did live up to the hype.  I cried.

Performance #5: Rancid at the Skyway Theater.  Really cool venue that I'd love to go back to.  Great show.

Performance #6: Kate Nash at First Ave was a fantastic show.  Except for the weird giraffe print body suit she wore.  Although if anyone could rock it, it was definitely her.

Performance #7: Fratelli's at Varsity Theater.  Fun and upbeat, with just the right mix of old favorites and new stuff off the album.

Performance #8: The Hold Steady at Day Block: Our friend Adam's band rocked it!

Performance #9: Masked Intruder and MXPX on August 26

This show was FUN.  If you like punk and have a chance to see Masked Intruder live, GO.  We had such a good time.  The music is hilarious and makes you want to dance, and the "police officer" running around psyching up the crowd and stripping in the final song was a good touch.  It was my first show at the Triple Rock, and I would definitely go back.  It's an intimate club that lets you feel up close and personal with the band.  All around, a great night.

Performance #10: Going to do a girly night at First Ave on September 27 with Young the Giant

Tis the season for too many hand made presents

Every Christmas I get way too ambitious and tell myself I'm going to make a zillion and one hand made gifts.  This year, I really went overboard.  After making my halloween costume, I realized my yarn stash had grown unmanageable and needed a serious purging.  It was time for some one-ball wonder patterns to use up the various odds and ends hanging around.

My first stash buster is a pair of fingerless mittens knit for my sister-in-law.  They're made from Plymouth Yarn's Trabajos del Peru using this pattern.  I thought the cuff on the top looked dorky though, so I replaced it with just some simple ribbing.

Those were so quick and easy to knit up that I decided to whip up a few more pairs.  I found this cute pattern for wrist warmers, and set about making two pairs.

I found the perfect buttons at JoAnn.  Little owls for my friend Kelly, who wears a sunny yellow derby helmet and has an adorable kitschy style and the skulls for my friend Jenn, who plays for the Damas de los Muertos and is just generally fabulous.

I really liked the seed stitch pattern, and decided to try to get a little creative with it.  These wrist warmers have a nice girly flair, and were made with just adding stitches in four places as I went up.  They were gifted to the lovely Thu.

I also knit a gorgeous lace cowl for my step mother in law and a cute spiral scarf for my sister in law, Indigo, but I forgot to take pictures of them before wrapping them.  Even without visual proof, I can still check off three relatives on my Thirty Things Item #17.  Yay for progress!

30 Things #22 - Read 30 of the greatest novels of all time

This is a goal that I've had for a long time.  I used to read a lot of novels, mostly science fiction and fantasy, but once I hit high school my time went to other things and I haven't been great about making time for reading since.  That said, this has been a goal I've really enjoyed.  Here's what I've read from the Book Riot list of From 0 to Well Read in 100 Books

1. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain
2. Atlas Shrugged - Ayn Rand
3. Beowulf
4. Brave New World - Alduous Huxley
5. The Canterbury Tales - Geoffrey Chaucer
6. Catch-22 - Joseph Heller
7. Charlotte's Web - E.B. White
8. The Complete Stories of Edgar Allen Poe
9. Death of a Salesman - Arthur Miller
10. Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury
11. A Game of Thrones - George RR Martin
12. Gone Girl - Gillian Flynn
13. The Gospels
14. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
15. The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
16. Harry Potter & the Sorceror's Stone - J.K. Rowling
17. Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
18. The Hobbit - J.R.R. Tolkien
19. The Hunger Games - Suzanne Collins
20. Invisible Man - Ralph Ellison
21. The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe - C.S. Lewis
22. Romeo and Juliet - William Shakespeare
23. The Scarlet Letter - Nathaniel Hawthorne
24. Slaughterhouse-Five - Kurt Vonnegut
25. To Kill A Mockingbird - Harper Lee

There's a lot of 100 best book lists, and at various points in pursuing this goal I've used different ones.  Unfortunately, this means it took me longer to complete this goal than if I'd just picked one list and stuck with it.  Other books I've read that frequently end up on other 100 Best book lists include:

1. Robinson Crusoe - Daniel Defoe
2. Gulliver's Travels - Jonathon Swift
3. The Count of Monte Cristo - Alexander Dumas
4. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland - Lewis Carrol
5. Little Women - Louisa May Alcott
6. Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain
7. The Lord Of The Rings - J.R.R. Tolkien
8. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
9. Catch-22 - Joseph Heller
10. The BFG - Roald Dahl
11. Something Wicked This Way Comes - Ray Bradbury  
12. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
13. Ender's Game - Orson Scott Card
14. Death on the Nile - Agatha Christie

There's obviously books that I'm more interested in reading than others from the Well-Read list.  I'm putting the ones I really want to pick up here so I can find it easier next time I'm at the library.

1. 1984 - George Orwell
2. The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
3. Everything is Illuminated - Jonathan Safran Foer
4. American Pastoral - Philip Roth
5. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
6. The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
7. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
8. The Corrections - Jonathan Franzen
9. The Book Theif - Markus Zusak
10. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
11. Frankenstein - Mary Shelley
12. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier Clay - Michael Chabon
13. Casino Royale - Ian Fleming
14. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
15. Mrs. Dalloway - Virginia Woolf
16. Murder on the Orient Express - Agatha Christie
17. Their Eyes were Watching God - Zora Neale Hurston
18. Things Fall Apart - Chinua Achebe
19. The Things They Carried - Tim O'Brien
20. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
21. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao - Junot Diaz
22. Candide - Voltaire

30 things #21 - Read 15 Software Engineering Books

So this is what I get for putting together my list of 30 things without looking fully at all of my supplemental sources, like http://www.noop.nl/2008/06/top-100-best-software-engineering-books-ever.html.  Apparently, there's only 75 and I'd need to download some pdf to get the rest.  Not sure I want to do that.  That may make things more difficult, since there's a chance I'd already read a few of those last 25, but oh well.  I read way fewer of these than I initially thought when I set this goal, but we'll call this one a stretch and we'll see how far I get. 

This goal is important to me because as I do much less coding now than I used to.  I'm transitioning into more of a project manager role and I really love it, but there's definitely some skills I've noticed that I just don't have and other skills that I learned about in school but have never applied.  I'm also realizing the longer I'm in the real world that there are a lot more different methodologies than I was ever exposed to in school, and I'd love to get more in depth exposure to paradigms other than agile and waterfall. 

Here's what I've read from the list so far:

1. 1 Steve McConnell Code Complete: A Practical Handbook of Software Construction
2. 28 Thomas H. Cormen, etc.  Introduction to Algorithms, Second Edition
3. 20 Karl E. Wiegers  Software Requirements (2nd Edition)
4. 64 Harold Abelson, Gerald Jay Sussman  Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs - 2nd Edition 
5. 56 Grady Booch  Unified Modeling Language User Guide, The (2nd Edition)
   
6. 30 Martin Fowler UML Distilled: A Brief Guide to the Standard Object Modeling Language (3rd Edition)

Here's the things I plan to read, in approximate order, plus some extras:

1. 9 Frederick P. Brooks  The Mythical Man-Month, Anniversary Edition (2nd Edition)
2. 7 Joel Spolsky  Joel on Software
3. 12 Alistair Cockburn, Writing Effective Use Cases
4. 2 Elisabeth Freeman, etc   Head First Design Patterns 
5. 14 Steve McConnell  Software Estimation: Demystifying the Black Art
6. 3 Steve McConnell  Rapid Development 
7. 15 Mike Cohn  User Stories Applied: For Agile Software Development
8. 16 (I'm counting this one as three) Donald E. Knuth  The Art of Computer Programming, The, Volumes 1-3 Boxed Set (2nd Edition)
9. 6 Robert C. Martin  Agile Software Development: Principles, Patterns and Practices 
10. 8 Tom DeMarco, Timothy Lister Peopleware: Productive Projects and Teams (2nd Edition)
11. 11 Mike Cohn  Agile Estimating and Planning
12. 23 Gary McGraw  Software Security: Building Security In
13. 25 Tom DeMarco  The Deadline: A Novel About Project Management 
14. 34 Jim Highsmith  Agile Project Management: Creating Innovative Products
15. 21 Craig Larman  Applying UML and Patterns (3rd Edition)
16. 35 Scott Berkun  Making Things Happen: Mastering Project Management 
17. 46 Alistair Cockburn  Crystal Clear: A Human-Powered Methodology for Small Teams 
18. 47 Steve McConnell  Software Project Survival Guide 
19. 48 Tom DeMarco, Timothy Lister  Waltzing With Bears: Managing Risk on Software Projects 
20. 54 Andy Oram, Greg Wilson  Beautiful Code: Leading Programmers Explain How They Think 
21. 67 Johanna Rothman  Manage It!: Your Guide to Modern, Pragmatic Project Management 
22. 75 Edward Yourdon  Death March (2nd Edition)

Have suggestions for books that should be on this list instead?  I'd love to hear them.  I'm definitely open to suggestions.

30 things before I'm 30

Original Post
Once upon a time I stumbled upon my friend Thu's 30 things before I'm 30 post, and I've been meaning to start one of my own for awhile now.  I recently found some fantastic mentors at work who've been pushing me to set more goals and really think about what I want out of my career, and I decided it's time to do the same for my life outside of work.  Also, I totally did number 19 this morning and I wanted to get credit for it.  That's not cheating too much, is it?

It's only a few weeks after my 26th birthday, which means I've got just shy of 4 years to do a lot of baking, travelling, crafting, reading and blogging.  Oh, and getting in good enough shape to rock bright red pants again.  Wish me luck!

Updated - August 8, 2016
So, I haven't been doing great about pursuing things on this list.  As of today, I've only officially checked off 7 of my 30 things.  Some of this is because I forgot, some of it is because my life and goals have changed, and some are close but not quite there.  Today, 3.5 years after making the list and 3.5 months before I'm 30, I'm renewing my vow to accomplish 30 things before the big day.  To accomplish that, I've annotated the original list with my new goals and taken credit for 7 big things that I'm proud of but never imagined myself doing at 26.  Here's to adjusting to what life throws at you, seeing failure as a learning opportunity, and continually trying to better myself and the world around me.

1. Bake a perfect cheesecake - December 31, 2013
2. Blog about at least 30 of my Grandma's old recipes - Get all the recipes here!
3. Buy a house - August 28, 2013
4. Buy another pair of red pants and wear them in public
5. [EDITED] - Learn to tailor a pattern - Design a dress pattern - I've updated this one because I remember the original intent when I set this goal.  What I really wanted to do was to be able to adjust any pattern to fit my unique body shape, and I feel like I've done that.  With the help of some pretty awesome books, including Gertie Sews Vintage Casual, Vogue Sewing Handbook, and several other sewing guides I've checked out and returned to the library, I feel really good about my tailoring and altering skills.  Therefore, it's a win.  
6. Finish a prototype for my start-up idea 
7. [EDITED] Give a technical talk - Give a career talk at the University of Minnesota - The first week I moved back to MN I gave a joint talk at CoCo on AdSense content strategies and SEO.  During my last few months at HomeSpotter, Brent Kastner and I gave a talk at MobileMN about the value of requirements and process automation in software development.  I may not have reached out to the University of ACM and gotten on the Cool Jobs, Hot Technology speaker circuit like I initially planned, but I don't know if that program even exists anymore. I also did come back and sit on a panel of Google Engineers when I was visiting for a mentorship program.  The initial goal was to give a solo talk, but given the circumstances, I feel good about checking this one off.
8. Go see at least 12 live music performances (includes both musicals and band concerts) - Progress!
9. [EDITED] Go camping - Go to Disney!  - I still haven't been to Disney, and it's just not going to happen in the next 100 days.  That said, we did invest in a pretty sweet tent and camping set up, and we went on 5 camping weekends that all told were probably less than the price of Disney admission.  They were also the kind of relaxing vacation I needed at the time, and it's an investment in gear that we'll use again and again.  
10. Go to Europe - Completed March, 2013 with a work trip to Dublin AND Nov 2015 with a trip to Munich, Bamberg, Cologne, Brussels and Amsterdam
11. [EDITED] Go to WFTDA MRDA championships - When I wrote this goal list, my life revolved around roller derby.  After moving back to Minnesota, I reset my priorities, eventually stopped skating, and started coaching for the guys.  Not only have I been to MRDA championships twice, the team I bench managed qualified for champs last year.  I call that a success.
12. Go to Yosemite - Completed February 2013
13. [EDITED] Become a parental figure - Have a baby - Biology decided we weren't going to have a baby in this time frame, and you know, that's ok.  It gave us room in our home and our hearts to take in Carl's little sister, Indigo.  Indigo is 16 and will be living with us until she graduates high school. 
14. Knit a pair of socks
15. Knit an adult-sized sweater (sweater vests and dog clothes don’t count)
16. Learn to crochet (like, really learn)
17. Make a handmade Christmas present for everyone in my immediate family and my inlaws. (Not necessarily all in one year) - Progress! plus, not blogged about, I made a hand painted sign for my mom and dad that said "live your life, not your age."  I also made hot mitts for my mom and sister. For my sister-in-law Jenni I made a baby tote bag.  I also made dad an Icelandic wool hat last Christmas.  That leaves David, James, Sid, Todd and Carl to go.  Hmm.... I better get crafting, especially because boys are hard. Find me on ravelry.com (inspire05) to check out some of my projects.
18. Make enough of my own clothes that I can wear one piece each day for an entire week (Not counting hats, scarves, and mittens) - Completed in January 2016 when I finished my polka dot skirt.
19. Participate in a flash mob - Completed December 2012
20. [EDITED] - Enroll in a dance fitness class - Participate in community theater - This would have been super fun to do, but looking at where my time and priorities lie right now, getting fit needs to be at the top of my list.  Having an outlet to shake my bootie and shed a few pounds is definitely a higher priority for the next 3 months.
21. [EDITED] - Read 8 15 of the 100 greatest software engineering books of all time - Progress!
22. Read at least 30 of the novels from Book Riot's From 0 to Well Read List - Progress!
23. [EDITED] - Learn a new programming language - Read at least 6 of these top recommended graphic design books - Not only have I gained a solid understanding of Ruby on Rails and Angular JS, I founded startups using them.  I also experimented with Node.js.  When I wrote these goals I really thought I'd be doing a lot more design work than I am now.  Now, I just do a little bit of everything.  I'd still like to go back and read a lot of these books.  Maybe I'll create a 35 before I'm 35 list and add them there.
24. Run a 5k in under 25 minutes - Friend me on MapMyRun to see my progress
25. [EDITED] See at least 100 90 150 of the top 250 movies on IMDB - Even more Progress than I first realized!  Time to re-reset this goal.
26. See the musical Wicked
27. [EDITED] - Snowboard at Jackson Hole Tahoe - I would have met this goal as originally written if I hadn't taken an (awesome) trip to Jackson Hole with my sister and royally messed up my knee on the last run I just had to do before the sun went down.  It took a few weeks for my kneecap to go back to the right place, during which the Tahoe trip was planned and Carl went without me.  :(  
28. [EDITED] - Volunteer for a political campaign / party - Snowboard at Whistler - I'm not traveling to Canada in the next 3 months.  However, this is a pretty damn important election and I can volunteer my time in meaningful ways.  I'm the webmaster for my mother-in-law's campaign, did data entry for the DNC after the caucus,  and plan to look for other ways I can be of service in local races for this November.
29. Take a cake / cookie / cupcake decorating class - Complete 8/6/2016
30. Take a knife skills class