2024: A Look Back

It has taken me almost three weeks to write this post because to be honest, I didn't really want to revisit the first part of 2024. It was a very dark time for me as I navigated the loss of my beloved mom and I have a hard time thinking back to that time when it felt like I was barely hanging on by a thread every single day.

There's this idea that you should only look back to see how far you've come, and I decided to adopt this mindset. As a result, I'm proud to say I ended 2024 in a much different place than where I began it. I miss my mom so much and I often wonder if I'll ever experience a joyful moment that isn't tinged with sadness in some way because she isn't here to share it with me. However, over the course of the year, almost imperceptibly, despair slowly stopped being the emotion dominating my life.

Time was certainly a factor, but I really credit travel for lifting my spirits and helping me gain some much needed perspective. It's always fun to recap our travel at the end of each year and we were fortunate to go to some great places in 2024!

We spent 51 nights in a hotel (not including C's trip to the Grand Canyon with my dad and my brother or my trip to NYC with my best friend) and two nights were spent on red-eye flights (LAX-SYD and YYZ-MUC). Not too shabby!

In terms of domestic travel, we took six trips to WDW (January, February, March, April, May, and June), finishing our 11 trips to WDW over the 11 months of the 23-24 school year! We also had one trip to Disneyland in July, a weekend trip to Denver, a stopover in Chicago, and day trips to Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, New York, and Connecticut. Although Canada is technically international, we always consider it part of our domestic travel because it's home for us, and in 2024, we went to Canada several times!

Internationally, we went to Milan and Venice for spring break; we went to Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, and Cairnes (with a layover in Tokyo) over the summer; and then ended the year with a winter break trip to Munich and Vienna.

The biggest family event of the year was the birth of our nephew in October! He is so tiny and perfect and we're incredibly lucky to now have a niece and two nephews to love!

The least fun event of the year was Avalanche getting skunked in February! The stench lingered for months! So gross!

My favorite travel experience of the year was seeing the Little Penguins on Phillip Island in Australia! Truly one of my favorite travel days ever!

Avalanche turned 13 in October and we have been so fortunate that he's had the best people to love and care for him while we travel. He loves his time at his dog hotel, he completely adores his babysitter, and of course, C's mom and dad are amazing and he has the best time when he's at their house for several weeks at a time! We're beyond grateful for them!

I had a tough time narrowing down my very favorite moment of 2024 because there were a lot of great ones to choose from, but the one that filled me with such happiness was going outside with Avalanche at 2:00 am back in February when we had some overnight snow. He and I just ran around the yard together in the middle of the night and it was magical!

We've got some big trips scheduled in 2025 and I'm looking forward to all of the memories we're going to make!

Happy Tails to you!