2022 The Year For Focus!

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Sharing my thoughts of the past year and all that we went though and what I’m focusing on this year.

Hey All!

Sorry I’ve been away so long! I’ve missed you and missed posting here.  2022 has started off with a bang thanks to the covid surge and dealing with non-stop health issues and my father-in-law passing. Sadly due to the new variants, this current covid surge is the worst one yet. Honestly it feels like I’ve just been living in a rerun for the past two years! Why people don’t come together to do what needs to be done to end this pandemic is beyond me and beyond upsetting. I pray for our healthcare workers and essential workers everyday. I’m immunocompromised with a 3 year old, so my life is literally like avoiding a mind field. We have not changed anything about how we keep me and my family safe. The only thing we did do last year was go out a few times to outdoor events before Omicron hit and now we don’t even want to leave the house!

I managed to get to both Universal and Disneyland for halloween and to celebrate my birthday.

Honestly I tried to have a good time at both. I was happy to finally go after almost 2 years, but I honestly did not feel safe. I had goggles on with my mask and only took the goggles off for photos. I did not feel comfortable taking my masks off ever! Masks plural as I was double masked. Don’t know when I’ll be able to go back to either, but it probably won’t be for some time.

We thankfully moved! From 2019 to 2020 we lived in an apartment that was literally a nightmare. I have never lived in a more traumatic place in my life. Luckily my son was too young to realize it and was always happy. But for me it was a complete nightmare. I literally have PTSD having to deal with that apartment from hell and the pandemic at the same time. This is why I didn’t post much from our home or much DIY’s or anything that I usually posted. It was hell on earth and there was no way to do any of that and no way to concentrate on that. I won’t go into too many details of what made it hellish, as I don’t want to relive that nightmare. I’ll just give you some highlights: multiple floods, gas leaks, a slumlord, animals in our air conditioning vents, insane bugs I’ve never seen before in my life and my father is an exterminator and more! I have never EVER in my entire life lived in a place that has literally left me traumatized! I seriously wished I could be like my son and not have a care in the world through it.

We ended up in that hell hole because our previous apartment building got bought by some huge company that wanted to kick all the tenants out, so they could raise the rents to almost $4000 a month! They bought us out of our apartment to get us out and we had to find some place to live quick. We found the hell apartment in our same neighborhood on a cul de sac. We thought the building was a little old fashioned but looked clean and well maintained. The apartment was huge and a great size for a family with a toddler. It didn’t have everything we needed but we were desperate and couldn’t find any place else who would take us before we had to get out of our old apartment. We took it and as soon as we moved in it was non-stop hell. The worst mistakes of our lives!

The place also made me VERY sick! I had to go get allergy tested recently and found out I was allergic to everything in that place, which is why I was so sick in that place! The apartment from hell was literally killing me with the allergies along with the stress! The stress was doing nothing for my health issues. That’s on top of the stress of the pandemic.

So we spent almost all of 2020 trying to survive the pandemic and trying to find yet another place to live. It seemed like everyone in LA was trying to find an apartment because no one can afford to buy a house, since the housing market went insane. It made finding some place we desperately needed all the more difficult. I was getting hopeless for a second and we finally found some place. We used every penny we had saved and finally moved in 2021! Sorry to share so much about 2020, but the years feel like they just blend in at this point.

Moving during a pandemic is also beyond stressful as you don’t know if the movers are going to bring rona to you while they are moving your stuff, but we had no choice. We had to get help to move. We don’t have family and with social distancing we didn’t have friends to help either.

So we moved and it was like a weight was lifted off of us in 2021. I’m still unpacking but I’m excited to decorate this place!  I’m also just thankful we finally got the chance after what feels like an eternity to really get to celebrate holidays this year.

I literally cried when I decorated for Halloween and put our tree and decorations up for Christmas! It literally was so magical and I couldn’t be more grateful to be out of the hell situation we were in 2020 year. 2021 was a year I was grateful to be in a new place and grateful my family and friends were all still alive and made it through 2020 and 2021.

I mean it’s still a hellish pandemic, but at least we feel safe and relaxed where we live now!

We also did Elf On The Shelf for the first time and I know people complain about having to figure out what to do with it, but I had a blast doing it. My son loved it too! It was the first Christmas that he really understood what Christmas was, learned about Santa and his elves, and just loved the whole thing! We literally both cried when the elf had to go away. I can’t wait until we can do it again this year!

Also during 2021 I had to have my gallbladder removed, kidney stones removed, and started having all kinds of health issues due to the autoimmune disease I have call Sjogren’s Syndrome. I want to talk more about it this year in case anyone who reads are site also deals with this auto immune disease. I’m actually being tested at the moment to see if I have something else with Sjogren’s.

They also recently found a lump in my back. It’s a cyst thankfully but it was VERY scary to find a huge red blotch and lump on my back out of no where. It got infected, had to go on antibiotics which was tricky since I’m now apparently immune to some antibiotics, and then I’m going to have to have it removed this year at some point.

So non-stop health issues are never ending. That’s why I’ve been really focused on getting my health under control and creating a plan to go forward with this site and business and just take care of me. I don’t want to go another year feeling sick!

That’s why I call 2022 the year of focus. I’m focused on getting my health finally in order, getting healthy, finding a balance and a plan and end game for my business, focus on my family, and focus on the things that make me happy. Another goal we’re focused on is moving to Canada! I know! Crazy right! I’ve always wanted to move there since I was a kid. LOL.

When I was in college I took a cross country Canadian tour to scout where I wanted to live. I’ve been wanting to move there well before all the crazy started happening here in the USA.

So with all that said for 2022 I’m focused on my health, keeping my family safe, unpacking, finding joy, finding a better direction for this site and my social channels, a better direction for my business and bringing that joy to you. I also want to keep you more informed about my life! I know this site is called Brite & Bubbly, but honestly life is not Brite & Bubbly. We do the best we can and relish the Brite & Bubbly moments we have.

I’m thankful to all of you who have stuck around with me for the past 10 almost 11 years! I’m thankful for all the new people to have come to our community! I hope I’ve brought you some joy and light during this crazy time and I hope to continue doing that!

Here’s to focusing on what we want and not focusing on the past or what others are doing!

Have a safe new year that you do the best that you can in. Know doing your best is perfectly fine!