As 2011 came to a close...

...we found ourselves in 2012.

Here we are on the other side of the New Year. I always feel complete looking back at the year, to mark the happenings and to be gracious for all we have. This year’s been a full one.

• We got married! I mean, seriously now, this is the highlight of 2011. Surrounded by our families and best friends, we vowed to take care of each other until someone kicks the bucket. This is not a small promise! (Love you, bebe!) We got the year off to a good start in March.
• January and February were filled with getting ready for our wedding. We did most of the work, from assembling the invitations and programs to decorations and writing ninety percent of the ceremony. (Yes, we cried when we first read our vows to see how they sounded. That’s when we knew we did them right.) April was spent recovering from the wedding.
• We honeymooned in Santa Fe, New Mexico. We perused art galleries, ate ourselves silly, and hiked through Tent Rocks National Monument. The photos came out pretty great. Too bad we were just learning how to use the camera.
• In professional news, Tracy earned a promotion at her structural engineering firm, which allows her to become a stockholder in 2012. San finished his first year of work at his current job, editing a professional publication.
• Tracy was appointed to the condo association board, and became the president in October. “SUCKER” must be etched into her forehead in some secret fashion.
• Over the summer, Tracy and San rearranged the small room off the kitchen (who really needs a formal dining room anyway?!) to accommodate a piano. Tracy is finally beginning to re-establish her relationship with the instrument that fueled half of a piano performance minor.
• Tracy took up a new hobby: DSLR photography. A budding pile of photography books has begun to collect on the lowest shelf of the coffee table, and Tracy’s latest purse selection took into consideration whether or not the camera would fit comfortably.
• San continues to fill all of his non-working hours dreaming of producing mead in a more structured and consistent fashion, and nurturing his new baby, I Kick Your Face Comicast. The podcast is scheduled to be a weekly downloadable discussion show about comic books and pop culture. If you’re interested, it’s on iTunes or at www.ikickyourface.com.
• Friends visited Chicago, and we visited friends. Attending the Superman Festival seems to have become an annual tradition. Tracy finally visited Niagara Falls (her second trip to Canada!) while visiting San’s family in New York for Thanksgiving. Christmas proved to be another short, busy jaunt to Kentucky. The long weekend was livened with an evening spent at a local winery that was recently opened by a couple Tracy knew from high school.

At the beginning of a new year, we raise our glasses to toast the exit of things past, and to celebrate optimism and looking forward to great adventures ahead.

The year in review

2009 was an excellent year for us, filled with grand journeys, great love and copious amounts of meat (for San). It marked the first entire year we spent together!

We traveled across the sea to glorious Ireland, where San’s BFF Holly had spent the previous three months. Holly hosted them with gusto, enchanting San with the Guinness Brewery tour where we all learned how to pour a perfect pint. San also drank several perfect pints…enthusiastically. Next came our first rugby game in the hotel pub, in which Ireland breathtakingly defeated Wales in the waning seconds of the match. After the first night of revelry, which included finding the Dubliner version of Captain America, Holly lured us into a train using wine and cheese, and stole us across the country to her abode in Galway. One day was devoted to visiting the majestic Cliffs of Mohr, underground caverns where bears once dwelled, and exploring graveyards and castle ruins. We even met her Irish Boyfriend, who introduced us to a village where where old (and not-so-old) Irishmen start drinking at the local historic pub at approximately 7:06 a.m. (The Irish Boyfriend eventually made two trips to Chi-town later in the year to see his beloved Holly.)

Shortly after returning from overseas, Tracy hunkered down to study for her professional engineering licensing exams (yes, plural, as in two). Hours, hours, and more hours at the end of March and most of April disappeared in such quiet places as coffee shops, libraries and the dining room table on Saturday and Sunday mornings. She rejoiced in July upon finding out that she passed. She can now legally oversee and sign off on dangerous projects that could very well kill you.

We met our respective families for the first time this year, traveling first to Tracy’s hometown in Kentucky. On Day One, during mid-drink at the local baked goods establishment, Tracy’s Aunt Sheila unexpectedly gave San a southern seal of approval. San also experienced a Kentucky tradition of biscuits and sausage gravy, made from scratch by Tracy’s Pop. (It was later explained that such a feast was only prepared for those her father liked.) In the fall, Tracy met San’s extended family in New York. His parents, aunts and uncles took a vote, and decided she could stay.

In June, San fulfilled his 10-year dream to attend the Annual Superman Celebration in Metropolis, Illinois. The geekfest featured the world’s largest Superman statue, a Superman Museum, appearances by Superman writers and actors, locals dressed in a variety of superhero costumes, and a nefarious gaggle of Mole Men - all eagerly enjoyed by a wide-eyed San, who gleefully purchased collectibles and photographed as many Supergirls as he could.

This year was also filled with obligatory wedding trips. We attended our first Jewish wedding in Cincinnati, complete with a “little hat” for San and kosher delicacies. Tracy was a beautiful (and unfortunately pink) bridesmaid for her brother’s ceremony in Kentucky, where she managed to be unnaturally perky for several hours. San was the best man at his childhood chum’s wedding deep in the Adirondack Mountains. He got to ride in the back of a 1940s fire truck, was appropriately introduced at the reception to the Pulp Fiction theme song and, of course, gave a riveting best man speech about the groom’s love for dragons, which had been sweetly supplanted (or at least augmented) by his love for his new bride.

Halloween was celebrated with eerie finesse, complete with costumes, cobwebs, corpse-faced fiends, chili and spider-legged cheeseballs. We hosted our friends in our first and final bash at the old apartment, filling it with opposing sounds of creepy sounds and death metal, and baking decorate-your-own cookies. The party was certified a success when the marathon partiers began battling board-game zombie legions, while Tracy mysteriously disappeared around 1 a.m. San later found her on the bed, where she mumbled, “Someone must protect the coats!”

In November, Tracy closed on her first home. During this exciting time, San reached his major personal accomplishment (along with his trustworthy chum, the Captain) for 2009: he finally defeated every single burger on the menu of his favorite restaurant, Kuma’s Corner. While San and Cap packed their bellies, Tracy spent the day packing boxes. (San made penance by spending 14 hours packing the following Saturday.) We finally moved ourselves and the two grumpy old cats in December, shortly before Christmas.

Christmas was spent with Tracy’s family, where San woke every morning to the savory smell of pork sausage in her Pop’s man-kitchen. A painful amount of food was eaten, many presents were opened (to the three kitties’ glee), and much snow and rain was driven through to get to and from the festivities. San even learned not to snuggle with the calico cat, who first played shy then tried to eat his ear.

We hope this year has been as kind to all of our friends as it has to us. Happy holidays, and may 2010 rock your arm sockets out!

San & Tracy