With apologies to Spinal Tap, of course.
I don’t always do a year in review post. But as I sit soaking in the sounds of college football, I found myself thinking about 2010. On the outset, I started with a Year in Review that looked back on the epic nature of 2009 for our family – then fell off the blogging map until October. I blame Facebook entirely for this. My expectations for 2010 were rather subdued. We had seen significant growth in business, to the point that Mad Lab Media became our sole source of income for the first time. We had seen a couple of ginormous family vacations, and a year of really settling into Colorado as home. I only expected to have a year of further settling, less travel, and I really wasn’t anticipating anything huge of note.
As usual, I was wrong.
The early portion of the year was just as described – settling in, enjoying Colorado, and deepening our roots here. We didn’t plan on any vacations, at least not of the out-of-state kind. But as fall approached, we started to dream of a trip that’s been on our minds for a while now. So we packed up our minivan and starting venturing east to visit some dear friends in Memphis. We made it unharmed – our van however did not. As the transmission began to fail, we bought up another cheap van, and left ours to sell on craigslist. The new van became our new family ride, and became the biggest souvenir ever. Shortly after that, we attended a family wedding back on the Oregon coast. This time we flew the friendly skies of Frontier Airlines. So our year of no travel turned into 16 days on the road, to places old and new and all of it tons of fun.
This year, the business grew by 50% – from an entity that barely keeps us afloat to a legitimate, growing business that not only pays our bills but allows us things like vacations. We’ve been truly blessed.
This year, we discovered a house church network that has resulted in some new friends, and a new fun adventure in church planting. It seems to be the year we’ve finally released the dreams of typical “church planting” and embraced the path of living as the church. Don’t get me wrong, we have a lot to learn and a long way to go, but we’re at least on the track.
So that’s what 2010 brought. I do not intend to predict 2011, but I have a feeling it will be as unpredictable and exciting as any year has been up to now. Here’s to a year of family, friends, growth, and love. And a distinct lack of drama would be a nice addition to 2011.
Coming next – a bit of a turn in subject matter in which I rant about why Dish Network is an enemy to sports fans everywhere.
