So Long, 2012

Hello, 2013.

Highlights of 2012:

• Traveled to DC and Disney World. 
• B learned to walk. C learned to read. 
• One Ordinary Mom and One Ordinary Dad turned 30. 
• C learned to swim and ride a bike (still, with training wheels, but we'll take it).
• B went from a few words to full sentences. 

We will not miss the GI troubles that plagued me at the beginning of 2012 (the ones that turned out to be an egg sensitivity) or jury duty. We won't miss some of the car troubles we've had-- maybe 2013 will bring a new one.

2012 brought us great music-- we saw Joshua Radin, Over the Rhine, and Mumford and Sons in concert.

It also brought us great books-- so many, I had to break it down into categories (I did a lot reading this year apparently):

• Favorite fiction books read this year-- a tie between The Art of Fielding and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
• Favorite non-fiction-- The President's Club (fascinating no matter what side of the aisle you're on). 
• Funniest-- Let's Pretend this Never Happened (I peed myself just a little bit reading this one).
• Best YA-- another tie between The Invention of Hugo Cabret and The Mysterious Benedict Society. 
• Best for fueling the soul-- Jesus Calling (though Reflections for Ragamuffins was a close second). 

If you have the YouVersion Bible App, I highly recommend the Soul Detox reading plan. I did this for a month over the summer and it helped me clear out a lot of toxic mind junk.

2012 brought One Ordinary Dad and I time to see a few movies in the theater. Argo and Les Miserables were two of our favorites this year. 

Last year my resolutions were:

1.  To branch out in my knitting (which I did when I made these awesome legwarmers).
2. To learn how to use my camera more (which I kind of did-- I'm a little more comfortable in RAW and learned a few more editing tricks).
3. To unplug a little more (despite gaining an iPad as a wonderful 30th birthday present from my husband, it is something I've been a lot more aware of lately and I don't think I spent nearly as much time in front of a screen this year as I have in years past). 
4. To grow and cultivate my faith. This will be an ongoing process, every year. But this year, we took a risk on opening our home and small group to a few new families (worth it), I went through YouVersion's Soul Detox, and experienced God in a new way through Jesus Calling. 

So what's up for 2013? As far as resolutions, I'm keeping them simple:

1. Make time to curate my stimuli-- in other words, setting aside intentional time to fill my mind with things that challenge me, inspire me, and cause me to see the wold in new ways (whether through reading, creating something with knitting, listening to some vinyl-- yes, my husband has made a convert out of me, running, photography, anything that stimulates my mind).
2. Put my faith into action. One Ordinary Dad lives by the philosophy, "Preach the gospel, and when necessary, use words." I want more of that in my life. I want to reflect the awesome-ness of my creator in not just my words, but in my actions too. 

Yes, that's really it as far as resolutions go.

And as for our family in our little corner of the world? 2013 will bring about some great things. For starters, C will start kindergarten (hopefully at an awesome magnet school in our district). One Ordinary Dad is going to continue in his role as stay-at-home parent by day/craft brew routing logistics guy by night/Excel data analyzer whenever a job comes his way. B will hopefully get potty-trained. And as for me, I'm hoping that I have news of the Master Teacher designation (something I applied for in December) soon and in the fall, I'll enter year 10 of teaching.

God has blessed us with health and happiness in 2012. I pray He blesses us, and you, with the same and more in 2013.

~One Ordinary Mom :-)