A look back on 2019...
In honor of the New Year I am dedicating this post to the Highlights accumulated in my life this past year. 2019 has been a year of growing, balancing, and moving forward!
At the beginning of this year I was making strides to move up in the work field I am practicing and falling more in love with the man of my dreams. In February I was able to move up to a Full time position at my place of work as well as getting a raise. So as far as my job goes, It worked out pretty well. Brandon was just getting out of the training program for the Fire Department and getting placed in a Station working full 24’s and fighting fires and saving peoples lives like he dreamt of.
By March we were continuously looking for a place of our own to call home.
Then April came around and I turned 20! We spent the day at the Columbia Zoo with my Family and enjoyed a delicious burger at Fuddruckers. My lowest point of that day is that I can be pretty selfish sometimes (I'm working on it) resulting in me crying on my Birthday because I didn’t feel SPECIAL. It was like any other day to me. It did not feel like my birthday. But I have learned since then that even though that is your special day, how you perceive the day and what should make you feel special is not the same as it was when you were a child. I am an adult now and adults don’t get to be the pretty princess they were when they were 5. I mean you can, but even if you don’t it shouldn’t define how your day turned out. So I will NEVER CRY on my BIRTHDAY again! I will be happy no matter if I am stranded on the side of the road, I will find the joy.
Before the close of April came Brandon and I found the perfect place to call our first home! Come May 1st, we had signed the contract and the following days were filled with moving escapades, family time, and lots of STRESS! I remember the day we started to move all of the furniture and boxes into the Townhome, it was sometime in the afternoon and I was organizing my clothes and getting the drawers and closet space together so Brandon could get his clothes put into place. Now I have a TON of clothes. So I wanted to go ahead and get mine out of the way and organized so I could figure out how many drawers and what part of the closet Brandon needed. Instead Brandon came and took all of his clothes and placed them in the guest bedroom dresser. This made me loose it. I was about to have a melt down sitting on my not-yet-made-bed! My aunt closed the door and kept asking me what was wrong, which in-turn made it worse. I kept saying, “not right now” or “nothing” because I did not want to break down in front of EVERYONE! I mean Brandon’s Family and mine! That was embarrassing. The reason this happened was because I was STRESSED OUT! I wanted everything to go according to my plan. I wanted to get everything organized to my standard, but there was just waaayyy too many people there. Brandon moving his clothes into the other room made me feel horrible, not just because is screwed with my plan of action, but because this was our room, not MY ROOM! At this point all of my stuff was in there, but nothing of his. In the end I told him how I felt and that I was just stressed and my OCD was getting the best of me. (so to be clear, all of his clothes and shoes are now in our room) Within this month I said goodbye to my childhood room and what had been my home for the past 20 years of my life. It was a bittersweet moment because I was saying goodbye to my adolescent years and hello to the beginning of a new chapter.
Over the summer we enjoyed fixing up our backyard, days at the lake and beach, decorating our new home, and most excitingly we got our first pet together! At the end of June we welcomed Shadow, our snuggly crackhead of a kitten, into our family. Now she is much bigger and doesn’t exactly look like a kitten anymore and she isn’t even a year old yet. She loves sitting by the door or on a windowsill and watches outside, that is if she isn’t scurrying past us and getting outside! In the beginning of June I went to Girls State at GSU, it’s like a government camp for girls going into their senior year of high school. Don’t let the Government part fool you, it is so much fun and you make friendships that will last a lifetime. I was a Citizen (student) in 2016 (summer before I graduated) and I have been a JC (Junior counselor) ever since. Also in June my BFF welcomed her second baby girl into the world! She is so precious and even though I haven’t seen her in person in a few months, the pictures and videos all over social media shows me how big she has gotten! I celebrated the 4th of July with family and friends and come August we wished my god daughter (the aforementioned BFF is also the mother of this baby girl) a happy 2nd birthday. Brandon and I also took our annual Carowinds trip. One of my favorite times of the year!
Now to my favorite part, September 1st came out of nowhere and all of a sudden I am engaged to my forever love! (to see more details on this see My Engagement Story under Our Love Story Blog) We commemorated the occasion with a combined engagement and birthday party! Three days later my now Fiancé’ turned 23 and I surprised him at his Advanced EMT class with balloons and a goody basket! At the end of September I did something that I was terrified to do. I created this blog for the soul purpose to better my writing skills and to not get in a slump to where I don't go after my dreams. I guess since then these pages have been away to keep the memories I am making alive and is a great way to look back on what I did when I was 20. I am so glad that I had the courage to make this happen because in the end I am doing what I love, writing, whether 2 people or 2,000 people read this I know I put myself out there and tried. That is what counts! Come October I had already done a lot of preparations for the wedding and we hit the 2 year mark for our relationship! In our new home we hosted our first ever Halloween party, which was awesome but did not go as expected. (for more on that check out Hosting a Halloween Party) November rolls around and the Fair came into play. We had our Thanksgiving Holiday a day early this year because my giving boy volunteered to work on the actual holiday so that families could be together. I also found the perfect Wedding Dress the last weekend of November! (For more on that see My wedding dress shopping experience) Now it is December I am celebrating the first holiday season on my own, in a new house. Brandon again worked on this holiday so we had our Christmas on the Eve. This December we went to Carowinds Winterfest for the first time and had a blast! (check out Winterfest 2019 for the experience) Then My family participated in our annual Christmas Traditions. (See December Traditions for a look at what my family likes to do for the holiday season)
Now that January is here I am happy to say that I have had a good year! I made strides in my adult life and have become more mature and less lazy in the process. Don’t get me wrong I am still LAZY and a little selfish, but self help is an ongoing fixture that takes work everyday. For 2020 I am looking forward to mainly getting MARRIED, going to Disney World, and continuing to better myself!
I hope you enjoyed my ups and downs of 2019! Sending good vibes to you all for the New Year!
( I did not list all the details, and focused on mostly the good parts of 2019 and did not mention or dwell on a lot of the bad. I shared some to show that know ones life is perfect and everyone has their off days. But mainly because this year really was a great year and next year is going to be even better!)
