Can you all believe it?! A year ago today on a sunny afternoon, Enthusiastic About Life went live. Today Enthusiastic About Life is now officially 1 year old. I can’t believe that it’s been 1 full year of the blog! Get the champagne and let’s start poppin’ bottles to celebrate.

And before you ask…yes, I had a poppin’ bottles photo shoot with my friend Elaine and we had a blast. Not sure if it’s common to actually drink the champagne during a photo shoot…but we totally did (lol). Also, taking a cute ‘poppin bottles’ photo is really hard. Like extremely difficult. Keep reading and maybe you’ll stumble upon some poppin’ bottles photo fails (I promise they are hilarious lol).

It was a great day until I got home because I found out that regular wine stoppers don’t work for champagne bottles because of the pressure build up in champagne (there’s your science lesson of the day). On my way home, the wine stopper popped off and champagne exploded all over my car. And I got soaked. And now my car smells like champagne. And it’s been one week. And the smell won’t go away.

But anyway, a lot has happened in just 365 days and I’m very excited to have been able to share this with you, whether you’ve been Enthusiastic About Life since day 1 or if you are completely new to my site. Thank you to everyone who has supported me, given me ideas/feedback/encouragement, and those who have provided mentoring (huge thank you to Kathy AKA The Crafty Chica!).

I could write a 26 page article on what has happened on my blog this past year, but nobody wants to read all of that, so I’ll just give some highlights. Feel free to check out the Blog page to read all of my blog posts if you feel so inclined 😉

Let’s take a stroll down memory lane.

We started our enthusiastic journey on August 21st, 2015 and it was a day that I crowned The Beginning. I’m very dramatic, I know. This was my first blog post and if you read it now, the message that I shared a year ago still rings loud and clear. I wanted to share my bucket list journey in order to inspire others to create their own bucket list. I wanted people to live their own version of an epic life.

This year, I made a ton of friends online. My favorite photo sharing website Imgur started following me on instagram, one of my favorite Mexican restaurants Guero Canelo tagged me on Instagram, and I actually literally met 50 CENT. The rapper. Yes. I met him. And it was awesome.

I’ve had some great, uplifting posts like when I thought life was interesting, but I’ve also had some rough times like the time I got stranded on a mountain by myself, with no cell service, no food, no water, AND NO BATHROOMS.

I’ve crossed off some epic bucket list items including drinking Guinness in Ireland, grape stomping to make wine, and going to the International Balloon Fiesta.

My favorites were mentioned in my 24 Under 24 blog post. To view the full list of all of the bucket list items crossed off so far, feel free to check out the Bucket Lists! And while you’re there, join me in reminiscing a little on the graduation bucket list by learning about 11 things to do in Tucson.

This year, the travel bucket list officially started with my first international trip. I had adventures in Belgium, Canada, France, Germany and Ireland!

And I will be visiting Puerto Rico in a few months!

I started a YouTube channel and I’ve gotten footage of everywhere from the Grand Canyon, to hikes in California, and to waterfalls in Canada.

I pulled an ABC Family stunt and changed the name of my blog from MairaLBL to Enthusiastic About Life…and I’m so glad I did. Because I feel like now when I tell people the name of my blog, they immediately know what it’s about. It’s more intuitive and I think it has a nice ring to it. And I also love the fact that people have nicknamed me ‘enthusiastic about life’. People will text and me say ‘Hey Enthusiastic About Life, let’s go to Sedona’ and then we go! It’s great. 🙂

Nine months into having my blog, I started taking blogging a little more seriously. Yes I know, I was a little late to the party but I got here! In taking my blog more serious, I applied and got admitted to the ultimate Blogger Boot Camp where I met my amazing blogger mentor and my favorite bloggers. And together, we all attended one of the best conferences ever.

This year, I also made running (and documenting my races) a priority and that is how the ‘year of running’ came to be. I ran 5Ks (and placed 2nd in a race!), 10Ks, 15Ks, and I am currently training for my first half marathon. And the races I did were super fun ranging from running through bubbles, colored power, and airport runways!

The little sis and I crossed off some bucket list items including Arizona Cardinals football games, pottery painting and getting interviewed!

JUST. SO. MUCH. IN. ONE. YEAR.

It’s been a wonderful year and it’s really nice to be able to look back at the pictures, the videos, and the blog posts. I’m really happy to be able share this with all of you and I am very excited for the future and for what is to come.

Again, thank you for sticking around. I hope you are inspired every time I post and I hope you know that it’s your responsibility and that you owe it to yourself to create your own bucket list and live an epic life.

Thanks for reading, and stay enthusiastic! And this is your site as much as it is mine, so a big happy 1 year to all of us 🙂 and since this site is ours, feel free to comment below or message me what you’d like to see in the future. Or if you want to join me on a trip or on a bucket list adventure, my inbox is ALWAYS open 🙂

Cheers!

P.S. – As promised, check out some poppin’ champagne bottle photo fails. Enjoy, because they are not flattering at all haha.

Let’s start with a mild photo fail and work our way up.

The first fail came because I didn’t shake the champagne bottle enough, so the explosion wasn’t as intense.

But it still managed to scare me. The second fail was me getting scared by the cork popping off.

Then I tried to be cool and take a picture chugging the champagne but that didn’t work out because the champagne exploded and went up my nose and I almost drowned.

Then there’s this duck who tried to ruin all of my pictures.

This one doesn’t seem like a huge fail. I’m just jumping, right?

WRONG. Todo mundo con la lengua afuera!

Now are you ready for the worst one? At first, it doesn’t seem like a huge fail…

Until you start to zoom in on my face…

Zoom in a little more…and BAM. THERE IT IS.

Thanks for reading friends lol, and I promise I don’t look like the picture above. Here’s a nicer picture of me and my wonderful photographer Elaine so that you don’t leave my blog with that terrifying image in your brain.

Hope you enjoyed the fails, hopefully next year we’ll get a nicer poppin’ bottles photo, stick around to find out!

-Maira