Wednesday, January 1, 2014

What the Newells did in 2013: A Recap

2013 was an okay year for us. Nothing overwhelmingly special happened but we did have some great times.

Trey started school at VCU in January and so far has completed three semesters and has a 4.0. I am so incredibly proud of him!

In February we celebrated our first Valentine's Day as a married couple. In true Trey-Lara fashion, we did absolutely nothing. (At this point after not doing anything for the past seven-ish Valentine's Days it would be weird if we all of a sudden started acknowledging them). I also went up to DC for a week-long conference.

In March we welcomed a new baby niece, Emily Alice and went up to Charlottesville for the Easter holiday.

In April Trey and I ran our first 5K together, the Color Me Rad 5K in Richmond. I was pretty proud of myself for finishing, but I don't think I'll do another run that involves powdery things being thrown at me.

In May we celebrated my birthday, woo hoo! Another year older. We also spent a week  in Atlantic Beach (NC) at Trey's parents' beach house. Even though it was not hot at all and it was quite windy, we had a great time. We also travelled to the western part of the state and went to a winery. It was quite a long drive and had I know that we probably wouldn't have gone.

In June I went up to Baltimore for a week long forensic anthropology class and...I don't think much else went on.

July we added over 2,000 miles onto my car by traveling from Virginia, to North Carolina, through Tennessee, to Arkansas for the 4th of July. We spent some time in TN with my mom's side of the family and celebrated the fourth by camping in cabins and canoeing down the Buffalo River in Arkansas. Trey thought it was a fantastic time. I am not an outdoorsy-let's camp by the side of the river-type girl so I found it just okay. But I hardly ever see these people from my dad's side of the family, so we grinned and beared the trek across half the country.

In August, we celebrated Harley's 5th birthday. She still acts like such a puppy I can't believe she's already five.

For Labor Day I went with my parents to the NC mountains and my father, who apparently enjoys tormenting his daughter, took some hairpin mountain curves too fast ensuring that I never allow him to drive in the mountains. Ever again.

In October we moved into a new house, one that is much bigger and has a separate place where Trey can do his woodworking and whatnot. We also celebrated our one year anniversary with a trip to San Francisco. It was SO much fun. The only thing I didn't like was that whatever the weather was reported to be was false. Very misleading as when I hear "70s" I wear shorts and a tshirt, but no, it got to 70 for 30 seconds SOMEWHERE in San Francisco (NOT where I was) and I froze to death all day. We did get nice San Francisco jackets and sweatshirts, though.

I had to work the Thanksgiving holiday so my family came up to stay with us. There was lots of yummy food and it was nice to see them.

Something else happened in November: I got hired full time at my job! I had been hoping for so long that it would happen and it did! Now we have health insurance, a retirement plant, and a bigger paycheck! We're starting to feel, sort of, more adult-like :)

Since I had to work Christmas Eve and Christmas, my family came up again and we celebrated and did the Christmasy things, just not on Christmas. (Which, as several people told me, since I don't have children it doesn't matter what I do on Christmas or when I celebrate it.  Pish.)

Trey's birthday was New Year's Eve and all he wanted to do was finish some project he has going on in his shop so he did that. We watched A Bit of Fry and Laurie on TV until midnight came and by that time we were already falling asleep on the couch. I guess we just aren't as young as we used to be :)

All in all, a pretty good year. I have a feeling, though, that 2014 is really going to be great.

Happy New Year, ya'll!!