Ah, 2020…do I even bother with a highlight reel? From what has been declared by so many to have been the shittiest year on record? Tempting as it is to just toss last year from the memory banks, I do believe there was beauty in the ashes. Good books and good music and more time with my two favorite people than I ever could have hoped for. So here goes…
Favorite book:
I finished 20 books and can say I actually liked all of them!
Fiction took the cake this year, with The River by Peter Heller and Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens keeping me up reading into the wee hours of the night. Both of these books completely transported me, to the Canadian wilderness and the marshy shores of North Carolina. Â
Honorable mention to The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate, which I read with Juliette, snuggled into her bed as tears streamed down my face. That one got me right in the heart.
Favorite non-fiction was Be the Bridge by Latasha Morrison, because it made racial reconciliation feel possible while still laying bare the white supremacy that’s so deeply woven into the fabric of our nation. There is hope. There’s work to be done, but there’s hope.
Favorite TV show:
Top honors to The Queen’s Gambit. I will say that I tuned into this one a little reluctantly, only after Shane’s urging. Chess? Not my thing. But the characters were brilliant and the acting was superb and the camaraderie that shines at the end gave me all the warm fuzzies. Plus, that 60’s wallpaper! It’s a feast for the eyes.
Honorable mention to The Great British Baking Show for gracing us with a surprise new season last summer. I wasn’t sure how they’d pull it off in Covid times, but they did. And for several weeks, it gave our family something to look forward to on Friday nights. 2020 was all about the little things.
Favorite movie:
I’m having a hard time recalling which movies I even watched last year as all those evenings on the couch are sort of melding together, but I know that we loved Onward for all its tugging on the familial heart-strings. Super-sweet story with a handful of good laughs.
Favorite podcast:
Another toughie! I’m still quite happy in my rut with The Daily, Reply All and Heavyweight, but I did expand my horizons to include Unlocking Us with Brene Brown this year. She’s got a way with an interview, and her episodes with Austin Channing Brown, Laverne Cox, and Dolly Parton rattled around in my head for days after I listened to them.
Favorite album:
Easy. Taylor Swift gave our family a much-needed gift with her release of Folklore (and then did it again with Evermore!). The number of times I’ve watched Juliette tip-toe dance across the living room to Mirror Ball… And Exile never ever gets old, even after 200 listens. Thanks, T-Swift.
Favorite purchase:
We didn’t buy any life-changing new gadgets last year. I certainly didn’t invest in any great clothing, as I had nowhere to wear it. Most of our spending went into home improvement, as being home all day, every day gave me ample opportunities to come up with new fix-it, replace-it, and decorate-it projects. The main wall in our entryway has been blank and asking for some sort of art since we moved in and I found the perfect piece in this 3D wooden map from Enjoy the Wood. Puzzling this thing together on the wall was a fun Saturday project and a stellar geography lesson. Juliette has mapped out our trip to New Zealand (via Paris) and now I can proudly report that I know where Baffin Island is!
Favorite personal pastime:
Again, home improvement for the win. I crossed a lot of projects off my list last year, big and small, and as we settle in for another couple (few? several?) months of hunkering down, I feel affirmed that every hour and every dollar was well worth it. While the bathroom reno wins grand prize in terms of upgrades, there was also a lot of joy in banging out the little things that have bugged me for the past two years. Ugly nipple lights in the hallway? Gone. Dirty, clunky fireplace grate? Sayonara. And I’m still loving our dining room wall.
Favorite family pastime:
Welp, I suppose I have to find an answer other than camping given how little we got out last year… Our family discovered a shared loved of card games toward the end of last year when we taught Juliette how to play Rummy and now spend almost every evening at the dining room table trying to be the first to 200. I tell you, total game-changer (pun intended) when your kid becomes old enough to play things you actually enjoy. 7 p.m. has become my favorite part of the day, when dinner is done and screens are put away and Taylor Swift is cranked up and cards are dealt.
And, favorite moments…
There’s no denying that 2020 was rife with loss, but in our quiet little Schnell bubble, after a 2019 that found me away from my family far too much, I’m exceedingly thankful to have made my way back home.