Together on Tuesday: IT'S 2013 & WE'RE BACK!

Hey everyone!  Its 2013 and we are back!  Us brain-trusts here at ToT have decided to kick off this year by Listing our Top Moments from 2012 and our Hopes for 2013.

And of course, I'd be remissed to not point out that I didn't post my VERY FIRST ToT entry of the new year until the Saturday following our first Tuesday's post!

My Top Moments from 2012
These are not all happy moments - they are significant moments that defined 2012 for me, my friends, and family.

• Starting this blog and joining the Together on Tuesday group last spring!  Had I not done that, this blog entry itself would be non-existent! 
• Building the shop for Mark.  We did this in the spring as well.  He loves it and it really has served a tremendous purpose for giving him the type of space he's needed for projects.  Not to mention, the storage space we gained, oh the glorious storage space! Some events during its construction actually became the springboard for my very first blog entry!
• Starting my Yoga class at PM Yoga.  I cannot tell you how much I've benefited from the actual practice of Yoga in a studio setting.  But more than just that, they really do have a sense of community there.  They kept in close touch with me during my injury and recovery.  Certainly not because they had to; they did so because they truly cared.  It is rare to find people and businesses that truly care the way they do, so when you find it, hold on to them dearly and let them love and support you!  
• Spending TWO Weeks in Europe with my honey!  Granted we spent a lot of that time crammed into a tiny car trying to navigate our way around, it was awesome.  Two weeks that will forever stand out as some of the best & most memorable times of my life!  As an added bonus we also got to visit several really great friends who had moved there over the past couple years.
• Our friends Dayna and Blaine's wedding!  Their wedding was an incredible good time with people who were gathered in the name of love!  Not only the love between Dayna and Blaine but looking around, you could just see the vast amount of love that supports them from their friends and family.  No matter what these two come up against in life, they have many people who are there to support them!  Not to mention, that on top of all that, everyone had an amazing great time that night & I KNOW that is what they wanted for everyone!  
• The personal tragedies that MANY of my friends endured last year.  In my circle of friends, cancer was even more horrible than usual.  It just kept happening over and over again.  It became a juggernaut that we could not stop or slow down under any circumstances.  I watched my beloved, treasured friends go through cancer battles with their children, parents, siblings, spouses, and significant others.  Some we lost to the evil thing that we call cancer, and others are still fighting the brave battle and we continue to pray for their victory.  There have also been some who were able to declare their victory - and it is those who provide us with the hope that those still fighting may also do so one day.  One thing I have learned from this is that a hero doesn't need to wear a cape and make the local or national news.  Rather I have seen a number of plain-clothed true heroes emerge.  They are the loved ones who sit at home or in the hospitals after a long day's work and hold the hands, make gut-wrenching decisions, and provide comfort (sometimes until late in the night, knowing they have to get up early and try and work the next day).  
• Now, I feel obligated to follow that with a happy one!  My friend Elizabeth had their third child last year following a high-risk, difficult pregnancy.  Oh yes, and her husband spent most of that time serving and defending our freedom in Afghanistan...during which time she was in Alaska without any family nearby for support, all while keeping up with the daily needs of her other two children (who am I kidding here...she is supermom - she did FAR more than just 'keep up' with their daily needs!).  During this time, she also found the energy needed to provide other families of deployed military with support and comfort as well as serving as a vital line of communication when there was information coming out of the locations where their soldiers were located.  We are all so thankful that her husband returned home from Afghanistan just in time for the birth of beautiful Morrigan Sophia!  I got to meet Morrigan while they were here for Christmas, and she is a precious, mellow-tempered baby! 
• The single-most terrifying moment of last year (well above and beyond any fear that arose during my own medical crisis) was when I was present when a small child nearly died.  There is absolutely NO greater fear than when a child is possibly dying in front of you, and nothing that you've been taught to do in these situations is working.  There is absolutely nothing you would not sacrifice or give up; including your own life, any amount of money, or even your home in order to save that child.  Thankfully, in what I believe to have been the final possible moments of recovery, someone present was able to get her breathing again.  This is also the thing that I was most thankful for last year.  Her parents are able to hold her, love on her, play with her, and have hopes and dreams for her future.  I cannot imagine that having been ripped away from them that day.  
• This brings us to the big lurking event that you all knew would show up.  My horrible Neurological injury.  Horrible is the only way to properly describe it.  I nearly died.  I came face to face with my own mortality at an age when we typically do not give much thought to the possibility of our own death.  One day, I will tell you guys all about what happened, if for no other reason than to hopefully help prevent you from going through it.  However, for a number of reasons, I cannot do that right now.  But that day will arrive and I hope that someone is able to take something away from it that will help them in some way - just something to make what I've gone through somehow benefit the world. 
• I am going to end my memories with the final moments of 2012 - New Year's Eve.  We did not go out, party, and have a crazy good time.  Rather, we spent it here at home with our two boys.  Honestly, by midnight, I'd fallen asleep at least three times and Mark had to wake me up for the countdown!  But, 2012 was a hard, difficult year on many fronts and I was all to eager to kick it to the curb and start a fresh year!  The first thing that happened after I got my New Year's kiss from Mark, you ask?  I got out a confetti shooter that I'd bought and tucked away and tried to shower Mark in confetti.  Did NOT go as I expected...a piece of the confetti cartridge somehow flipped under his glasses and got him right in the eye...eek!  But, then again that is pretty typical for us - would you have expected anything less bizarre to kick of the year?  Probably not!

Hopes for 2013

• After all of the negative, sad, and scary stuff listed above you've gotta know that my MAIN hope for 2013 is for the health and well-being of my friends and family and their loved ones.  It JUST has to get better for them.  I hope this more than anything.  
• I hope for emotional healing for those who lost love ones last year.  There were many.  Too many, in fact.  There were times that in order to maintain an acceptable decorum, I just had to figure out a way to block myself from feeling the full gravity of the situation at hand - had I not done so, I surely would have crumbled into a sobbing, heap of an emotional mess either at work or in some other public location.  
• I hope that out of each of the tragedies listed above, I am able to find some valuable takeaway that helps me become a better, more compassionate person.  I really want to get to where before I form an opinion, I first think of myself in the situation and think about what I would want others to consider before judging me.  I have done that a few times recently, but I know that in order to grow as a person, I need to do this far more often.  
• I hope to be able to continue sharing my thoughts, experiences, successes, failures, and debacles with you through this blog.  Our ToT group really, really brings together a group of ladies with all different backgrounds, life experiences, and family & career situations.  We all bring a different perspective to every topic we write about.  I urge you to read all of them.  I read everyone's entries every week and regardless of the topic I gain new perspectives every single time.  
• Lastly, on on a more comical note, yet speaking truthfully...I really hope that Austin curbs his eating and destruction of inanimate objects.  He is really gifted in this area, that one is!