My favorites things in 2016

With 2016 behind us, I thought it might be fun to look at some of my favorite things from last year.

Favorite phone

I ended up using six different phones last year, largely related to the Galaxy Note 7 fire fiasco. Mine never caught fire, but the various recalls were messy.

Droid Turbo 2: I came into 2016 on Verizon with the Droid Turbo 2. It was a great phone! The best thing about that phone were that it was shatterproof and had a huge battery. I hated to give it up, but…

Galaxy Note 5: When we switched to T-Mobile in April, I had to switch phones. I went with the Galaxy Note 5, mostly because I heard the new Note coming later in the year would be a beast and I wanted to start getting used to the Note features.

Galaxy Note 7: Despite being two digits higher than the 5, it’s the direct successor to it (they added an extra number to keep it matched up with their other annual “S7” device). It was indeed a great phone! However, they had a recall on them so I had to get another phone temporarily.

Galaxy S7: This was my loaner phone, and really is a great little device. My daughter has one and loves it. When the recall was complete and the “fixed” Note 7 devices were ready, I switched back to that.

Galaxy Note 7 (#2): This was the replacement Note 7, though they soon found out that these had issues as well.

Google Pixel: I wasn’t sure what phone to get next, so I went to the Google Pixel and Project Fi.

Phone of the year? The Galaxy Note 7 was an awesome phone, but the Google Pixel is undoubtedly the best phone I’ve ever owned.

Favorite game

I don’t play a lot of games on my phone, but I play a few games on my phone a lot. The winner this year, by far, was Clash Royale. If you’re not familiar with it, here’s a quick video that shows how it works:

I love that you can hop in, play a three minute battle, then move on with your day. Quick, fun, strategic. Great game!

Favorite site that we built

We built a lot of great websites this year at GreenMellen, but I think my favorite has to be HopeQuest Group. They have an amazing mission, and their new site really helped to capture that spirit and hopefully will encourage more people to turn to them.

The runners-up are pretty much every other site we built in 2016. We worked with some amazing clients and built some great websites, and I’m proud of everything we accomplished. Here is a list of all of the sites we’ve built in the past few years.

Favorite photo that I took

My wife is the better photographer in our family, and this post of hers shows some of her favorite photos of the year. Mine has to be the photo below, because it was such a fun day. I was a chaperone for my fourth grader in April and we took a bunch of kids from her grade up to Chattanooga.

Those 34 empty pizza boxes after lunch represented a ton of energy that those fourth graders burned off during a very fun, very tiring day.

Favorite event

We went on a few fun trips to the beach this year, I went to WordCamp US in Philadelphia in December, and we had a variety of other family outings during the year. My favorite had to be the soccer tournament that my 13-year-old daughter’s team played in November.

For some background, she’s played soccer for many years now and the teams she’s played on have historically been bad. Very bad. I coached many of them, and we simply were never very good. Her team last year (that I didn’t coach) scored something like three goals the entire season.

That team broke up, and I offered to coach this new team since no one else had stepped up. Turns out we had some very talented players this season! We were 6-1-1 in the regular season, but the tournament was amazing. Long story short, we won the championship with a minute left in double overtime — it doesn’t get much more exciting than that!

2016

All in all, 2016 was a very good year. GreenMellen is continuing to grow and thrive, and we were thrilled to add Brooke to our team in March. The family is happy and healthy. This blog is rolling again. Good things abound, and 2017 will be even better!

What was your favorite thing in 2016?