2023 In Review!
2023 was a year of traveling, job changes (for me), and turning our house into a home. It was also a year of waiting and being patient for things.
But mostly, this was the year of travel – we got really good at packing and unpacking :/
Here’s the recap!
January
Rang in the New Year with the annual Szymanski New Years Eve party, then ended the month with a job change for me that resulted in a work trip to Paris, France! We had never been to Europe before, and it was an amazing experience. The food was incredible, and we witnessed two marriage proposals at the top of the Eiffel Tower.
We had a layover in London, England, on the way home – so we made the most of it! After arriving in London at about 5pm local time, we found our AirBnB then ran around the city until 2am haha. The night consisted of fish and chips for dinner, gelato for dessert, some pub-hopping so we could sample different ciders, and finding 221B Bakers Street 🙂
February
The Europe trip extended into the first few days in February. Once we got back, we got ready for our family trip to Florida with my parents – we played a ton of pickleball, swam, and got up to watch the beach sunrise.
March
The Florida trip also extended into March (apparently, we just didn’t want to be in Minnesota when the months changed).
Erik also officially got out of the military and gained his one weekend a month back! I’ve been really thankful to have more time with my man 🙂
We started painting the dining room and the basement at this time too!
April
In April, we finished painting the dining room and one wall of the basement. We hung out with friends (Anna and I went to see Hamilton at the Orpheum!), and celebrated Easter.
We also started our campaign with Rise Up Recovery – but it was all behind-the-scenes work at this point, and Erik started training for the Twin Cities Marathon!
May
We started our next co-ed softball season, I started making my own flour and sourdough bread (s/o to Amy!), and we anticipated the beginning of summer!
Sam also graduated college with an engineering degree from UNW St Paul – super fun to celebrate with him!
June
June brought summer, more marathon training for Erik, and a work trip to Austin, Texas. We got to see Samantha while we were there too, which was so fun!
The end of June brought Erik’s 24th birthday – we celebrated by making waffles for dinner, exploring a new restaurant in Welch, and heading to the lake early for the 4th of July.
July
We celebrated Independence Day at the lake with Meema and Boppa and the rest of the family! Erik bought me a nice shelf for all my grains for bread-making too 🙂
At the end of July, we embarked on our second youth group mission trip to CO. It was an unforgettable journey filled with bus break-downs, sketchy hotels, crazy chaos, and amazing fun. I think the kids loved it, and despite the mishaps, it was a great trip all around 😀
Last but not least, we flew home from the mission trip and drove to Wisconsin for Erik’s Best Man, Tristan, and his now wife, Emilee’s, wedding, where Erik had the honor of being the Best Man for Tristan. It was a beautiful wedding and we were happy we got to be a part of making their day special!
August
I started out August by visiting one of my best friends, Elizabeth Beeli, in Utah before she embarked on her year-of-travel around the world as a nomad! It was amazing getting to see her and look forward to hearing all about her experiences when she returns.
We ended the month with another work trip to Colorado and we tacked on a few days at the end of the trip to visit my uncle and cousin before heading home.
Before the month fully closed, we brought Rose to the State Fair for her first MN State Fair experience – accompanied by Meema, Boppa, and Sam!
September
September 3rd – we celebrated our 2nd wedding anniversary and made a whole weekend of it. Exploring restaurants, staying at the Lowell Inn and partaking in a fondue dinner (which was super amazing and fun!), exploring downtown Stillwater some more, and spending lots of time together.
The next week, I went on my last work trip of the year to Boston, then flew home a few days later. Glad to be done with traveling for the year!
For my birthday, Erik allowed me to take home our new ragdoll kitten, Krème Brûlée (Kreme – pronounced “cream” – for short). She’s a cute little fluffy ball of energy 😉
Erik was still sorta training for the marathon, but he was ready for it to be over…
October
The first of the month was supposed to be the long-awaited Twin Cities Marathon! Unfortunately, due to record high temperatures, it was canceled hours before the start of the race (this is the only time it was canceled besides 2020). Erik said he’ll never train for one again. The good news though, was we were able to raise about $4,800 for Rise Up Recovery!
The Twins made it to the playoffs, so we went to a game with Erik’s brothers and their wives (before they lost to the Astros in the next round).
We finally finished the basement theater! Since then, we’ve debuted several films in our home.
In the middle of the month, we DJ’d a wedding for our friends, and it was a blast!
I started another new job too (where I am currently).
We also said good-bye to Erik’s grandma Harriet 🙁 She is very missed, but she told us before she left that she was very excited to join her husband, Lenny, in heaven <3
November
In November, we attended our second marriage retreat with our church, which was very fun!
The week after, we hosted Thanksgiving at our house for the first time. It was a bit tight, but went pretty well overall!
December
This month has been full of fun parties, great food, wonderful gifts, and learning to make kombucha (thanks Tiffany!).
We’re truly blessed and very hopeful for what 2024 will bring <3
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Looking forward to another adventurous year this upcoming year, but hopefully with significantly less travel! I love travel, but the frequency was a lot last year 🙂
Thankful for the blessings God gave us this year, and trusting Him with the year to come!
Blessings from the Andersons,
Hope & Erik
Photo by Moritz Knöringer on Unsplash
Parting the Red Sea
