Category Archives: #best09

best of 2009 #31- resolution? what resolution?

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#best09 December 31 Resolution you wish you’d stuck with. (You know, there’s always next year…)

As a rule, I don’t make resolutions. I just believe that for me personally it sets me up for failure and wallowing in my own guilt over failing. It’s not that I don’t have areas to improve upon: dropping five pounds, cleaning up my potty mouth, keeping the Big Top neat and tidy ALL the time, not drinking so much, and on and on and on…

I shoulder enough real and imagined guilt just being a mother of five. I don’t need anymore, thank you very much. It is for that reason that my family and I choose to reflect on the previous year as we anticipate the coming new year. Every year we make a list of our personal best and worst of the year. It is an opportunity for us all to appreciate the good in our lives and how it almost always outweighs the bad. I won’t lie to y’all. 2009 was a pretty rocky year here under the Big Top. Still, I have to say that in spite of the bad it really was a pretty good year after all. So here you are, with further adieu, the Big Top’s Best and the Worst of 2009.

Bill
best- Toni and Jesse’s wedding, Thanksgiving
worst- being unemployed

Laura
best- time with family at Toni and Jesse’s wedding, joining the Shredheads movement and running
worst- Bill’s unemployment and my under-employment, meningococcal meningitis

Holly
best-meeting Ben, moving out (again), watching Hazel grow and change and become cuter everyday
worst- none

Zoë
best- traveling to France
worst- losing friends

Abby
best- Best friends transferring to my high school.
worst- Breaking up with my boyfriend of nearly two years and all the drama that came with it.

Jodie
best- Dancing at Laurie Mittman’s fundraiser
worst- meningococcal meningitis

Daniel
best- Disneyland again, being the best ring bearer ever at Toni and Jesse’s wedding
worst- none

Hazel
best- moving in with BFF Ame, toddlers rule the house!
worst- that bad fall and nearly breaking her collarbone (again)

So long 2009!

Hello Twenty-Ten! Can’t wait to get to know you and the adventures you will bring!

best of 2009 #30- ad

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#best09 December 30 Ad. What advertisement made you think this year?

An ad that made me think this year?

hmmm…

I’m drawing a blank.

I could blame it on the fact that this year was not necessary a stellar year in advertising. Some blame it on the recession but then again, the Golden Age of advertising and television did happen when the US was in the midst of a recession. So no, I can’t blame my it on that fact. But after seeing this ad again I remembered why I can’t recall an ad that really made me think.

I knew it! Television is just an alien plot to disable us so that they can eat our brains!

best of 2009 #29- the best laughs

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#best09 December 29 Laugh. What was your biggest belly laugh of the year?

You know, it is hard to pin-point the best or the biggest belly laugh of the year. Life with a large family always promises laughter, lots of laughter coupled with silliness just as much as it promises tears, raised voices and yes, even quiet moments. It truly is a circus. My girls and my boys never fail to make me laugh and for that I am thankful. But I have to say that the biggest laughs were the result of the antics and discoveries of our sweet grandbaby, Hazel Faye.

Hazel Faye with her namesake, Great-great Grandmother, Hazel Frances

She has grown and changed so much in just one short year. Her sense of humor and comedic timing is a family trait I am so glad to see that she is richly blessed with. I look forward to many, many more years of laughter and joy with my deliciously silly grand daughter.

best of 2009 #28- stationery

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#best09 December 28 Stationery. When you touch the paper, your heart melts. The ink flows from the pen. What was your stationery find of the year?

Back in the day I used to write letters all the time: to my grandparents, to my Aunt Margie, to my Mom, to my Dad, to friends and family. My stationery was simple though. Usually just plain notebook paper. Occasionally I would splurge on some pretty, pretty paper or notecards. But to me, the beauty was in the words that came from my thoughts to the pen and on to the paper. Then I got away from letter writing. I became a busy, distracted mom. I relied on my computer’s word processing program and then discovered email which led to texting and Facebook and Twitter. I’m one of those people in whom letter-writing has become a lost art. I usually don’t notice beautiful stationery anymore. Why should I when all I have to do is send a text?

Pitiful, I know.

Then a couple of months ago while attending a fundraising event, I won a gift basket stuffed with beautiful stationery including some amazing postcards featuring the photography of André Kertész.

Perhaps for 2010 I will get back into the letter-writing habit.

Best of 2009 #27- best meet-up

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#best09 December 27 Social web moment. Did you meet someone you used to only know from her blog? Did you discover Twitter?

This year, after several years of blogging and being active through assorted social media outlets, I finally stepped a little further out of my protective box and did hook-up with people I only knew online through blogging and twittering and, surprise, none of them are crazed axe murderers. Actually, I have met up with a few people before this year.  Most have come into and out of my life with the speed of the internet but I have cemented a friendship with one…haven’t I Jenn? But this year was a year with meeting face to face with a number of online acquaintances, making new friends and hooking up with people I have “known” and admired online for quite some time. The best in real life moment this year was the funniest too. On my way home from Las Vegas, I found myself passing the time at my gate twittering away with friends when I received a tweet from Kim of Emergiblog telling me that she was too was killing time at her gate waiting for her flight home. Turns out she was at the gate right next to the gate where I was sitting. As we realized this, we both got up and started walking over to the next gate, passed one another, turned around, saw each other for the very first time, laughed out loud and hugged.

We hugged like dear, old friends because we were having followed one another’s blogs for a few years now. We spent the hour before our respective flights catching up in the way that old friends do. That hour flew by much too fast as it often does when one is enjoying good times with good friends.