B,B&E's Year in Review: 2012, Part Four

When it gets cold out I sort of become lethargic. It's hard to motivate myself to do anything. I thought the plus side to this would be that "Part Four" would be a lot easier to do than the rest of our Year in Review posts so I'd get it done fast. Unfortunately, I got distracted again. But I'm doing it now!

October: In October my friend, Kjersty came up to Seattle for a few days. It was SO COLD that week so we didn't get out and do much but we did make it to a pumpkin patch up north with her and her daughter and a bunch of our friends. We also visited the Woodland Park Zoo while she was here. The zoo probably would have been more fun for everyone if it hadn't been raining and windy that day but we improvised with garbage bags and umbrellas and the kids managed to stay mostly dry. Later that month E had his 9 month check up! He was such a trooper at his appointment. He didn't even cry when he got his flu shot. We also got to go to a few Halloween parties and we hung out in the back of a friend's car for the Stake Halloween trunk or treat because it was, once again, pouring rain.

My favorite part of October was dressing up E for his first Halloween. He made an awesome Clark Kent. We also learned that, despite all his toys, his favorite thing to play with is a bucket of markers. And, E loves graham crackers. A lot.

I just realized I forgot to mention that in August Ben started his last year of Pharmacy School. Luckily, there are no more tests but some of his rotations have been pretty intense. In August he was working for the Indian Health Board. Ben, correct me if I'm wrong about any of this but, he really enjoyed what he was doing there but the location left a lot to be desired.  In September he was doing a geriatric care rotation at an Assisted Living Retirement Center. He'd alternate between a couple of locations so he wasn't just stuck in one place all month. And, in October he was at a hospital down near SEATAC airport: Highline Medical. He really liked working there. Or he at least liked working there enough to decide that he should at least try to get a residency. I guess we'll see how that goes in the months to come.

 
November kicked off with our ward variety show. Ben showcased his painting of Seattle while E had a painting to display of his own. Both works of art are now proudly displayed at the entrance of our apartment.

For me,  November was filled with chores. More specifically, getting the apartments winterized. This included a lot of time spent raking leaves. Luckily, E still wasn't crawling so I could just stick him in a pile while I worked on the next area of the lawn.

Before we knew it Thanksgiving was here and Ben and I were running our much anticipated Turkey Trot. There were a lot of people there which made running the race with a stroller very difficult. Once we had a bit of a gap though, we took off as fast as we could. We managed to finish when the clock said 33:13. But I'm almost certain we did it in under 30 since we had to walk for so long before crossing the start line. (We would have known the exact time but my stupid phone decided to shut itself off at some point between the start line and the finish.)

This year we did Thanksgiving a little different than in the past. A friend of ours was in charge of our Stake Thanksgiving Dinner so we headed over to the church and ate with everyone there. I made a Turkey for the dinner but it still didn't quite feel like Thanksgiving to me. I never could figure out what exactly it was that made it different.

The day after Thanksgiving we headed over to our friends' home to have a Thanksgiving #2 dinner. But, since we'd all had Turkey the day before, it was decided we'd do an Indian Food feast. I was skeptical because the one time I've eaten at an Indian food restaurant I was not impressed. Let's just say I was pleasantly surprised! The food was DELICIOUS. I guess my friends all need to go in together and open an Indian restuarant and then let me eat there for free!


In November Ben was doing another Geriatric Care rotation. He didn't enjoy this one as much as the first. I think it was because the work environment was a lot less hopeful for the patients involved. As a result, he seemed pretty happy to be done with this one when the time came.

December! What a wonderful month. You can just feel the magic in the air. I wish we could have the December atmosphere all year long but then I'd get spoiled and take it for granted.

Anyway, we spent one long evening addressing, return labeling, and stamping all the ward Christmas cards. Apparently I am getting old because my back hurt for a week after that but it helped Ben so it was worth it.

We also went to Snowflake Lane in Bellevue and saw it fake snow. I loved it! I think E would have loved it more if it hadn't been bedtime but he was still fascinated by everything going on, we just never got a smile out of him.

Some other holiday festivities we did during December: We went and walked through Candy Cane Lane--a small neighborhood of houses that all decorate their houses together for the community--one evening; made gingerbread castles with some friends; ate A LOT of candy; E got some awesome first christmas PJs; and we had a ward Christmas party.

As you probably know, E got sick so we were stuck home for two weeks which forced me to craft. Not that I'm complaining. I like to craft I just haven't made time for it in so long so I got a lot of things on my list done!

On Christmas Eve we went over to our friends' home again for a Christmas Eve dinner and program. Each family contributed something. I played Oh Holy Night on my Clarinet and Ben surprised everyone by coming in at the end and playing it on the Recorder, although he was laughing which made it hard to play. He practiced for a week straight for that and then I left the diaper bag (which had the recorder in it) at home. He almost didn't go back to get it. I'm sure our friends were wondering why I thought it was such a big deal for him to go get our diaper bag when everyone had diapers and wipes to share with me.

On Christmas day we lounged around in PJ's and opened gifts. E wasn't super into the gift unwrapping. In fact he was getting mad at us for taking away toys and putting wrapped presents in his lap. Christmas was a really good day. Ben and I played games and listened to Christmas music all afternoon. Relaxing. My favorite type of Christmas.

Ben's rotation this month was one he did from home. It would have been awesome but I'd go several hours not talking to him (which is really hard when he's sitting at the kitchen table), trying to be good about not asking him to help with things around the apartment and then I'd find out that he wasn't even working the whole time! All month long this happened. Maybe if we had an office it'd be easier for him to buckle down and get the job done during normal business hours but he spent many a night working late into the evening to make up for what he didn't get done that day.

And, if you're wondering what a pharmacist can do from home ... ask Ben. I'm still not completely sure. But it was nice to have him around nonetheless.

And thus ends our year. I'm sure I've left out a lot but, since I've been horrible about journaling, most of my memory come from pictures so this is what we'll remember about 2012 in the years to come.

I guess in summary, It was a great year. Amazing. One of the best. I can't imagine they get much better but I'm not about to complain if they do. Hope your 2012 was just as good and if it wasn't, maybe 2013 will be your year!

Happy New Year to you all!