Twelve?? I"m Supposed to Pick 12?!?!

Dwija has put a call out for posts which include 12 favorite photos from 2014.  Clearly Dwija doesn't know that I have taken thousands of photos this year alone, and choosing 12 would cause much angst and time and hand wringing and time and himming and hawing and time and did I mention time?

Luckily for you all, it's Christmas break and I require less sleep when I don't have to drive kids hither and yon each and every all day.  I was able to narrow the photos down to 12 photos highlighting the big events of our year.  

First up, the winter which shall not be named, because I don't ever want to hear those two words ever, ever again.  There was only one good day out of the entire winter.

Phoenix carrying a bootless Turken back to the house.

By March, the kids and I were fed up with the cold, so we packed up the van and headed south for Spring Break.  No reservations.  No definite plans.  We just drove on back roads until we saw something interesting or felt like taking a silly photo.  We took quite a few of them.

In April, my sister remarried. One of my brothers and my mom made the 10 hour drive and met up with my dad in Virginia for the wedding.  No kids.  No spouses.  I was surprised at how quickly grown adults can revert back to their childish ways when they travel with their parents.

It took us about 20 tries to get one in which we are both in the air at the same time.

I am behind the wheel of the van a lot.  I mean a lot a lot.  One of the few positives of the situation is that I get to see all sorts of beautiful sunsets and awesome views in the sky.

Bryan and I celebrated our 20th anniversary this summer by taking a trip of a lifetime to London and Paris.  I took hundreds of photos, some of them I really liked, but I'm posting the photo someone else took of us.  Partly because it is one of the few of the two of us, but mostly because I find it hilarious that we were photo-bombed by a double decker bus.

Ten days after our return, I finally had surgery to correct the spectacular disaster I made of my knee when I played soccer with my kids a tad too competitively.   Bryan took this photo of me when I was still completely doped up on pain meds and passed out in the middle of eating my cup of pudding.  I think it was to get back at me for calling him a bad driver on the way home from the hospital.

Please don't ask me why a Christmas pillow was out in the middle of July but was sitting in a box on Christmas Day.

Ten days after surgery, we took our 12th annual vacation with our high school friend and his family.  This year we spent the week at a lake in upper Wisconsin.

We only made it to the local pool one time this summer.

With the knee injury and subsequent 4 weeks of therapy, surgery, and 6 more weeks of therapy, the kids had to basically raise themselves and take care of me over the summer.  I felt terribly guilty about it, so instead of going to the state fair in August like we normally do, I surprised them with an afternoon at King's Island.. Who knew the park has such a fabulous area for younger kids??

How can I do a year-end wrap-up without mentioning soccer?  With 5 kids playing on 5 different teams, I can't.

Mine is the keeper.

It was the youngest's year for a special trip, and he wanted to go to the beach. I took him to Florida, where we stayed with a blogger friend for four full days.

That's my baby, approximately 30 feet in the air.

And because this year didn't have quite enough travel in it (That's a joke.  We never, ever travel this much in one year!), Bryan and I jumped at the opportunity to take a (remarkably cheap) trip to the Bahamas.  In December.  I still can't believe we did it.

The view from our hotel room.

Despite the minor calamities of dead pigs, broken bones, knee trauma, shredded car wires, and chicken mass murder, it's been a wonderfully fun year.

Thank you for being a part of it.

I pray your coming year is full of laughter and fun.  Take lots of photos!

If you'd like to join the link-up, head on over!



Have a lovely day!