What a year. 2009 just plain sucked ass. We were so glad to close the door on it and welcome 2010 with open arms. It was a bumpy ride at the start. We lost a good client at the start of the year and started really questioning if we could make it. The days were dark and quiet. The nights were worse. Tears. Intense conversations. Fear. Lots of fear.

And then my pragmatic-oh-God-I’m-becoming-my-mother side kicked in and the ride took off. We made lists of old clients. We called people we hadn’t spoken to in several months and the heavens opened. March was like a light switched on and we haven’t stopped since. Websites. Copy. Ad design. Flyers. Logo. Brochures. More copy. August is usually our slowest month of the year and we barely had time to breathe.

We somehow survived the recession. Scraping together money, sometimes robbing Peter to pay Paul, praying we’d figure it out. But here we are, with money in savings, the bills paid, and the end of a business year that saw our profits double from 2009.

We have been blessed with wonderful friends, people who surrounded us when Tucker died (how do you top an offer of bringing us dinner and shedding tears with me at band rehearsal?), who graced our table and camped on our couch to watch crazy movies, who looked after our pets when we cavorted elsewhere, who loved us when we were sick and encouraged us when we were down.

We grieved Tuck.

We adopted Monkey formally and shortly after, Zion came padding across the back door with her crazy Siamese markings, crossed eyes and Hemingway paws and we have yet to let her go. Life with 3 healthy cats is so much more entertaining than I thought possible.

We’ve watched Natalie grow into this entertaining, funny, not-quite-2 year old who talks, walks, runs and is seriously the smartest kid I’ve ever seen. (Not biased at all here, she is my niece after all!)

We’ve had weddings this year.. Robyn and Andrew, Jason and Paloma. We danced. We drank. We ate and celebrated the growth of our family with 2 incredibly wonderful people. How did we get so lucky?

My family has supported us through the new adventure that is Load Bearing, encouraged us to keep on.

And as always, there’s my husband. How do I even begin?

2010 was a wild ride.  I’m blessed to have a partner who encourages me, cares for me when I’m sick or laid up with a foreign body in my foot, makes me laugh or sometimes roll my eyes.   If you’d told me when we married that this is where we’d be 2 1/2 years later, I’m not sure I would’ve believed it.  And I’d probably change a few things along the way but the depth of love I feel for this man who chose me?  I wouldn’t change that for the world.