Why, hello again

Was my last post really in April?? I have to admit, I didn’t expect to abandon my blog for that long. I was hoping to post at least once a month – not because I felt obligated to, but because I actually liked having a monthly recap that I could look back on at the end of the year.

I knew I’d have less time with a baby, but I do still have time for my hobbies. I just don’t have time for all of my hobbies, and so I’ve had to prioritize and balance them. Well uh… I didn’t balance them. I basically prioritized toy photography, video games, and baking.

But anyway, my last recap was for January and February. What have I been up to since then?

March

• Celebrated my birthday with a lot of eating
• Started refactoring my team’s Vue JS project from our company’s hackathon

April

• Took a week-long staycation for the first time ever. I’ve taken days off before, but anytime I take off a week or more, it’s because of holidays or traveling. It was nice to just relax at home with my family!
• Helped organize a work picnic for our engineering department

Visiting the botanical gardens during my staycation

May

• Sadly, one of my uncles (my dad’s oldest brother) passed away from cancer. He was truly one of the kindest people I knew and was always looking out for family and friends. I flew out to California for his funeral, along with my family and almost all of my relatives. While it was a sad occasion, it was also nice to see everyone together again.
• Celebrated Mother’s Day with my parents and then in San Antonio with my in-laws

June

• Started to take Tali to a Chinese-immersion Mommy & Me class, where they only speak Mandarin Chinese in the class. Though it’s a “Mommy & Me” class, it’s really my husband that takes her 😉 (Since I have work at the time.)
• Helped organize a work potluck and gaming day for the engineering department

July

• With another manager, we ran another hackathon at work. Since this one was product-related, I didn’t participate, but we got a lot of great entries!

August

• Celebrated Tali’s first birthday! We took her to an interactive children’s museum, and then on the weekend, we had a small celebration at our house with my parents and in-laws.
• My company also got acquired by a public company. While that might sound exciting, it was a pretty rough time due to the layoffs. My job is safe, but that’s all I can really say about that.

Tali at the children’s museum

And now it’s September! My husband, Tali, and I flew to Pennsylvania to visit my brother and also to attend our cousin’s wedding in New York. It was Tali’s first time on a plane, and she did pretty well! She just whined a couple times because she didn’t want to be in her car seat, but apparently she can be bribed with snacks. (Ah, being bribed with food. She is my daughter after all.)

After we got back, I was immediately busy with my company’s annual user conference. I always like to help with photography, so I joined a team of 3 other photographers to cover the event. I mainly covered the main events, the expo hall, and was pretty much on call for anything that came up, like vendor requests.

And then! After that! I picked up our new car!!! For years, I’ve been wanting to replace our cars with one hybrid and one electric and was waiting for better options in both markets. Last year, we bought the Kia Niro (hybrid), which we’ve been impressed with, as it’s been getting 50+ miles per gallon. And now… we have the Tesla Model 3!

I’m soooooo excited to have this car. I’ve wanted an electric vehicle for so long, but I either wasn’t impressed with what was available or they were too expensive. The Model 3 finally fulfilled both requirements. It has a good range and set of features, while being a price I was willing to pay.

And that’s it from me lately! I’ve had an itch to blog recently, so maybe I’ll get back into the swing of things here? We’ll see though. In the meantime, I still visit blogs once in a while to catch up on your entries, even if I don’t always leave a comment. And of course, I follow most of you on social media, so I’ll see you on Twitter or Instagram!