Highs and Lows of 2013

There’s no doubt that, for us, 2013 was a pretty crappy year.  My husband lost his mum at the beginning of February and a close friend lost her mum in April.  Another close friend discovered she had breast cancer and my husband started a new business that, whilst an exciting project, brought with it a lot of stress and financial worry under already difficult circumstances.

A week didn’t seem to go by without bad news in some form or another to the point where we seemed to be almost waiting for it.  Therefore in many ways we’re glad to see the back of 2013…and yet I feel like it would be unfair to only focus on the negatives and not remember that there have been good bits, too.

I saw something posted by a friend on Facebook that I thought was a great idea: it suggested during the year we should put notes in a jar of ‘surprise gifts’, ‘accomplished goals’, ‘the beauty of nature’, ”LOL’ moments’, ‘memories worth saving’ and ‘daily blessings’ to open on 31st December.  Whilst I probably won’t be organised enough to do this, I’m using this blog to recall my ‘memorable’ moments of 2013:

January 2013

At the start of the year I wrote a poem about saying goodbye to Christmas and welcoming 2013 with all the resolutions I wouldn’t keep (Mumsnet ‘Blog of the Day’).  Then later in the month I blogged about our terrifying toddler and his ability to wreak complete havoc in our home, filed under ‘memories worth saving’…now that I’ve stopped rocking and dribbling in the corner.

February 2013

February was emotional; it was a month of feeling amazingly proud of our four-year old who demonstrated complete acceptance towards a friend at pre-school; reconciling the difficult relationship I had with my mother-in-law before she passed away…and then falling down spectacularly on a weekend away in Manchester which, although embarrassing, worked in temporarily taking my husband’s mind off his grief.

March 2013

In March I had an amazing night out with all my oldest and closest friends and celebrated the special things about our ‘Friend Ship’.  Then I prayed for a miracle when J volunteered to ‘help’ in his Sacramental Programme’ and I worried he could be arrested for burning down our church.  Good times 😉

April 2013

In April I celebrated the fantastic books I had been reading (can’t beat a bit of escapism when life gets a bit rough), played out a fantasy of being the housewives’ version of James Bond (‘Quote of the Week’) and wrote a ‘Bedtime Rhapsody‘ (‘Blog of the Day’).

May 2013

In May I was inspired by my friend who was fighting breast cancer with a smile on her face and a positive mental attitude…followed by an unfortunate incident where I fanny farted in the middle of a yoga class; that was a popular post (‘Blog of the Day’, ‘Quote of the Week’ and over 1100 hits)…  We also visited my lovely cousin and her family and reignited the close relationship we used to have before distance and having children got in the way.

June 2013

In June J turned eight and we had a fantastic party for him…but only after the stress of the party planning.  I had to ask the question ‘Is Blogging Sadistic?‘ (Mumsnet Front Page) when M fell into a patch of nettles and all I could do was think about how I’d construct a blog post about it (is that classed as celebrating ‘the beauty of nature’?).  I also became a fairground attraction in my own right…

July 2013

The highlight of my year – Phillip Schofield followed me on Twitter! Oh, and I found some ‘daily blessings’ in having ‘A Family That Loves Me’ (on Mumsnet Facebook)…despite the chaos of every day life. Hubby and I also celebrated our nine year anniversary.  Oh how things have changed…

August 2013

August was the summer holidays…so I tried to remind myself of all the positives in ‘Our House‘ but couldn’t help but get a bit distracted by tantrums in Tesco and the end of ‘Me Time’.

September 2013

You can tell they went back to school in September: not only did I write a poem about feeling blessed, I also missed my boy when he went to Beaver Camp and asked the question, ‘When Does It Get Easier?‘

October 2013

Hmm.  October.  Sober October.  On the plus side, though, I raised over £500 for Macmillan Cancer Care, completed a 10K run in just over an hour and accomplished my goal of starting a paid job that wasn’t teaching. I also got frustrated because my children have no sense of urgency; probably the lack of wine making me grumpy.

November 2013

I obviously celebrated the 1st of November with a well-deserved glass (or two) of wine and I attended BlogFest for the first time which was a personal achievement.  I also received some lovely ‘surprise gifts’ from family and friends for my birthday.

December 2013

Last month I lived vicariously through J and his budding love life, apologised to my boy and found hilarious pranks for our  elves before the year came to a quiet, understated but pleasant close.

So they were my highs and lows of 2013.  Despite the hard times, one thing you can always guarantee when you have children are ‘daily blessings’ and lots and lots of ‘laugh out loud’ moments.  Happy New Year my lovely readers, thanks for supporting my blog throughout 2013 xxx