I can’t say I’m sad to see 2011 go. A lot of good things happened, but we also experienced some pretty hard stuff too. Here’s a quick recap of last year:
January: We bought our first house! The search was an exciting but long process. We were glad to be able to finally call this place ours. It didn’t take long before we started repainting all the rooms…
February: I think we spent all of our free time painting. We were still living with Baugay, but came to the house after work and almost every weekend to paint. We got pretty good at it after a while!
March: More painting + re-shelving the pantry and master bedroom closet. By this point, I was very ready to be done with painting and just move in!
April: We finally moved into our house on the 9th! Thanks to a lot of friends and family helping, it really didn’t take too long. I also fell in love with a china cabinet at a consignment furniture store and bought it. Just when we felt like we were getting settled in after a few weeks, the 27th brought crazy storms and tornadoes across the state, knocking out our power for a week, damaging a lot of our electronics, and taking the life of our friend, Marcus, in Tuscaloosa. I’ve never felt so many emotions like I did that last week in April, and I hope I never do again.
May: I think it took the whole month to start feeling semi-normal again. It seemed like week after week we kept finding something new that was broken or not working in the house, which just made it harder to feel like ourselves again. We replaced several things, but still had a long way to go. Emily also graduated from high school, so that was an exciting way to end the month.
June: This month can be summed up with two words: wedding stuff. Travis was in Matt and Maggie’s wedding. I hosted Alisha’s lingerie shower. Alisha also had a couple of other wedding teas/parties. Almost all of this happened in one weekend. Oh yeah, and Travis turned 25…the same weekend. Needless to say, we didn’t have time to do much of a celebration. We also installed a new garage door opener, and we went on a much needed family vacation to Fripp Island.
July: I would classify July as another rollercoaster month like April was. We spent the 4th with my parents at the lake house and had a great time. Alisha also had another wedding tea, and we went to PCB for a few days for her bachelorette trip. Somewhere in there, though, we found out my mom had breast cancer, which was initially like a punch in the stomach. She had surgery to remove the tumor the week after I got back from the beach and the week before Alisha and Tyler got married. The best news was that her lymph nodes were clear!! Alisha and Tyler’s wedding on the 28th was beautiful and a great way to end a pretty difficult month.
August: August brought us back to a semi-normal routine. We cleaned out our garage so that we could park both cars inside. Mom had her port put in and started chemo toward the end of the month. We also fixed our fence and hung more pictures on the walls in our house. The happiest day of the month was probably adopting two sweet kittens, Felix and Gabby, who aren’t so little anymore!
September: Travis and I went to Alabama’s first football game of the season and saw an easy win over Kent State. Mom had chemo treatments #2 and #3 and felt pretty up and down. She ended up in the hospital with a fever at the end of the month and had to get IV antibiotics. We watched a lot of exciting Alabama games and enjoyed seeing Gabby and Felix become more social and used to living with us.
October: October brought some cooler weather, which was wonderful. I decorated our house with some fall decorations. Travis had outpatient surgery on his nose to fix his breathing and sinus issues, and Mom had chemo treatment #4 that same week. I ran the Liz Hurley Ribbon Run and raised my goal amount of $500! It was a 5K, and although I didn’t run it as fast as I wanted to, at least I finished! Since the weather was so nice outside, we also pulled weeds in our flower beds. Toward the end of the month, I turned 25, we went to the Tennessee game in Tuscaloosa, we bought a new (to us) car, Mom ended up in the hospital again, and we went on our annual bed and breakfast mini-vacation with Ashley and Seth. Whew!
November: Alabama lost for the first time of the season to LSU in overtime. At least we ate some yummy gumbo while watching the game with friends! Mom had another chemo treatment. We had a great Thanksgiving day with the Dvorak clan and stayed out from midnight until about 5:30 AM on Black Friday to shop for a Christmas tree and some other stuff. Alabama also got revenge for that terrible Iron Bowl loss last year.
December: Mom had her 7th chemo treatment. We decorated for Christmas, which the kitties were extremely excited about. We did most of our Christmas shopping online. And, we had a great time celebrating our 4th anniversary and a few days later, Christmas with our families. Felix tried to throw a damper on the holiday by tearing up Travis’s hands, but we think he’s going to survive :) We ended the year by hanging out with Matt and Maggie and a few other friends on New Year’s Eve.
Well, I guess that wasn’t so quick a recap. Really, a lot happened in 2011. I’ll admit I have mixed emotions about the year in general, but I’m definitely glad to see a new year on the calendar. Here’s to hoping 2012 won’t be quite so much of a rollercoaster!
I think Travis and I definitely grew up a lot over the last year. Not that we were necessarily “immature”, but I feel like we were getting too focused on stuff, especially when we bought our house and starting fixing it up. It only takes something like a natural disaster or a cancer diagnosis to slap you in the face and redirect your focus onto more important things. Since April and July’s events, I know I’ve been more focused on family, friends, and God.
2012 is a new year, and I’m looking forward to it. I’ve got some goals in mind for this year that I’d like to share. Hopefully, putting them in the blog will keep me accountable, and at the end of the year, I can report on how I’ve done.
Here are my 2012 goals, in no real order…
1. Keep up with the KSR daily Bible reading schedule. Every year, I start out reading for a few days in January, and then I’ll miss a day and never really get on track again. This year, I’ve got the schedule printed out and lying on my nightstand, and it’s also on my computer. It’s only a chapter per day, so I’ve got no excuse…
2. Run a half-marathon. I’ve done the hardest part already, and that’s signing up. I’m running in the Nashville Country Music Half Marathon on April 28th! That’s 13.1 miles, and I’m pretty nervous about it. Aimee and Mollie are running it also, so that will definitely make it easier and more fun. I know if I don’t run a half marathon this year, I probably never will, so here’s to hoping I can finish! :)
3. Send one card per week to someone who is sick or needs encouraging. This is something that doesn’t take very much time to do, but it means a lot to the person who receives it. I know I can dedicate 10 or 15 minutes per week to this.
4. Invite someone to our house for supper at least once a month. We’ve got our house (mostly) in order these days, and we really need to start being more hospitable. Last year, our excuse was that our house wasn’t set up yet, but it’s good enough. It’s always fun to cook for others, so this is something we can look forward to doing.
5. Enjoy the present. That’s kind of an abstract goal, but I find myself always thinking about future plans and events coming up instead of enjoying the day and time that I’m in. As 2011 reinforced, we aren’t guaranteed to live another day, so I’m going to try to do a better job of enjoying the present day.
At that risk of making too many goals to keep up with, I’m going to leave it at that. Every once in a while, I’ll try to update you about how I’m doing. What are your goals/resolutions for 2012?
