2017 in photos

Wow, 2018…a new year is on its way. Well on its way by now, mid-January, when I am finally getting around to finishing this post.

As I write this, I am in Thessaloniki, Greece, making plans for the coming year. Where will it take me and what will I be doing? (Next post will explain how I ended up in Greece, when you last heard from me in Morocco!)

Something about looking out at the next year and wondering what it will bring makes me think back on the year that just passed, of all the people and places that comprised it, and all the things that were done and left undone. Here is the recap in photos.

JANUARY

A work-oriented month, with lots of time spent at the shelter and doing street outreach with our clients.

  I attended a women’s march on Denver with my godparents and my roommate, Joel, who took this picture. It was a beautiful convergence of energy and a reminder of my college days, where marches and rallies were commonplace for me.

FEBRUARY

  I got to celebrate great news with one of my best friends. We’ve been friends since 4th grade and now she’s engaged! So happy for her:)

 

MARCH

My 28th birthday came on the heels of me finding out that I had been accepted into graduate school. March was a good month of celebrating both things with the lovely people in my life:)

They surprised me at work during a staff meeting – one candle for birthday and one for getting into Columbia:)

APRIL

     A month of house sitting. I spent various amounts of time with these furry friends:)

MAY

         My stepbrother graduated from Longmont High (somehow didn’t get a picture of him – just my mom and stepdad at the graduation!)

It was a tough year at work – we lost several clients and I ran my best Bolder Boulder 10K ever in memory of one man in particular who passed away just before the race and all the homeless veterans in our community.

JUNE

We celebrated my dad’s 60th birthday (and did some fun family activities such as building a bird house from a kit we found in my old bedroom).

Then the other part of my family flew to Boston to celebrate my grandfather’s 90th birthday and I got to see some family I hadn’t seen in a long time.

JULY

I left my job at HOPE after more than three amazing years. A hugely bittersweet time. I was so overwhelmed and encouraged by the goodbye wishes I got from my coworkers, our volunteers, and our clients.

After leaving HOPE, I spent a lot of the summer on Long Island in New York, playing Scrabble with my grandmother and going to the beach while Daniel and I prepared for our trip.

AUGUST

Spent some lovely weekends in Manhattan with my grandfather, attempting to take selfies and prepping for my move to the city in 2018

Visited Niagara Falls for the first time with friends from Peace Corps and took silly poncho pictures!

SEPTEMBER

We celebrated my grandmother’s 100th birthday at her assisted living facility in Pueblo, Colorado. It was a big year for birthdays in my family!

Enjoyed a weekend with friends from high school in the small mountain town of La Veta, Colorado. We hiked, made s’mores, looked at a a mass expanse of stars at night…it was lovely.

OCTOBER

Daniel and I explored Morocco.

Spent a lot of time with the color blue in Chefchaouen.

Made new friends and cooked a lot of tasty tagines.

NOVEMBER

We made a Thanksgiving feast in a tiny hostel kitchen for an international family!

Discovered the Sahara desert:)

DECEMBER

I spent most of December by the ocean  – in Essaouira and in Dakhla.

Then Daniel and I met back up in Budapest, Hungary, where we spent Christmas with some friends of his who live there.

On December 31, I ended up in Podgorica, the capital of the small, former Yugoslavian country of Montenegro. I had a great New Year’s attending an outdoor concert in the city square. More about that in the next post!

What a year. Thank you to everyone who made it so wonderful… Here’s hoping 2018 is another good one:)

Best belated new year’s wishes to you all!