Random Superlatives 2012

I have 2 confessions.

(1) I was ready to box up Christmas on the 26th of a December (a far cry from my childhood days of whining while we took the tree down on New Years Day.  I could have kept Christmas year 'round back then.)

(2) I look forward to doing this and my goal post starting back in November.  I don't know what it is about wrapping up the old year and starting anew. 

So here we go with my Random Superlatives for this past year...


~Favorite book read (even though it took me for-e-ver to get through:) Memoirs of a Geisha

~Favorite movie checked out from the library and watched on a night S was working, just so he wouldn't harrass me: Memoirs of a Geisha

~Best deal that ended up costing me more money in the end: going to Downeast Basics for an $80 pair of capris...only to find that they were 40% off that day!  So I bought 2 pair...

~Most incredible new recipe tried (and to be shared on my craft blog at some point, don't worry:) Black and White Cupcakes from The Sweet Tooth Fairy

~Best use of a cooking appliance rarely ever used before: Slow Cooker (Seriously.  It's probably had more use this year than the last 10 years we've owned it.)

~Best personal trainer: Bean.  After my c-section, she took me on several walks to the juice station on the maternity floor.  She wanted juice.  I needed to get back on my feet.  Perfect solution.

~Favorite song:  Three-way tie between Adele 'Skyfall,' David Guetta 'Titanium,' and September 'Cry For You.'

~Best gift received (other than having S home for Christmas for the first time in 4 years...which was my facebook status update and which I very sincerely meant:) it could be the room (and desk and shelves...) that S built for me.  Or it could be my new iPhone Santa brought me.  Or it could be my kitty-cat footsie pajamas (there's a whole other story behind that one.)  But I would have to say my 4 stone birthstone pendant he gave to me on our 10th anniversary in the very spot where we first met.  One of the most memorable moments I've ever shared with him. 

~Scariest moment: being left home alone with 2 kids for a week while S went to some out of state training.  Boy was only 10 weeks old.  Nothing catastrophic happened but I sure was glad to see S again!

~Favorite movie I expected to like (and did:) a tie between The Hunger Games and The Avengers

~Favorite movie I didn't expect to like as much as I did: What to Expect when You're Expecting.  Might have just been the proximity between watching this and Boy being born, but I cracked up during almost the whole movie!

~Thing I didn't miss at all while I was home with the kiddos this summer: Work politics, obnoxious behavior, and the doomsday-ism that tends to come with my job.  (Wow, that makes it sound horrible.  It really isn't that bad...)

~Thing that I don't miss about being home all of the time: the constant poopy diapers and spit-up that comes with a new bundle of joy.

~Proudest moment at work: validating two new instruments in record time AND validating them both to do antibody identifications when I was 8 1/2 months pregnant.  (I can multitask.)

~Proudest moment at home: when Bean came to me and told me that she had written her own name down.  I kind of nodded my head, "uh-huh," and didn't think much more until I went in the other room and...she had written her own name.  She's three going on twelve.  Also, surviving potty-training at the first of the year.

~Favorite date with S:  I loved our trip to Atlanta together last January (even though I nearly slept through half of it.)  I also loved our first evening out without the kids after Boy was born--an anniversary dinner up at Log Haven and then milling around City Creek for a few hours.  But the thing I remember the most was when Boy started sleeping well enough through the night so that S and I could stay up after the kids went to bed and watch a movie.  (I may have actually fallen asleep then, too, but I was thrilled when S suggested the idea!  It's the little things that show progress...)

~Favorite new website: Houzz.  It's like Pinterest, but with home design and remodeling in mind.  Their weekly emails are full of fantistic ideas (that I then pin to Pinterest, haha.)

~Most unexpected reaction on Christmas morning: when Bean refused to come downstairs because she thought that Santa Claus was still there.  Nothing like starting off the morning with kicking and screaming...

~Best new addition to the family: Boy.