On this, the second last day of the year...

Yup, lifting Barb's title from her last blog entry today (http://www.scrappinbarb.typepad.com/) : I know that she won't mind ! In this blog entry, I will endeavour to resume 2009, not an easy thing as it was such a heavy year. Lots of happy memories, some sad ones but also lots of difficult situations in our family life and a very busy year to boot. I feel like I never had any time off. I am very tired. I am also hopeful, positive and I'll keep going. It's been one thing after another this past year. My time-off was always filled up with appointments and errands of all kinds. My hobbies of photography and scrapbooking have been put aside - I'm hopeful that I will be able to resume them this coming year. This was year 2009 for me and I've lived it as best as I could. I've learned lots from all of my 2009 experiences. This is what the Universe had in store for me for 2009 and I feel blessed and thankful about it in many ways ... I am hoping though that 2010 will be lighter ! ;)

So, here's a random sampling of my 2009 memories (a bit long but it will be useful for me to scrap about, sometimes in 2010) :

- Great memories of my work as a teacher, having awesome teaching experiences with my students and my colleagues
- Creating new displays with my students for my school's art gallery in the main office
- Introducing scrapbooking to my class of grade 6 boys after they asked for it (they wanted to do a scrapbook like my grade 6 class of girls were doing) and then taking to it in an incredible way
- Transforming our son's playroom into a library last March : the change was great visually and the best of it was seeing my book-loving son and nephew reading even more, spending loads of time in the library, either sitting comfortably in my late in-laws comfy chair or on their stomach over a big ball. It also made it more pleasant for me to go play the piano so that I resumed playing piano almost daily !
- Putting up our home in Hull for sale in mid-July (a little heartbreaking for me as we have loved living there for the past 20 years but also happy to buy a smaller home, closer to my family and our friends)- and all that comes with putting up a house for sale (leaving at specific times to allow for visits, keeping it spic and span all the time, etc)
- Shopping for homes in Orléans during the 2 last weeks of July : we looked at so many houses on the internet and visited so many homes (sometimes 7 in the same day) that our life was consumed by it. A whole other kind of life, let me tell you ! It seemed like it lasted 2 months instead of 2 weeks. All the while maintaining our Hull home in a pristine condition for potential buyers' visits.
- Buying a new home in Orléans that we absolutely love after visiting so many that didn't appeal to us : what a blessing to have found this one in a neighbourhood that we love !
- The packing of our stuff over several weeks ; renting a small U-Haul trailer 4 Saturdays in a row; the multitude of extra trips I made from Hull to our new home in Orleans during most week evenings after DS had fallen asleep, with our car filled to the brim to then unloading it all in our new home and organizing our belongings right away so that we'd feel more at home after our big move later on ; our many trips to the red box to donate some of our stuff all the while having to keep our house always ready for people visiting our home to buy ; packing all of my art stuff (boy, do I have a LOT of it) and moving it personally in plastic bins so that I wouldn't have to pack them in boxes (more work) .
- My being dreadfully sick for 10 days in August, therefore missing our Montréal trip (DH, DS and nephew went and had a great time). I spent most of those 10 days in bed or on the couch.
- Two new great friends entering my life in the fall.
- The shopping to select wood-flooring and paint for our new home in between appointments and DH's and my work in October ; finding people to do those renovations right after we got the keys to our new home - not a small feat ! No more carpet in our home ! YES !
- Our son improving his crawl abilities while taking swimming lessons in September-October by bringing him to practise 3 nights a week in between his lessons
- Spending a night at CHEO on Halloween's Eve with our son to learn that he had H1N1 influenza virus and then spending a couple more hours after 1 a.m. to find a pharmacy that was able to fill up his prescription. We arrived home past 3:30 a.m. DH and I were literally white with exhaustion.
- My DH taking over for his boss during his medical leave.
- Our many trips to the Shawarma restaurant in Hull during our moving months (Oct. & Nov.) : we love the food at that particular restaurant and we had limited time to cook. YUM !
- Learning at the end of November about the Gatineau's Learning Disabilities Clinic after I told her that I was sure that my son had learning disabilities but that no one had put their finger on it yet.
- Having our furniture and most of the rest of our belongings moved to our new home by professional movers on Saturday November 27th, including my piano. The first thing I did after the movers had left at 3 p.m. was to play on my piano ! So thankful that we had moved lots of our stuff in the previous 6 weeks so that we didn't have to live with mountains of boxes !
- Traveling with my colleague in her car every morning to go to work : great conversations and good laughs !
- DH and I meeting the Director of the Learning Disabilities' Clinic on December 2nd (that date is etched forever in my mind) to talk about our son, knowing that we had finally come to the right place (team of multidisciplinary experts) to help our son after searching for more than 5 years.
- Our son being evaluated the next morning by the first specialist at the Learning Disabilities Clinic and finally having more information about our son's learning disabilities coexisting with his giftedness and epilepsy at a subsequent meeting with the LDC's Director.
- The Christmas student concert that I participated in with my colleagues at school, playing on the new school keyboard. That concert was such a smashing success !
- Creating many musical parts for the above-mentioned Christmas concert. It was great for me to reconnect with music after so many years of doing nothing musically ! LOVE that ! It was so good for my soul !
- Celebrating Christmas with my family (father, brothers, sisters, etc) on Dec. 18th
- Our son having a 24 hour ambulatory EEG on Dec. 22nd to get more information about his epilepsy. It went very well and he was such a trouper. I call him my champion ! The hardest part was seeing him suffer when the specialist was removing the "glue" from his head afterwards. It was very painful for him. We finally opted that he keeps the white "glue" on his head and he had it unglued in the warm shower afterwards. We celebrated the patience of our son by going to his (and ours) favorite Thai restaurant, Royal Thai, in downtown Ottawa for lunch. Yummy !
- Our son's happiness in receiving the Nintendo DSi for Christmas, his two Lego boxes (airplane and helicopter) and a few books (some on his favorite animals, the penguins).
- Our little family of 3 celebrating Christmas on Dec. 25th in a relaxed manner in our new home, all cozy.
- Our little fun trip to Montréal after Christmas ending with our wonderful visit with Nathalie and her family at their place : they were truly the highlight of our trip ! Thanks again !
- Organizing our home - it's a long process but I am enjoying it as I love organizing our home.
- Our many trips to IKEA : buy, return, check the AS-IS section, etc. We have eaten quite a lot of their hot dogs for a quick meal since the end of November ! We also got some great deals in their AS-IS section, amongst them a couple of great bar chairs for DS's worktable, a CD unit and my new scrap table.
- The joy in my DH's face in finally buying a new high-tech television a couple of weeks ago and picking it up last night !

Mostly, I'm deeply thankful to have my family and friends in my life and our health. Those are truly the most important things in life. I never forget it, this year more than ever.

I'd love to hear about your 2009 year, the joys and the challenges of it ! In the meantime, this gal has more areas to organize in our new home and some laundry to do while the boys are out at Canadian Tire to get something to hang our heavy mirror in the entrance and donate some Christmas decorations at the donation center in Orléans. Hurray for more simplicity in our lives ! Take care !

Danielle
xoxo