Happy New Year!
Had a lovely time at the two New Years parties I made it to (Katie's and Lo's), and was also happy to have a double header of neighbors for breakfast and friends for board games yesterday. There are lots of things I'm looking forward to doing in 2014! I don't make resolutions, but this year I have a bunch of goals...
2013 was a year of some pretty huge changes. I got a new job (after five years at Acumen), I bought a house for the first time (after swearing I would never do so!) and I had a baby. So, on to
Job:
-Love being in what feels like a 'real' programming job. Good atmosphere of helping out coworkers. My boss Dotan continually gave me large tasks with little guidance, and felt like I rose to the occasion (created a new UI -- Human Kite -- very proud of it).
-Had the summer of being a de-facto leader of a team of four when our boss basically went awol. Fascinating experience being the person assigning work to other people.
-Fun things like making a Harlem Shake video, retrospectives with sticky notes, and of course, the all night coding competition Hackmatch
House:
-Painting at midnight the day before we were moving in while eight months pregnant!
-The sweetness of coming home from the hospital to a sign welcoming Wendy. And then days and days of having neighbors come by with home cooked food
-Getting to know neighbors and be involved in the community has been great. Was actively recruited by two committees and am considering just doing both! Also got to be part of the first tricky political situation (regarding Christmas decorations) and was reasonably happy with the results (with ideas for how to have it go even more smoothly next year)
-Love our cooking circle of the five 'young couples' of JPC
Pregnancy:
-First trimester knocked me out, and I felt lame for needing to sleep and missing social events
-The rest was great. Took three cross country trips in the end of second/beginning of 3rd trimester. Kept running up until three weeks before giving birth. Full of energy to Do All The Things while I still Could.
-Took all the baby classes ever (a precurser to maternity leave where I joined All The New Mother Groups Ever)
Baby!
It's awesome having Wendy as part of our lives. There is a sharp divide to this year of pre-Wendy and post-Wendy. It's very fun to watch her grow. It really is true that at this age, every single week is different, and right when we discover a pattern, it changes. Some fun Wendy things this year included 'Baby Dance Time', her first smile, having mom teach her to bat the musical flowers (which resulted in briefly batting everything), her first laugh (this full throated chuckle when I was pretending to drop her!), and the hugely relaxing visit to Michigan and St. Louis where she smiled and was sweet to both sets of grandparents plus bonus aunts & cousins.
Other awesome things this year:
And also, as traditional, my unbiased list of best and worst media of 2013:
I also have a couple of long term goals. I don't think I will get to these in 2014 but I want to write them down anyway:
-Run a marathon
-Visit Egypt, Petra, and Subsaharan africa
-Go to Antarctica with my dad
Welcome to 2014 everyone! Hope this year treats you well.
- Have friends over for dinner more often. I'm considering some sort of regular thing like a 'friday dinner night' or some such.
- Have more gaming in my life (I miss apocalypse world, and wasn't very successful at making it to Glorantha in 2013)
- Travel with friends
- Connect with my Scottish relatives
- Take Wendy to the aquarium and children's museum
- Celebrate Imbolc with JPC
- Take a trip without the baby
- See movies
- Start running again
- Stay in better contact by phone/skype with friends that are far away
2013 was a year of some pretty huge changes. I got a new job (after five years at Acumen), I bought a house for the first time (after swearing I would never do so!) and I had a baby. So, on to
Job:
-Love being in what feels like a 'real' programming job. Good atmosphere of helping out coworkers. My boss Dotan continually gave me large tasks with little guidance, and felt like I rose to the occasion (created a new UI -- Human Kite -- very proud of it).
-Had the summer of being a de-facto leader of a team of four when our boss basically went awol. Fascinating experience being the person assigning work to other people.
-Fun things like making a Harlem Shake video, retrospectives with sticky notes, and of course, the all night coding competition Hackmatch
House:
-Painting at midnight the day before we were moving in while eight months pregnant!
-The sweetness of coming home from the hospital to a sign welcoming Wendy. And then days and days of having neighbors come by with home cooked food
-Getting to know neighbors and be involved in the community has been great. Was actively recruited by two committees and am considering just doing both! Also got to be part of the first tricky political situation (regarding Christmas decorations) and was reasonably happy with the results (with ideas for how to have it go even more smoothly next year)
-Love our cooking circle of the five 'young couples' of JPC
Pregnancy:
-First trimester knocked me out, and I felt lame for needing to sleep and missing social events
-The rest was great. Took three cross country trips in the end of second/beginning of 3rd trimester. Kept running up until three weeks before giving birth. Full of energy to Do All The Things while I still Could.
-Took all the baby classes ever (a precurser to maternity leave where I joined All The New Mother Groups Ever)
Baby!
It's awesome having Wendy as part of our lives. There is a sharp divide to this year of pre-Wendy and post-Wendy. It's very fun to watch her grow. It really is true that at this age, every single week is different, and right when we discover a pattern, it changes. Some fun Wendy things this year included 'Baby Dance Time', her first smile, having mom teach her to bat the musical flowers (which resulted in briefly batting everything), her first laugh (this full throated chuckle when I was pretending to drop her!), and the hugely relaxing visit to Michigan and St. Louis where she smiled and was sweet to both sets of grandparents plus bonus aunts & cousins.
Other awesome things this year:
- Went to India for Caitlin&Amod's wedding! Loved meeting their parents and sweet extended family, vacationing in Goa on the Perfect Beach
- Started staffing Cottington, really enjoyed the events, had some good parts including Master of Ceremony, Jack in the box, and Arden.
- Wrote an Iron GM game with Katie, David, Jamey, bonus food&help from Kat and Jerry. Ran it twice. Loved the pressure of staying up all night to write, and thought both runs were hilarious and madcap.
- Re-ran Second Dawn at Intercon with Ben -- great to co-GM with him again, and thought we really cleaned up the game.
- Got to meet all the new babies! Hunter, Sebastian, Noam, Malcom
- Ilya & Erica's wedding -- those amazing cupcakes! And a beautiful church ceremony
- Katie saving Procon, full of indie games
- Took part in Katie&Jerry's wedding, complete with some new bachelorette-ing experiences and a wedding weekend that felt like a reunion of some of my favorite people ever
- Three trips out West three weekends in a row: Aunt Jeanne&Uncle Bob with bonus Dana visit (Cascades! Strawberries! Fun Solstice celebration with Eileen & Kyle!); Oregon trip to see Marea&Eddie&Robin with bonus Serin&David&Hillary; St. Louis visit with relatives and Matt&Katherine&Ben
- Kendra and Adam's wedding -- beautiful day, good dancing and good company
- Lesley moving back! Yay!
- A super relaxing Staycation with delicious Gracies food
- Martha&Ali's wedding -- going with a newborn led to everyone wanting to hold the baby ever
And also, as traditional, my unbiased list of best and worst media of 2013:
- Best movie - Star Trek Into Darkness (Gravity runner-up)
- Worst movie - I didn't actually see anything terrible this year! Crazy. Clearly I need to watch more movies.
- Best TV series - Breaking Bad. So addictive. (Runner up: Downton Abby)
- Best movie seen @ home - Primer
- Best new game - Lords of Waterdeep (but if you ask anyone else I bet they would say "Sentinals of the Multiverse")
- Best musical - Once (Runners up: War Horse, Marry Me a Little)
- Worst musical - Jeckyl&Hyde
- Best book - The Corner (by the guy who wrote The Wire)
- Best pregnancy book - Expecting Better
- Best pop song (for catchiness, not message) - Blurred Lines
I also have a couple of long term goals. I don't think I will get to these in 2014 but I want to write them down anyway:
-Run a marathon
-Visit Egypt, Petra, and Subsaharan africa
-Go to Antarctica with my dad
Welcome to 2014 everyone! Hope this year treats you well.