HMOH: best of 2011

What's best about keeping a running blog of moments in time is the ability to look back on what you were doing a year ago.  The lessons you learned, the highlights, the low points, the people who stuck it out alongside you and made the journey what it was supposed to be.  A year older, definitely a year wiser. To be fair, I worry most not about what the next year will bring, but how many sheets of my daily to-do list I'll have to get through before I get the "month/date/12" right.  


So, have you accomplished all you set out to do (I mean, I know … that 5 lbs stuck out the year with me too)? Have you said the things you wanted to say or become the person you want to be?  Written that book you swear you're meant to?  


In preparation for letting the past year pass and embracing the next (it's going to be a good one, for real) … here are some wise words people have told me, or quite frankly I make up.  Regardless, this is the best of what 2011 has left me with.

• The powers that be will never toss you more than you can handle.  You'll learn that you can take on way more than you thought you could. #factoflife
• It could always be worse … but let's be serious, it could always be better.
• Even if you have to spend your weekends at wedding activities, you're spending them with your best friends.
• Natural disasters - hurricanes, earthquakes, college scandals, maids of honor - they can shake your core and worry you, but with those you love by your side … they become just another experience (and if you know me, a blog post).
• Despite your best efforts at bachelorette parties, you may find yourself faced with outrageous strippers, bride-to-be's ex boyfriends and high school acquaintances.
• Sometimes you just have to sit back and be grateful for what you have - and don't have - anymore.
• Just because they moved on does not mean they won.  It means someone else gets to deal with their bullshit.
• Double chins may come and go, but best friends - whether near or far - are forever.
• Let work teach you new things, open your eyes to new experiences and cultures, and fulfill you.  Don't let it consume you.
• New York City is New York City.  To those who live here, that can lose it's luster. But just exploring opportunities to be elsewhere can make you realize you couldn't be anywhere else.  

• Um, the demise of marriages and productivity everywhere? Simply put … Pintrest. 
• You are never too old to rally, head back to college, survive on little to no sleep, believe you're really 25 again, and "beast".   
• But seriously, you're like pushing 30. It's ok to stay in, watch a movie or catch up on your trashy reality TV-filled DVR.
• Stop complaining about Facebook changes.  They will inevitably happen, you will adapt, and you'll eventually forget what the "good ol days" used to be before your life was a timeline.
• The search for that watch that always shows when the time is right continues ...
• Eventually your MOH duties transition into "Aunt of Honor" duties as your best friends learn they're expecting.  2012 is going to bring some changes (read: baby showers, HMOH projects, and diapers), new additions - and the next little love of my life.

So with that and lots of HMOH love … I say a year later, cheers to 2011, here's to 2012.


-HMOH


And in keeping with tradition, 2011 HMOH totals:

• Wedding Invitations Received: 9
• Weddings Attended: 7
• Bridesmaid Dresses Purchased: 2
• Engagements Celebrated: 5
• Save-the-dates Received: 5
• 2012 Weddings, To Date: 4