Looking Back at 2011

I always like New Year's Day. It's like a blank slate. There is always the promise of great things in the future. It is always a little scary of what the unknown holds but I believe 2012 will be the best ever. Maybe I'll have a working computer so that I can finally send some work in. Maybe 2012 will be the year I start to make money writing. Who knows?  Looking back on each month, here is the year at a glance...the good...the bad...and the ugly.

January: Gia turned one. We had a big party for her and celebrated the miracle that she is. It's funny...I fretted about her walking and talking and now she's running and talking so much, it's hard to believe there was anything to worry about. My heart melts each time I hear her say, "I love you, Mommy."

February: I jumped in with both feet into the blogging world and Tidbits From the Queen of Chaos was born.

March: We went to Disney again and had a blast with friends and I vowed never to go to Leo's mom's again for Spring Break (something that I am sure he is banking on me forgetting I said).

April: Nico became a teenager and my sanity began slipping.

May: Tommy's weird leg thing finally got resolved. As long as he takes the penicillin, the leg bumps stay away. We always knew he was a medical anomaly...this just proved it. So relieved that all of his tests came back normal but I remember this month being very stressful.

June: I turned 41 with the biggest non-birthday ever. We went to Wisconsin Dells with my whole family where two of my kids got sick and one never slept. A family vacation to remember forever.

July: One of the biggest power outages and I lived out of my car for awhile. Well, not really. I stayed at my mom's but it was like living out of my car. It was awful and I hope I never have to do that again.

August: The beginning of the "mouth cancer fiasco". The world stopped for a little bit. Surgery for my mouth where we found out that I never had cancer to begin with and pathologists are only human and make mistakes (though that has to be the BIGGEST mistake ever...and glad it went that way instead of the other).

September: School issues, football starts and asthma becomes a bigger concern than CF.

October: The twins turn double digits (10 for those math challenged) and things in our house started to break...I lost my computer, my washing machine, the microwave and my printer. The critters of Winfield came to live and the seed of getting organized was planted.

November: Both boys made it to the Superbowl and the house clean-up began. The entire house was purged and slowly things got fixed. It felt good to take control of the house again and I found out what great friends I have.

December: Organization found its way to my house. Nico had surgery and I learned the important lesson in never taking my family for granted and to be thankful for each day that we have together.

The biggest thing for me was writing and making the blog public. It was a huge step for me to put myself out there. It has been incredibly fulfilling. It was therapeutic to talk about things that no one talks about (infertility, late term miscarriage and CF) and liberating to talk about things that others can relate to (how hard being a wife and mother sometimes is). I had people I didn't know recognize me when I was out and people tell me that I either inspired them to do something themselves or made them feel less alone. I love to hear all of that. My favorite was when I was at Target and a stranger came up to me and said, "Are you the Queen of Chaos?" When I looked at her in shock, she said, "A friend of mine sent me your blog and I love it. I recognized you from your picture and just wanted to tell you that I don't enjoy being back in elementary school either." How unbelievably cool is that?