2021 was better. After establishing some antibodies from catching COVID in the beginning of the year and lightening up of restrictions as cases declined, there were freedoms we hadn’t enjoyed in many months. I’m grateful for the improved experience of existing this year. There were many things I enjoyed that I’m excited to update you on.

Before reviewing the year as a whole, I want to share my current life situation. I started a new job on January 3rd with a data strategy consulting group, January Advisors. They focus on data consulting services specific to civic engagement efforts. I’m the Director of Business Development and incredibly excited about the new opportunity. It’s a great chance to combine my personal interests and academic background with the business development skills I earned through my 4.5 year job at MacroFab. The position is fully remote and the organization is primarily based in Houston. I am stoked that I get to live in Denver and have policy impacts in the city nearest and dearest to my heart, Houston.

I had three months off between jobs. It was the most free time I’ve had since before I started working at 14. I expected the time off to be a reward and a punishment in the same swing. It was. After years of a high intensity job and more than a decade of keeping myself busy 100% of my time, the pace of not working was a hard adjustment. I have some wonderful personal achievements from my time off; I furthered my sewing capabilities, took up a daily yoga practice, jogged, journaled and most importantly addressed my mental health. My anxiety had reached new heights since late 2019 and without work, I had plenty of time to fester in it like never before. After a few months on a waitlist I was finally able to see a psychiatrist. I was diagnosed with a panic disorder and general anxiety disorder (GAD). I started on medication in November and I’ve experienced significant improvements since then. The GAD wasn’t news to me. It’s something I’ve dealt with my whole life and been able to manage successfully. Overall, I’ve actually really appreciated my anxiety. It has helped me be a high-achiever and resolve negative scenarios in my life quickly. The panic disorder, however, was news and quite honestly has been hell to live with over the last couple years. My hope is that the medication can help me mitigate the panic disorder and leave it in the past. We will see how I am doing here in a few months to a year. I want to extend my deepest thanks to those of you that have been a listening ear or someone to provide advice during this time period. It’s getting better all the time.

David and I moved to Denver in July of this year and our schedule has been jammed packed since. We are fully settled since our move and have a wonderful 3 bedroom apartment walking distance from the Denver Botanic Gardens. Unfortunately, the rental market here is crazy and we have to look for new housing come March 2022. Our rent increased about $300/mo and we are saving to buy a house. Paying this much just doesn’t make sense but we are still looking forward to the new apartment we will be in. My parents got to visit us in November and we had a great time sharing our home and showing them around over the weekend. David’s job as a freelance graphic designer has been incredibly steady and inspiring this year. He’s currently working on rebranding his own business and it has been really great to see his excitement in this endeavor. We have been going through pre-marital counseling since November and talking about setting up goals to buy a house this year. We are thrilled and terrified. I keep telling him that I am not ready to be this grown up and he always kindly informs me I’ve been a grown up for years. I refuse to believe him.

In summary, 2021 was a step up from 2020. I’ve had a lot of big life changes; a move to a new state, a new job, new friends, and new personal reflections. I got to enjoy more “normal” things like eating at restaurants, attending concerts, hiking, and domestic travel. Now, to share a few more detailed updates on the year.

January

I tested positive for COVID in January after Christmas. David and I were about to start a long-delayed road trip when we were exposed. We cancelled the trip but got to enjoy a nice romantic New Year’s Eve celebration at home. January 6th was the day I tested positive. He never tested positive. I had flu-like symptoms that lasted for about 9 days, with only 3 of those being complete exhaustion. I lost my taste and smell completely for about 3 months. My smell came back first but was weak. My taste finally started to return once I got my second vaccination in April but it has not been the same since. I am at least thankful that I can now enjoy more spicy food than I could before. This was the most major event in my personal life this month. Besides this, David and I spent a lot of time with our cats and sprucing up the house. We played and play a lot of chess. A later Christmas present from David to me arrived this month and it was a beautiful wooden chess board. Once I recovered I returned back to the office for work.

February

Since COVID delayed our already delayed trip, we finally had a getaway in February. We settled for a lovely weekend in the woods at F7 lodges in College Station, TX. It was a lovely quaint and remote little cabin. Since the cabin was so close to College Station, we ventured into town so I could visit with the family I befriended when working at the donut shop in college. Their brother, David, passed away just a few weeks earlier. I was happy to have met with them to mourn and catch up.

The weekend after we got back from the trip, the freeze in Texas hit. I didn’t think it was going to be anything serious. I’m used to hurricanes after all, how bad could some snow be? We woke up on Monday February 15th with no power and frozen pipes. We ended up throwing our cats in the car and driving up to Spring to stay with my parents. What normally is a 45-minute drive took us 3 hours with ice. We saw multiple large trucks spin off the road. It was stressful but David handled the drive for us gracefully. We stayed for about 5 days and enjoyed a lighter work week and company with my family. We had a game night with my folks and lots of wine in which my mother proceeded to slaughter us all in Monopoly. The week stay in Spring convinced David to get an oculus headset too.

At the end of the month, David and I took a trip to San Antonio to see his best friend Ben who moved back to Texas from Denver during the pandemic. We also saw my best girlfriends and celebrated Wilson’s birthday. It was our first social event of the year and one of many trips to Austin.

March

The first event of this month was a dominos pizza delivery mishap that left us with 5 pizzas. I have no regrets.

David and I explored the new addition to the Houston Museum of Fine Arts. They had been working on an expansion for about 2 years and it was well worth the wait. I’ve been back 4 times since then and still have not been able to complete the building because it is so big.

Middle of March, the girls and I took a road trip to Arkansas. I was amazed at the natural beauty of the state. It was completely unexpected. It had also been 7 years since the four of us had taken a road trip together. Our last trip was to Colorado in 2014. We stayed a beaut of an airbnb, met a great friend of Levy’s, hiked, met up with strangers, and had a good time.

I celebrated my 27th birthday on the 19th. David and I spent the evening with my family in Spring. I was gifted a pair of uggs and a delicious cake.

We had many friends over this month who enjoyed playing with our oculus.

April

April was a lazy, rainy month, spent mostly in Houston. We had visits from people we love. We spent so much time at home in 2020; we put a lot of love and consideration into it. I am still proud of the first homemaking we got to do together. It was great to share it with others.

David’s parents visited us in late April. We played oculus, got drinks at my favorite spot in Houston, Better Luck Tomorrow, and introduced them to my folks over dinner! April was my mom’s birthday and both of David’s parents’ so we purchased a cake that said “Happy Birthday Sarah, Ken, Amy, and not Ron”. Dinner was great and we were so happy to have grouped up people we love. We gave Ken and Amy a tour around Houston the next day.

May

May starts to feel like summer and brings lots of fun. This month we solidified the details of our move to Denver and found our apartment. We got to explore the city with my parents for Mother’s Day. David and I traveled to San Marcos to celebrate my best friend Levy’s graduation from Texas State University with her Masters' degree. A tradition I love about Texas State graduates is that when you graduate, you jump into the river. I didn’t get to be there for Levy’s undergraduate jump and loved seeing it this go around. We spent the weekend at an Airbnb with her family. Her mother, Cindy, is a retired elementary school teacher and has been a staple mom to our friend group since high school. She read us new children’s book about the adventures ahead and I cried the entire time. The next day we had a long and miserably cold float down the river. The experience created memories nonetheless. We also hosted some dinner parties this month and I got a long-desired haircut.

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June

This was my most active month at work this month. With COVID spread lightening up, we had more customer visits, which meant more dinners around town. It was also my and David’s last month before we moved. It was full of packing, goodbyes, and sentimentalism. We visited his family in Austin one last time, shared a few dinners and nights out with my parents, and had drinks at Better Luck Tomorrow as often as we could. David packed up and left at the end of the month with our Uhaul full of things. I lingered for a couple of days so that I could drive up with the cats and finish my in-person work. A huge thanks to Chris Truong but helping David and I pack up our house and the truck, my parents for letting me crash at their house for a few days with the cats, and my friend Jayme for making the trip to Denver with me.

Leaving Houston and moving to Denver was closing a big chapter. I had dreams of living in Denver just after college and that fell through but allowed me to create a really great life in Houston. I didn’t always love and appreciate the city for what it was before that time period. I’m so thankful for it. Finally making the move to Denver 4 years later was scary and I knew I had to shed any prior expectations I had for what the experience would be. I no longer was just moving out of state, like I would have been in 2016, I was leaving home. I’m forever grateful to my parents for moving us out of California and choosing Spring to raise us in. The lush suburbia I grew up in provided me with more life experiences and opportunities than I could have asked for. I have found forever family in the friends I made from high school and my very special college group of clear lake friends. The career and financial gains presented to me have put me in a stable situation I would have not thought possible in college. A very special place in my heart for my time here.

July

Our first month in Denver was a blast. The trip out with the cats and my girlfriend Jayme started out hellish but around the 6 hour mark was calm. It took us two hours to get out of Houston because the cats kept getting sick. I selected Jayme as a co-pilot because I love her but also because she is a mother to three cats and I knew would be willing to deal with bodily fluids with me. She’s the best.

We got there around 9 pm the same day we left. We were greeted by David’s best friends Ben, Cole, and Sean. They had made Pina Coladas for us. We sat in our empty back room with the cats and joyfully celebrated our arrival. The weekend Jayme was in town we went to the botanic gardens and celebrated the 4th of July with some friends.

Later in the month, I drove to Telluride to help my friend Alyssa with her micro-wedding. Telluride is a beautiful mountain town about 7 hours away from Denver. I had a great solo trek and loved getting to see her on her big day. July is also David’s birthday and this year it was his 30th. We got some fancy sushi and drinks with pals. It was heartwarming to see David’s happiness being surrounded by his best friends again. We bowled the following weekend and went on our first hike in our new state.

I also made the decision to put in a two months notice at my job. There were many reasons for this decision but the driving force was that I was in need of a change in mission and structure. I am lucky to have been surrounded by great mentors for my time at MacroFab.

August

My first day of the month started off with a bang! Literally. Someone banged into my my car. Apparently hit and runs are common in the area. Bummer. Luckily, my insurance covered all of the costs but it meant that were without a car for the entire month. So we missed out on the last feasible month for camping but learned how to use the bus system and enjoyed some outings.

I had a visit back to Houston for work and saw family and friends as well. When I got back David and I went to our first musical event since COVID started, Underground Music Showcase (UMS). UMS is a collection of, mostly, local musicians that post up to perform along Denver’s South Broadway.

September

Beginning of September David and I took a trip out to Vermont for his cousing Gretchen’s wedding. We spent the long weekend with his family and it was such a great time! The wedding was beautiful and it was my first time seeing other parts of the north east besides NYC. I was really amazed with Vermont.

Later in the month, I had my last trip out to Houston for the year and it was about 2 weeks. During the time I visited my favorite spots, family, and friends. We even got to have a mother lunch date with my friend Levy’s mother and mine. This visit was primarily to close out my operations at MacroFab but it felt more like my true departure from Houston; more than the move did.

October

I wrapped up work early this month. It was a sentimental and scary closing but I was excited about having time off. I got an offer with a new company, January Advisors, this month and accepted it. I agreed to start as their Director of Business Development in January 2022. Which meant I would have October, November, and December off. This would be the first time since high school that I would have 3 months of time off.

David and I went to a fall festival event in Denver and picked out some pumpkins. It was a cute family fun event in beautiful open air.

I took an 8 day trip to Austin this month to visit my girlfriends. It was a blissful and exhausting trip that felt like being in college again. My girlfriend Becca, flew out from LA to hang and see the F1 races. Her and my girlfriends, Wilson, Levy, and Tori, got a long so well and I felt so lucky to have these women in my life.

After getting back, I started an almost daily yoga practice which kept me sane during my time off. David and I prepared for Halloween, which is also our anniversary. This was the first year I had planned in advance for the holiday and it paid off. We went as Batman villains, Poison Ivy and The Riddler. On October 31st, we celebrated our 2 year anniversary by brunch-ing in the mountains.

November

This was a fairly restful month in Denver. I got to watch the Astros lose the world series to the Atlanta Braves. David and I took a trip to Amarillo celebrate Michael and Clara’s wedding; his brother and, now, sister-in-law. We celebrated the wedding at their new home near Canyon Texas. It was a joy to meet the people in Clara’s life for the first time. Afterwards, we got tex-mex and story told for a few hours before playing board games. When we got back from Amarillo, we had a few trips to Meow Wolf throughout the month. If you haven’t heard of Meow Wolf, it’s an incredibly interactive exhibit with a few locations in the western US. It’s remarkable and a playful time for anyone who visits. Closer to Thanksgiving my parents drove out from Texas for the first time to visit. I was so happy to have shown them our house and a bit of the city. We had some good food and a pretty anticlimatic train ride in the mountains. My mom recovered some of the fun into the train ride by establishing a flirty back and forth with our train car’s Santa Claus. Sadly my folks had to leave earlier than planned because my mom got altitude sickness. I am still so grateful that we got to spend the time together.

At the beginning of this month, I realized that I needed something more to do than just hobbies so I started some casual pet walking/sitting on Wag! The week of Thanksgiving I house and pet sat for a family in northern Denver. I really enjoyed the time in a new space and with these great pets. The actual day of Thanksgiving, David and I spent with our recently engaged friends Sean and Sally, at Sean’s parents’ place. It was great to be surrounded by friends during the holiday but I definitely found myself missing family.

Personally, this month was full of a lot of growth for me. Without work, I was doing a lot of cooking, exercising, journaling, reading, and sewing. I saw the psychiatrist this month and got the diagnosis that I referred to earlier. It felt defeating and welcoming all at once. David and I also were about halfway through our pre-marital counseling sessions around the end of this month. I had thought we would do this and after a few sessions, the counselor would say to us, “Well, you basically have an A+ in your relationship. You can get married now”. Obviously, it didn’t go like that but nonetheless, it has been a really beneficial experience for both of us and I’m really lucky to have a partner that wanted to go through this step as well.

December

This was the first December in a few years that didn’t feel like it just suddenly was plopped on my lap. I wasn’t left with the common sensation of the year being over before I knew it. It felt like an expected and well-paced closing on a very eventful and fruitful season. We spent the first part of the month just hanging out at home and around town. A group of friends here had a holiday celebration at a karaoke bar, which was fun and embarrassing. I got a new tattoo this month! They are two fortune cookies on my left arm. One says “Yesterday” a call out to a Beatles song and the other says “Better Luck Tomorrow” a reference to my favorite Houston spot but mostly just something I tell myself on bad days.

On December 22nd, David and I left for our road trip out to Michigan to celebrate Christmas with the Singers! We stopped in Missouri at a cute little Airbnb in the woods. On Christmas Eve we arrived in Chicago and zoomed with my family to participate in secret Santa and general Christmas eve festivities. My mom wore a rainbow unicorn onesie and was a great host. We got the VRBO in Michigan on Christmas day. Our trip consisted of great meals, board games, puzzles, stories, lots of laughs and a few sentimental tears. We were at the house from December 25th- January 1st. This trip was the highlight of my year.

I have 2 separate picture threads below. One capturing general activity this month and the other one is specific to the Christmas trip.