Memory Lane: Some of the Best Bits of 2012

A new nephew
"My sister ejected another infant from her womb!"

Being rehired at my old firm and looking back on the job hunt
"There was this really weird experience with a recruiter who ended up actually being the company owner’s wife?? – I didn’t get that job; I’m sure it went to someone more ugly."

Reminiscing about that time I stole a penis pen topper
"Christa, the most straight-and-narrow person I know, saw the look of evil glee spreading over my face as I closely regarded the penis ornament (pornament?), and I’ve never seen laughter turn so quickly to sheer terror."

An eye exam
"She put the drops in, I sat in the waiting room by the trash can until fully dilated, then she completed the flashlight part of the exam more quickly than I’m sure she would have if I’d been different."

A testimony building experience
"God truly does know me personally."

YW days
"We could cook noodles! We could feed five whole people for a dollar apiece! We were going to be able to keep our children alive!!!!"

• This comment from my cousin-in-law was one of my favorites from the whole year:

The Annual Baby Names Post
Paizli, Razdyn, Zavan, etc.

• Several comments on this post deserve recognition, too. Some of them are from me. Is that lame? (Also, some are redacted. Also, they're not in chronological order, but you'll be okay. Also, I got called "evil" for the first time in my life in these comments - by Anonymous, who else?)

  

Moving on!

Pants on the ground
"The woman with the naughty dog screamed, 'I'm so sorry! I promise I didn't look!!' and Jon casually remarked, 'What? It's just underwear...', collected his pants and snapped them back together."

Thoughts on the Mormon obsession with modesty
"And for the men (oh gosh, I should have taken pictures) - translucent, clingy shorts that suction unrelentingly to penises upon exiting the water and leave absolutely nothing to the invagination-excuse me- imagination."

• The comments...I can't even narrow it down. You really should revisit them all. There's comedy gold, there's anger, there's someone who's disappointed in me as a Mormon, and there's some awesomely inappropriate Gooogle search suggestions. The first half of the comments were mostly supportive, but then so many dissenters piled on that I set up this poll to get an accurate gauge of the feelings amongst my readers. As it turns out, pretty much everyone was on the same page as me; the most vocal group on the original post happened to be the minority. On the poll, a reader named Scotty said, "We should never hold someone to an expectation that their Heavenly Father doesn't even hold them to," which basically summed up every feeling I've had on the topic in 17 wise words.

An easy fix
"It seems like before the one-upmanship platform of mommy blogs came along, a whole lot fewer kids were getting three-tiered ombre fondant cakes for their birthdays, is what I'm saying."

Ode to pure crazy Ada
Included because she turned 3 last year, and also because of Jon's comment:

They burned my heart!
Included because, duh, my heart is fixed. It was sort of the biggest thing that happened to me this year.