I’ll be honest and say that 2018 was a hard year. Probably the hardest
yet for us. It is easy to just want to mark the year as defective and
toss it away not to be remembered. But though there was so much
heartache and a lot of difficult times there were still moments of
beauty and that is what I want to remember from this year. It doesn’t
change all the terrible that happened this year. It doesn’t bring my
nephew back. But it keeps the year from feeling quite so dreary. It is
good to have a more scaled back overview to see that everything comes in
waves, the good and bad. Some waves are just much more destructive than
others. Here are just a few of the things that are imprinted in my
memory- in no particular order
- running miles with Jason through the Redwoods without another soul in
sight and a big smile on my face. Then hiking by a large pack of elk to
get to a completely deserted beach
- running my 5th marathon and breaking 4 hours
- snorkeling to see leopard sharks in La Jolla
- hiking through the desert to the Fossil Springs waterfalls
- seeing Courtney Barnett in concert and having her smile at me the entire show – then getting the set list afterwards
- watching hundreds of Chinese lanterns floating into the sky at the lantern festival
- finally getting to see Jack White and also MGMT in concert
- writing and singing a song with Jason for his mom’s 70th birthday
- going for rides on Jason's sibling's firetruck
- spending lots of time with family
Rowley family pics
fifth marathon
love this photo of Tarley I took in March :)
hiking to Fossil Springs on Brin's bday in April
Jason's brother got married in May!
MGMT concert in May was amazing
we went on a short trip to Flagstaff with our niece Madi. we went to the Lava caves, some ruins, and slide rock in Sedona.
in June we lost our sweet 17 year old nephew Mason. our family will never be the same without him.
the end of June we went to California to celebrate my birthday and hang out at the beach with some of Jason's family. it was good to get away but difficult after just having lost our nephew.
I got a ukulele for my birthday! I love playing it along with my guitar and I'm hoping to continue getting better.
July 4th
sometime around then we got two new dogs Ruger (black and white) and Sparky. they are Jason's brothers' dogs - and since he just got married he needs us to keep them temporarily until he's not renting. it may end up being permanent which I'm fine with.
we saw Jack White in august! no phones were allowed so this is the only pic we got. The White Stripes are one of Jason's all time favorites and so this was a dream for him. he is an phenomenal guitar player and I was glad he played a lot of White Stripes and some Raconteurs songs.
in September we went on another roadtrip in California. we went to Lake Tahoe, the Redwoods, San Francisco, then met up with Jason's family in La Jolla. I plan to blog more about it later.
we saw Death Cab for Cutie for the sixth time at the Van Buren. they are always amazing.
in October I saw Courtney Barnett at the Van Buren. I have been a fan of hers for a few years but after her concert I was a little obsessed with her. I was pretty close to the front and during the show she kept looking at me and smiling- it made me feel pretty special :). she was also amazing live and rocked out pretty hard.
Tempe Town lake walk around Halloween.
in November we spent a day in LA and then two days at Disneyland/California adventure with some of Jason's family. Jason's niece had won some tickets and was nice enough to give us one of them :)
I'm sitting by my niece Madi and that's our brother in law and nephew behind us :)
Jason had mentioned playing a prank on his sister on her doorbell camera to our niece Madi. one friday she wanted to really do it since his sister had gone out of town. we showed up at her house wearing all black and hoodies and went to the dollar store and found these Purge-style masks. we went to his sister's house and first we went to her driveway camera and all stood spaced apart staring at the camera. we realized it didn't work so we rang the doorbell and the pic below is what she saw. it was so hilarious and fun Madi and I had a hard time not laughing. his sister said she was freaked out for a few seconds then realized it was us.
we were so sad to lose our hedgehog Kiwi in November that we quickly bought a new baby hedgehog in December. her name is Tilly and she is adorable!
we rented Bird scooters with Jason's brother and his family one night and it was lots of fun riding them around the neighborhood.
we went on lots of firetruck rides this year on Jason's siblings' firetruck- it was perfect for looking at Christmas lights.
Jason wrote a song for his mom's 70th birthday that we played at her party. we practiced it a lot and we had a lot of fun performing it.
Lepetich family pictures done by Jason's sister.
day after Christmas hike in Superstition mountains with some of my family.
here are some past year reviews or year favorites lists:
2008
2012
2014
2016
2017
