Ugh. Please bear with me on this. I haven’t written an intensely personal blog post in a really long time – I’m finding I’m awfully rusty. Indeed it’s taken me a week three weeks to get this so that I am ready to publish it.

I’m not one to do public suffering. I admire blogging women who can reach out to their communities in a time of need. Me? I go into cocoon mode. So last year, I fell off the face of the earth. I’ve been rather tight lipped about what I went through, because it’s really not my style to talk about stuff unless I can put a positive spin on things. It’s taken me almost a full year to be able to do so. So finally – here’s what happened to eMom in 2009.

A Disintegration of Life as I Had Known It

During an incredibly horrible and stressful time in March/April of last year (we won’t go into that part), I started having health issues. I’ve never really been sick beyond the flu, and I knew this was different. I couldn’t get out of bed most days. I was starving all the time. My blood sugar was whacked. My usual forgetfulness started getting almost scary. I had insomnia and heart palpitations. It all came on gradually, so it took me a while to go to the doctor.  But I really didn’t think it was that big of a deal. After all, I’d been healthy all my life, you know?

Within only a few days, I was getting a very-unexpected cancer biopsy. And suddenly life as I had known it disintegrated before my eyes. I questioned my purpose in life and God. I dropped everything. I saw images in my head of my children, husband and parents mourning me, which was far more traumatic than thinking about dying.

I crumbled to pieces.

Before I go further, NO, I don’t have cancer. It’s a thyroid problem. But for one week in April of last year, the possibility of death loomed before me like nothing I could ever possibly describe.

2009 was my year in Hell. Even though up until that point I had lived a life of “no regrets”, suddenly I had plenty to go around. There were the not-so-surprising regrets of working too much, letting assholes rent headspace, and yelling too much at my kids. I regretted not taking care of myself as well as I did everyone else. And I regretted giving so much that there was nothing left for me.

2009 also showed me that when faced with one’s own mortality, no matter how briefly, one can never go back to living life the same way again.

The Silver Lining of 2009

My 2010 resolutions lie in stark contrast to my past, which used to focus on PR, PR, and a little more PR. I really thought that “fame” would bring me the success I craved. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

This year I have vowed more family time, friend time and more me time. And getting more organized so that I can have even more family time, friend time and me time. Life is now about treasuring the time I have on this planet and being grateful for every second of it. So far, 2010 has been the happiest, most successful and most satisfying year of my entire life. Every day I wake up grateful – I seriously never had that before.

Which brings me full circle to the point of this post.

2010 is also about finding a way back out of my cocoon to share what I love with the people I love – and that includes the real life friends and online community of people I truly, deeply appreciate. I’ve never been good at coming out of cocoon mode, so this will probably be a messy work in progress (kind of like the rest of my life). I need to get back to doing what I have always done best – sharing my knowledge, helping other entrepreneurs, and hopefully inspiring a little bit of greatness along the way. I may not be running full steam again, but I am indeed back on my feet.

There are a handful of people who have gently nudged me along (or hit me in the head with a brick) who deserve a shout out right now. Some I have known for many years. Some I met only recently and they provoked me to think bigger. Some don’t even know who the hell I am. These people (probably without realizing it) have played a big role with helping me to get back on my feet again.

They were there even though I blew them off.

They reminded me that blogging is about community and giving.

They inspired me by showing up in life and being truly, deeply awesome.

They took care of things I couldn’t take care of.

And they offered help when I was too stubborn to ask for it.

And they reminded me that while we are on this earth, it is our obligation to shine, even when we feel surrounded in darkness.

Char Polanosky, Liz Strauss, Danielle Smith, Steve Johnson, Lucretia Pruitt, Ted Murphy, Aliza Sherman, Patrick O’Keefe, Beth Rosen, Susan Payton, Martin Neumann, Brandi Kajino, Michelle Lamar, Kelly McCausey, Heather Mann, Rachel, Dorothy Stahlnecker, Randa Clay, Jen Goode, Shannon Weidemann, Marie LeBaron, Allison Czarnecki, Lindsay Maines, Katja Presnal, Megan Jordan, Erika Jurney, Lisa Lam, Derek Semmler, Sommer Poquette, Duong Sheahan, Sugar Jones, Jessica Smith, Jenn Fowler, Scott Stratten, Amber Tardiff, Lorna Brewer, Steve Sipress, Barbara Jones, Kevin Carroll, Alli Worthington, Amy Locurto, Kim Janocko, Lisa Marie Mary, Aruni Gunasegaram, Marla Tabaka, Renee Ross, Karen Putz, Janice Croze, Susan Carraretto, Jill Koenig, Jyl Pattee, Kenny Tomlin, Kristin King, Deb Ng, Lori Falcon, Missy Ward, Rick Calvert, Samir Balwani, Aimee Giese, Scott Monty, Alicia Paulson, Ree Drummond, JenJen, Laurie Turk, Deb Puchalla, Margaret Roach, George Manty, Kelvin Kao and of course my dearest husband, kids and the best parents in the world.

You are the real silver lining of my year in hell – strangers and friends who made an indelible mark on my life when I needed you the most. You beamed your light into my life, and now I shine brighter because of you.

Thank you.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxo

(PS – if you think I forgot to include you on this list, then I surely did. Please don’t take it personally, I’m probably one of the most forgetful people you know. And please hit me on the head with another brick and remind me, will you?!)

(PPS – yes, Momsational is my new ‘blogging home’ now that Sparkplugging is in new hands. Yes, I’m BACK to blogging, too!! I’ll talk more about that another time!)

It wasn’t until I purchased these from Anthropologie that I realized for the very first time that measuring cups can bring a woman to tears.

Seriously – even this gorgeous photo doesn’t do these things the justice they deserve. I realize $35 is a bit steep for measuring cups. But it is a teensy-tiny price to pay for the decadent feeling I get when I use them every morning. It is a drop in the bucket compared to the sheer joy I feel when I look at the delicate hand painted details. These measuring cups make me want to cook all day long. They make me want to completely remodel my kitchen so that I can feature them prominently to family and friends (ok, I admit I wanted a kitchen remodel before I got these). But they do make me feel like my existing kitchen is nicer than it really is (as long as I am looking at them and not my 30 year old cabinets!).

But for real – this is my absolute favorite indulgent purchase I have made in many, many months. And for $35, it only barely makes it into the ‘indulgent’ category.

Find the Izmir Measuring Cups on Anthropologie

I once wrote about how I used to get SAD – Seasonal Affective Disorder. I’m kind of puzzled now as to why I wrote “used to” in that post, because there are some ok winters and some bad winters – but it happens every winter. I guess this year it isn’t so bad – but this is the worst time of year for it. So I decided to go through my summer photos today to add a shot to The Photoblog in the hopes of it taking my mind off of this.

This photo was a little tricky to play with, because I found the overexposed white area on my son’s neck to be a little distracting. But any attempts at toning it down looked like I colored on the photo with a crayon. So I ended up playing with the levels a tiny bit and brightening up the rest of the shot to deemphasize it. I lowered the white point in the levels so that it became at least less white than my screen. I also put a soft focus on the image, but removed it in that area because the glow was only intensifying the problem. It’s not perfect, but at least you can now see the three absolute best parts of the shot:

The drip of water on his nose

The laughing girl licking up the sprinkler water from her fingers – this was purely accidental bokeh that I swooned over when I discovered it hours later!

The sprinkler spray in front of the hair and shirt – I had to dodge those out a bit more to really make them show through

One of my goals this year is to get more photographs of my kids doing their thing – candid shots when they don’t know I am looking. While I love their goofy grins and prima donna poses – it’s photos like this that really let me hold onto the moments in time that will be gone too soon.

My husband is an amazing cook. Every winter, he makes a huge pot of this soup – usually it’s more like minestrone, but this year, he decided to leave out the beans and focus on the veggies instead. He and I have very different approaches to how to cook soup. His takes longer, but I will have to admit that the broth in his soup is incredibly rich, complex and delicious.

The reason he does this only once a year is because he futzes with the broth for over an hour before he even puts any solids into the stock. Some years he has had to correct the seasoning so much that we ended up with two pots of soup. But this year I forced him to write everything down and I gotta say he done good.

This recipe makes a LARGE amount of soup – we make it in one huge batch and freeze in smaller serving sizes.

Prep Time: 3-4 hours

Tomato Vegetable Beef Soup

Add all these ingredients below in a large pot

3.75 quarts (15 cups) filtered water

3/4 jar 8 oz of “Better than Bouillon” lower sodium beef bouillon

(2) 20 oz cans of tomato sauce

(2) 20 oz cans of diced tomatoes

1/4 cup of red wine

1/4 cup of Worcestershire sauce

3 tbsp oregano

3 tbsp basil

1 tbsp salt

1/2 tbsp celery salt

1 tbsp pepper

1/2 cup sugar

5 tbsp onion powder

2 tbsp crushed or pureed garlic, or 5 crushed garlic cloves

1.5 oz fresh spinach (finely chopped) (half a bag)

Simmer above ingredients for 1 hour

Add

2 lbs of beef round roast cut in 1/2 inch pieces

Simmer for 1 hour

Add

16 oz bag of baby carrots, coarsely chopped

1 pound green beans, cut in 1 inch pieces

Simmer for 30 minutes

Add

1 pound fresh broccoli florets

3/4 lb medium pasta shells

Simmer for 30-45 minutes until shells and broccoli are fully cooked

Found on the ever-wonderful U-Handbag blog, I bought this calendar on Etsy a few weeks ago. I certainly thought it was cute, but in real life this thing is freaking adorable. It’s printed on thick water color paper, the colors are super-saturated, and the little Kokeshi dolls are to die for. I’ve got one pegged up with some mini clothespins for now, but I think I am going to put up a magnetic strip on my shelves to put up more than one at a time!

Illustrated by Stephanie Fizer. YUM!

It’s kind of hard to go on and on about how much I love Chicago when it is the middle of January. But winter is a distant memory come May, when this photo was taken in 2008. It is one of my favorite all time shots – the light on the Chicago River cruise was exquisite - and I know that sounds so cliche, but it’s true. Everything was glowing. I was running all over the roof of the boat snapping pictures as fast as I could. Lots of them came out fuzzy, but this one is my pride and joy.

Most people don’t know that we are a river rat family. My husband is addicted to finding decrepid boats, fixing them, expensively fixing his first round of fixups and turning out close to new beautiful boats. You know what B.O.A.T. stands for, right? “Bring on Another Thousand”.

Oh, if it were only that simple. I could tell you about the time the boat almost sank, the time the trailer broke in two while driving, the flat tires… but when we get out on the water, one moment of this makes it all worth it!