The older and wiser I get the more I start to loath the end of the year. It seems like once Thanksgiving ends and December rolls around everyone starts complaining about the year that is winding down and claiming to be so excited about "the shittiest year ever" ending. At one point in my life, probably not long ago, I was on that bandwagon. Every year I was thinking about how I just couldn't wait to end the worst year of my life and start a new year with a clean slate. I'm not like that anymore. I actually am incredibly irritated by all of the social media posts from people leading up to the new year about how bad the last 12 months were and they just don't see how next year could be any worse. I have personally made a very conscience effort to quite focusing on the bad shit that happened during the year, because let's face it, bad things are always going to happen whether we like it or not. I don't think Matthew and I have a caught a break in months, it's been one thing after another. Random things popping up that are either draining our bank account or draining our optimism (and Matthew usually has A LOT of that) and most of those things have been completely out of our control. The last week of the year did not prove to be a break for us either. But instead of focusing on bad luck and being a victim or circumstance, I am going to share about how AMAZING 2017 was for me, and how excited I am for 2018.
I have to admit that I don't recall anything overly exciting that happened between January and March. April is where things started to get exciting for us. We were able to coordinate a long weekend (Easter) where both mine and Matthew's family were able to meet us as we hadn't seen either of them since November/December. This landed us in beautiful Wichita Kansas! Okay, so not the most exciting place on the globe but we found enough to do and enjoyed each other's company. May was probably my favorite! In May we were able to coordinate a trip to the beach!!! Our friends from South Dakota had a vacation planned and we jumped on the opportunity to drive down and spend a few days with them. South Padre was my first beach experience, and it was just that, an experience! I loved every minute of being there. We weren't able to bring Wrigley so it was even a dog free, sleep in, no family knocking on our hotel door, weekend. Not only was a blast to just be there, but catching up with our friends, and seeing familiar (non-related) faces was something I needed more than I realized. June was fairly uneventful if I remember correctly and July is when the non stop excitement began. On the 4th of July we had our first adventure with tubing the Guadalupe, a very popular adventure that we had not yet taken advantage of. We went with a few other people and had a blast!
The fun did not stop there. In the middle-ish of July my parents flew down to Austin to spend a week of us. We were able to do some things we hadn't done before with them and utilized the weekend to have another beach trip. This time we went to Port Aransas, where we went' "glamping" in a cute little campground only a mile or so away from the ocean. That trip was full of food, drinks, laughs, and sun! The week after my parents left came the big one. On July 31st we confirmed that our family was growing! I was 6 weeks along with the little bean when I had my first ultrasound. I went back two weeks later and heard the heartbeat for the first time. It was a very hard secret to keep, but I managed to do quite well with it until week 12ish.
In August we had our first out of state trip since our road trip to Kansas. We packed our bags and headed north to see Matthew's mom. While we were there we took in the Illinois State Fair, and my personal favorite was the CHICAGO CUBS Matthew and his mom had worked out for us to attend. It was a week full of so many firsts for me, including my first time at Wrigley Field. While I likely would've enjoyed it a little bit more had I not been pregnant, tired, and extremely bloated. All of that aside, we definitely made the best of it. The following week we welcomed our friends from South Dakota for their first time in Austin. As luck would have it this was also the weekend we experienced our hurricane. Yep, Hurricane Harvey was also a visitor that weekend and had the audacity to ruin some of our plans! Rude!
September and October blurred together, they were the two months of the financial and emotional hits that had us questioning if we were terrible people. Of course we got through it and in November came the move to our two bedroom apartment to make room for baby BOY Menely. The move was a shit show, but again, we made it through and are extremely happy with our new place, which feels much more like a home to us.
December, oh December! December brought me intense feelings of stress, anxiety, sadness, anger, defeat and more tears than I have cried in months. I had several break through sessions in therapy, I was burnt out at work, we had to find Christmas presents that we could travel with, and I was trying to remain optimistic about everything all at the same time. Which, of course, brought on more stress. Once we landed in freezing South Dakota, the stress and anxiety were washed away. We had a great week back home with my family. We were blessed with a small baby shower my mom coordinated and received so many nice gifts from our family and friends who were able to make it.
Being back in Austin and trying to get back into the swing of things without the move, holidays, traveling, etc hanging over our head it is time to get that baby room ready! I am officially in the 3rd trimester now which has increased my "new mom anxiety" and has me feeling like we are nowhere close to being ready to bring a baby home. I know once we get the furniture put together I will feel better. I've already washed a load of baby clothes so I know that I am definitely at the point of this feeling MUCH more real. Well, that and this boy is like a damn acrobat in my belly and never stops moving!
Anyway, I stand by my original thought that 2017 was an amazing year for us, and that 2018 only has better in store for us.
I have to admit that I don't recall anything overly exciting that happened between January and March. April is where things started to get exciting for us. We were able to coordinate a long weekend (Easter) where both mine and Matthew's family were able to meet us as we hadn't seen either of them since November/December. This landed us in beautiful Wichita Kansas! Okay, so not the most exciting place on the globe but we found enough to do and enjoyed each other's company. May was probably my favorite! In May we were able to coordinate a trip to the beach!!! Our friends from South Dakota had a vacation planned and we jumped on the opportunity to drive down and spend a few days with them. South Padre was my first beach experience, and it was just that, an experience! I loved every minute of being there. We weren't able to bring Wrigley so it was even a dog free, sleep in, no family knocking on our hotel door, weekend. Not only was a blast to just be there, but catching up with our friends, and seeing familiar (non-related) faces was something I needed more than I realized. June was fairly uneventful if I remember correctly and July is when the non stop excitement began. On the 4th of July we had our first adventure with tubing the Guadalupe, a very popular adventure that we had not yet taken advantage of. We went with a few other people and had a blast!
The fun did not stop there. In the middle-ish of July my parents flew down to Austin to spend a week of us. We were able to do some things we hadn't done before with them and utilized the weekend to have another beach trip. This time we went to Port Aransas, where we went' "glamping" in a cute little campground only a mile or so away from the ocean. That trip was full of food, drinks, laughs, and sun! The week after my parents left came the big one. On July 31st we confirmed that our family was growing! I was 6 weeks along with the little bean when I had my first ultrasound. I went back two weeks later and heard the heartbeat for the first time. It was a very hard secret to keep, but I managed to do quite well with it until week 12ish.
In August we had our first out of state trip since our road trip to Kansas. We packed our bags and headed north to see Matthew's mom. While we were there we took in the Illinois State Fair, and my personal favorite was the CHICAGO CUBS Matthew and his mom had worked out for us to attend. It was a week full of so many firsts for me, including my first time at Wrigley Field. While I likely would've enjoyed it a little bit more had I not been pregnant, tired, and extremely bloated. All of that aside, we definitely made the best of it. The following week we welcomed our friends from South Dakota for their first time in Austin. As luck would have it this was also the weekend we experienced our hurricane. Yep, Hurricane Harvey was also a visitor that weekend and had the audacity to ruin some of our plans! Rude!
September and October blurred together, they were the two months of the financial and emotional hits that had us questioning if we were terrible people. Of course we got through it and in November came the move to our two bedroom apartment to make room for baby BOY Menely. The move was a shit show, but again, we made it through and are extremely happy with our new place, which feels much more like a home to us.
December, oh December! December brought me intense feelings of stress, anxiety, sadness, anger, defeat and more tears than I have cried in months. I had several break through sessions in therapy, I was burnt out at work, we had to find Christmas presents that we could travel with, and I was trying to remain optimistic about everything all at the same time. Which, of course, brought on more stress. Once we landed in freezing South Dakota, the stress and anxiety were washed away. We had a great week back home with my family. We were blessed with a small baby shower my mom coordinated and received so many nice gifts from our family and friends who were able to make it.
Being back in Austin and trying to get back into the swing of things without the move, holidays, traveling, etc hanging over our head it is time to get that baby room ready! I am officially in the 3rd trimester now which has increased my "new mom anxiety" and has me feeling like we are nowhere close to being ready to bring a baby home. I know once we get the furniture put together I will feel better. I've already washed a load of baby clothes so I know that I am definitely at the point of this feeling MUCH more real. Well, that and this boy is like a damn acrobat in my belly and never stops moving!
Anyway, I stand by my original thought that 2017 was an amazing year for us, and that 2018 only has better in store for us.
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