2009 has been equal parts awesome and awful. I can’t remember any other, aside from perhaps 2006 (sick, but met the Chop) and 2003 (my Nana died/my sister got divorced, but moved to the East Coast), where there was such an equal amount of good and bad.

January
We elected a new president, and although it hasn’t been all roses, I’m still glad he’s it.
We started planning the wedding and getting pressure for our “no gift” policy. Sigh. And I lit our oven on fire.

February
We picked our wedding spot, caterers and photographer—and they all turned out to be absolutely perfect.
A dear friend lost her husband.

March
We went on vacation in Ireland, which was amazing. Even though I have a little bitterness about not moving there, lol.
My dryer crapped out, three of our favorite restaurants closed and, oh yeah, that 15% pay cut. Damn the recession.

April
We went and saw David Sedaris, the world was introduced to Susan Boyle and the Chop and I decided to start house hunting.
I had to go to Vegas for our conference; we put an offer on a house that turned out to be the lemon of the century (hello $30k in fixes)… and so we pulled out.

May
Went to a very entertaining wedding of a good friend—and on the same day, found the house we would buy.
We house-hunted every weekend.

June
Bought our house, switched states and marked four years of blogging.
Moved out of my favorite place and left my home of four years.

July
Quit one job and got another. Kept the other job as a client for more money and less pain—win, win.
The dog decided to inaugurate the house by using the basement as her personal toilet—very. bad.

August
Oh god, the wedding planning. And the DMV. And the lack of air conditioning. August was rough.

September
Convinced my parents I should be able to wear red at my wedding. Built the wedding website.
Wedding planning. Hell. Went dress shopping. Double hell. Worked like a dog.

October
Went to TX, where my awesome godmother made my VERY RED dress!
Worked like a dog. Went to ME with my mom and sister—where we fought constantly. Tried to convince Chop that we should elope already goddamnit.

November
Went back to WA for a bridal shower, where my awesome cousin surprised me, which was lovely. My family came for Thanksgiving, which was also surprisingly lovely.
Counted down to the wedding, with all the insanity and annoyances that came with it. Worked like a dog.

December
Got MARRIED—now I get to wear an additional shiny, shiny ring. Went to MN for Christmas and had so much fun. Am planning to spend New Year’s happily ensconced at home, with my husband.
Went through so much insanity during the week of the wedding—and the wedding. Dealt with every possible crisis that could come up. Am still exhausted from the entire year.

Very happily got married, which made the entire year worth it.
Isn’t my husband the cutest?

It’s been five years and I still feel like it was yesterday my Nana passed away.

How time flies.

We miss you still.

I’m leaving on Thursday to go hang out with my parents while my dad’s at a conference in Philly. While we’re there, my mom and I will be traveling to her hometown, putting flowers on the graves of my grandparents and visiting my Nana’s best friend Emma… who is in her 90s and still kicking.

I was trying to think of something we could do, or bring, this amazing woman who lives alone in the middle of nowhere, and I remembered a conversation I once had with my grandmother.

Every time she came to visit, she made cinnamon rolls from scratch, and I am telling you, they are the greatest things in the world. She’d get up early, mix up a batch of dough, let it rise for a few hours, then roll it out, spread the different ingredients on, roll it up and let it rise again for another few hours before she baked them in a brown sugar-butter syrup. One of my fondest memories of when I was young was eating the “ends” off the raw cinnamon-sugar-butter dough roll-ups before she placed them in the pan to rise and bake. She always made six pans (oh the deliciousness, normally two were gone on day one!), and I asked her what she did with them when she was at home (she had lived alone for over 20 years).

Oh I give them away, she said. The neighbors, your aunt comes and gets a pan and then I always give one to Emma. She loves my rolls.

So yesterday I shopped, and today I got up early and made the dough. And this dough? Not easy. For some unknown reason my mom and I have horrible luck with yeast, LOL. It’s either old, or our water is too hot, or the bowl is too cold, etc., but yeast is the bane of my baking existence. Amazingly, the yeast worked this time… granted, I bought it fresh yesterday, heated the bowl and used a thermometer to measure the water, but I was still stunned.

Now I’m waiting for it to rise and missing my Nana.

Update: Finished product!

Driving to yoga tonight I ended up behind a tow truck, whose noxious fumes caused me to hold my breath and breathe through my mouth.

And suddenly my mind flashed back a dozen years, Kathy Troccoli was playing in my head, cold air was wrapping around my legs and the smell of exhaust annoyed my nose.

Then I started laughing, and debated calling my sister to see if she remembered our weekly bus trips to the mountains during the winter. (I’m sure you do, right?)

For a few years (I honestly can’t remember how many), my parents signed my sister and I up for weekly ski trips to the mountains. Our Dad would wake us up at 5AM on Saturdays, feed us breakfast (favorite being the refried bean and egg burritos, yum) and drive us to the bus pickup, where lots of other kids joined us to drive the two hours north.

We’d ski/snowboard for a few hours, have lunch up there and drink cocoa, ski some more, then pile back into the buses around 4PM, the smell of car exhaust and the cold being the predominant things I can recall.

I don’t remember enjoying it as much as I thought my sister did, but I was going through my try-to-be-the-best-Christian-possible-and-maybe-I’ll-actually-believe-it phase, so I didn’t talk to a lot of the other kids on the bus, tended to ski alone and wore my headphones on the rides to and fro (hence the memories of Kathy Troccoli, lol).

We finally stopped going sometime when I was in high school. It was always so early (for a Saturday, sheesh), and I think they finally trusted us to do what we wanted on the weekends… granted, that ended up involving jobs and boyfriends and late nights, but it was way more fun. ;)

Still, whenever I smell bus exhaust (particularly in the winter when it’s cold), I remember those trips and smile.