It’s easy to beat up on 2011. I don’t know how many times in the last couple of weeks I’ve heard people saying how badly 2011 sucked. Yeah, national and local politics definitely hit an all-time, infantile low. And, for my friends who lost a parent this year, it definitely was a miserable year. My parents home got robbed just before Christmas. I’m still trying not to be so angry about that. In so many ways 2011 kinda was a drag.

But…

Really it had some great moments.

• After years of clawing my way out of a financial rock bottom, I jumped back in to real estate and bought my second home. (Thanks Glenwood Agency)
• I finally created the beginnings of my dream bedroom (Phase 1 finished. Phase 2, accessories, still to come).
• I painted my bathroom HOT PINK! (No more keeping things neutral waiting on Mr. Right)
• I joined the digital age and let go of two perfectly good-working analog TVs for a TV and Blu-ray that can stream TV shows and movies. Reading subtitles is so fabulous now that I sound like a fool babbling about that to people.
• Which brings me to another passion I developed in the spring of 2011 that makes me sound like a teenage girl with a crush–Korean dramas 한국드라마. It jump started my childhood love of learning about other cultures and languages again. Over the years, I let the daily grind and lack of money or time beat my dreams of traveling overseas out of me. I’m not sure that I’ll have the opportunity, but right now having that excitement of trying to learn a new language is fun.
• Random people prayed for me.
• I talked to an old friend from grad school by phone, even though we interact on Facebook everyday.
• My cousin jumped on the Schnauzer rescue train–adopted from NCSR and also is a foster mom, too.
• I met more Twitter friends IRL because I tweeted less and lived more.
• Thanks to attending Wordcamp Raleigh, I was thisclose to writing a post a week (which is a big deal for me). I fell off during the end-of-year holidays flurry of activities.

I think if I focus on the special things like these, it really wasn’t that bad of a year. It was fantastic.