Now that 2008 is solidly behind us, I wanted to take a few minutes to share my “Best of 2008”.  A lot of things happened to me in 2008, some bad, some good.  Rather than dwell on the negative (which I have a tendency to do), I want to focus on the positive things that I experienced over the last year.

  1. Bob and I celebrated our first wedding anniversary.  The first year was rough, especially getting used to living with each other, but I believe we passed with flying colors.  I am thrilled to say that our marriage gets better with each passing day.
  2. My baby sister graduated from college.  I know it didn’t happen to me, but I am just so proud of the incredible woman that my sister has become.  Smart (she has officially out-nerded me in the academic department), beautiful, and incredibly talented, Kristen is going to go a long way.  You rock!
  3. I finally paid off my lawyer.  Woo hoo!
  4. I learned how to knit!  Thanks to Sarah (and her online knitting video recommendations), I know can competently knit a beautiful scarf!  Guess what everyone got for Christmas? 🙂  Goal for 2009: learn how to purl.
  5. I reconnected with friends I thought I had lost forever.  I am so happy to have them back in my life.  You know who you are!
  6. My brother in law has almost fully recovered from his illness – the aorta which spontaneously dissected itself back in June.  Our entire family is overjoyed that he’s doing well, and is back to work.  It will be some time before he’s back to 100%, but we’re all so grateful that he’s still here and can watch his beautiful daughters grow up.
  7. Which reminds me – our niece Madeleine was born in January!   She just celebrated her first birthday.  She’s been mobile since 9 months of age, and is apparently creating a path of destruction wherever she goes.  She’s absolutely adorable.
  8. I joined Facebook, and have been in touch with so many people that I had nearly forgotten about, from high school and college.  Best part: seeing all of the embarrassing photos from the 80’s and 90’s.  Worst Part: Facebook is more addictive than crack.
  9. Speaking of crack, I got a BlackBerry.  I love it.  I have no idea how I managed to function as a human being before.
  10. My neighbor Chef Mark, gave me a personal cooking lesson in his kitchen.  He taught me to make Osso Buco.  I had the time of my life being his sous chef.   We got to share the results with our spouses afterwards. We plan many more of these lessons.  Mark and Mary are such good friends!

I’m sure there are more good things that happened to me last year, but these are the highlights.

Here’s to an even better 2009!  L’Chaim!