Happy New Year! What a year! 2010 started out with a New Year's party, posole, and the goal to spend more time with friends and family. This year we hosted New Year's again, complete with posole and an East Coast countdown for the kids, who didn't quite make it to midnight. Matthew even led the kids (13 of them!) in a practice countdown (so they'd know what to do - all of them were 4 years old and under) with percussion instruments and kazoos. Fun times. Oh, how New Year's Eves have changed...
2010 was an unpredictable year. I started out with so many goals, and changed course so many times. I accomplished some of the goals, some not so much. We were able to complete our will, make the final payment on our Subaru, plan our trip to Hawaii to celebrate 10 years of marriage, and figure out a way for me to earn my project management certificate. Whew.
And then the beginning of my pregnancy spurred a halt in the completion of anything (which lasted a few months). When I found out that we would become a family of FIVE in March 2011, all my energy seemed to evaporate as this new reality sunk in. I waited almost 18 weeks before I let the cat out of the bag publicly. There were so many questions I anticipated that I wouldn't know the answer to, and I really didn't want to hear the questions, e.g. Are you going to stop working? How much time are you taking off? Are you going to get a new car? Are you going to move to a bigger house? What are you going to do about daycare? On and on... I still get the questions and I still don't know all the answers, but it just doesn't matter. In this two-kid town of Portland, we will have three kids. Done. We bought a mini-van, and I kind of like it. We'll have three kids in daycare for a few months until Dean is in kindergarten, and we're not the first family that has done it. So freaking what. Somehow we'll manage. After all, I am #3 child in my family of SIX, and if my parents were ever freaked out about having three kids when I was born, and then one more after my brother was born, I never knew it. We were normal.
As I was coming out of my pregnancy brain coma, I worked on Fiona's baby album (which I managed to complete before she turned two! Yay!), and I started getting excited about the baby in my belly. Holding Fiona for the first time, introducing her to her big brother, taking her home and bathing her, feeding her, watching her grow and change and develop into a feisty little girl - it all happened quickly and naturally. She and Dean are now peas in a pod. So our pod will get a little bigger.
We started sharing our news finally this fall, and I actually was surprised by all of the support (why was this surprising?). We took some steps back into our social scene, hosting parties to celebrate Matt's, Dean's, and Fiona's birthdays, and we even were convinced to throw another New Year's bash. My creativity was sparked when my mom visited in November. She and I were a bustling sewing team, creating skirts and dresses for Fiona, and trading tips on the best sewing blogs (me) and how to fully appreciate the power and skill of my Bernina (Mom). I have been on a crafting frenzy since she left.
I'm back, and I'm enjoying this sudden burst of energy.
2011 holds so much promise.
My sister issued a one-word challenge for the new year, of one virtue or attitude that we should try to embody. I immediately thought of JOY. This new year began with both my children and my husband celebrating joyfully among friends, making all kinds of happy noise to welcome the new year, and the baby in my belly responded with kicks and movement. For the moment, no one was worrying, anticipating answers to all the unknown questions or challenges of the upcoming year. It seems so simple, but after the last few months, I want this self-reminder to be jubilant - in thanksgiving of the present and hope for the future. I will try to embody this feeling of joy.
