Year in Review

2021 HIGHLIGHTS

JANUARY

To celebrate Owen's 9th birthday, our family went to iFly and the Flowrider up in Ogden, which was a big hit. January also brought about an attempted insurrection I got to watch live. Had some discussions with my kids about history in the making. Speaking of which, the boys and I watching the Inauguration was pretty memorable for me, but especially when Owen raised his fist and shouted, “We have a woman Vice President now!” once VP Harris was sworn in. A highlight for us was heading out to Antelope Island and running around on the frozen Great Salt Lake. We also quarantined as a family once Annie tested positive for COVID. Greg started a remodel of our master bathroom and laundry room since we he was off work for two weeks. And Bernie in mittens memes made the whole month.

FEBRUARY

Owen attended a Zoom class in nothing but his underwear, but I didn't catch him until it was over. We headed back out to Antelope Island to run around and take some fun pictures. The kids also did a photoshoot with their cousins for Valentines Day. Hilary got hired by the Salt Lake County Health Department to help with the vaccination efforts, and got her first dose of Pfizer. And one day the snow came down super brown and gross. Does anyone else remember that? I also cut off the tip of my finger with a mandoline slicer, and shortly after traumatized a class I was substitute teaching when they asked about my bandage.

MARCH

We spent the first half of Spring Break in Las Vegas, enjoying the outdoors, doing some indoor rock climbing, and taking the girls to see the Bellagio fountains. The best part was that it was the first time in a year we'd been able to see all of these people in one place, since we'd been camping with my whole family in Valley of Fire last March when we got the news the world was shutting down.

APRIL

We finished up the second half of Spring Break in Vernal and the National Dinosaur Park. With an added stop at the other-wordly Fantasy Canyon, which is a family favorite. I moved from my work at the mass vaccination centers to be an Event Manager for our Equity Outreach team, and my life would never be the same! Since then I've been privileged to work in every corner of this Valley, and our families have stepped in and up in countless ways, as Greg and I both work far, far too much! This year was filled with limitless gratitude for family, and a decent-sized chunk of Mom-guilt. We attended our first concert since COVID started, with a Beatles tribute band at the Maverick Center. The girls were unimpressed.

MAY

My kids enjoyed spending Mothers Day with both Grandmas together this year. We kayaked and paddleboarded several miles of the Jordan River, which is a bit of a tradition now. Annie and Ellie received their first doses of the Pfizer vaccine, and I may or may not have shed a tear or two. Isaac was Sherlock Holmes in his class play, "Geology Rocks". We celebrated birthdays for all three girls in our family. Ellie got an iPad this year, and immediately started creating super cool artwork on it. Annie got her learners permit, and teaching her to drive was about as easy as teaching Annie anything else in the life -- meaning, it took no effort on my part and has ruined me for other kids :-) This was also the month we FINALLY got the all clear on Annie's cancer scare, and her final biopsy came up as 'not great, but not awful' and we just had to remove the growth.

JUNE

Owen had his third grade egg drop. The egg did not survive. We finished up our last day of school! Later that month we headed down to St. George to swim, hike, and cave. The highlight was playing in the Virgin River. This was our first trip with Annie driving on a long road trip. Lacy's family came back up with us after the trip, and we had fun exploring Memory Grove and going paddle boarding.

JULY

July was a huge highlight of our year, as our family who lives in Saudi Arabia was FINALLY able to come back to the U.S. and spent several weeks out here in Utah with us. The kids were so excited to go to Lagoon, Causey Reservoir, Splash Summit, and Millcreek Canyon with their cousins. The girls took Frontrunner down to Uncle Cody's house for the first time to spend the weekend with their youngest cousins. We got news that Annie had passed both of her AP tests and had earned her first 15 college credits before she'd even turned 15. And this full-time working Mom finally wised up and started ordering some meal kits -- the kids have taken well to making a lot of the meals. Thank you Every Plate and Hello Fresh!

AUGUST

The kids started off August by going camping at Lagoon with my parents. We tried to spend our remaining Summer playing outside and with cousins, Annie cut off 8" of her hair, and the kids started their 4th, 6th, 8th, and 10th-grade years.

SEPTEMBER

We spent Labor Day at Nicklemania. Our Governor started off the month by calling people who wear masks 'extreme maskers' and my daughter got called a 'COVID freak' for wearing a mask out socially, and had a kid rip a mask off her face in public. I continued to spend countless hours away from my family running vaccination clinics for the County. Annie went to homecoming with her friends. We tried to squeeze in a few more visits to Lagoon in the Fall with our season passes. With our fun plans for Fall Break canceled due to COVID, when we got the news that Greg had to work out of town for two weeks, the kids and I decided to follow him for an impromptu LA trip, where we swam in the ocean multiple times (despite it being 62 degrees outside) and took the kids to Universal Studios. Hogwarts was a huge hit. And my hot take is that butter beer is hugely overrated.

OCTOBER

I decided to get my kids' pictures taken with an alpaca. Why? We still don't know. We headed back to California with some family to swim with sea lion pups, boogie board in the freezing ocean, and go to Sea World. Our hotel's heated outdoor pool was a family favorite. And this trip marked the first time I've lost one of the kids in public, and poor Owen was abandoned in a gift shop in the Arctic, where nobody noticed he was missing for twenty minutes, and with us being underground we weren't getting phone calls. He did everything right, found an employee and was taken to guest services -- my kids are still really grateful to him for getting lost, since Sea World gave us family passes for snacks and goodies!

NOVEMBER

My boys got vaccinated! God bless all the scientists! Annie was inducted into the National Honor Society, and Ellie started playing basketball for the Mountain Ridge team. We also headed down for Thanksgiving to visit my sister Lacy and her family and get to meet my new niece, Olivia. We played on some red rocks, played with family, ate good food, and learned some tricks on the silks at their local gym.

DECEMBER

I was able to go to see the Nutcracker with Isaac's sixth grade class, which was basically the first time this school year where I was able to feel like I got to be involved with anything at school! Which has been a big change from the past several years on the PTA Board. We had a snow day and the kids have enjoyed a few times out sledding after we finally got some snow this month. The rest of the month has been a blur for me, since I've been working even more than normal, but we're all looking forward to some more time all home together the next two weeks! Ellie has been counting down the days until Christmas since October, and Owen is thrilled our Elves came back this December. I'm less thrilled.

I end this year feeling extremely grateful (sprinkled with feeling overwhelmed and burned out). I will never get over how amazing these kids of mine are, how incredible of a husband I have, and feeling profoundly lucky for the two families we come from.