Last day of 2021!!!

 I think we are all ready to say goodbye to 2021!! I'm not sure 2022 will be that great either with Covid on the up ward climb again with the new variant Omniron that can infect the vaccinated too, but just not get us as sick. Also stronger storms are occurring every year. There was a deadly tornado down south in December, now Colorado has a large fire that burned 500+ homes near Denver! What's to come of 2022? Should we be hopeful with the costs of everything increasing, but not incomes as fast? 

How Steve and I spent the last two days of the year!

Thursday, we went cross country skiing! I started a new hobby! Which is diet and exercise. The only two things that truly make me happy. I though of other hobby ideas but none brought the rewards and joy like being fit and losing weight. So for now this is what I'm concentrating on. Me! 

I do love to bake. Saw this bread making book on Tic Tok. A must get cook book! 

4 days later....

 Merry Late Christmas Logan! 

Logan was finally feeling better on the 29th after getting sick Christmas Eve. 

We finally watched him open Christmas gifts. 

Now on to celebrate Christmas with the rest of the family on New Years Day. Fingers crossed everyone is healthy!!

New Hobby Needed!

 Just sharing some unique art.. I'm in need of a new hobby or more new habits in 2022! 

What do I incorporate in my life right now?

Yoga daily for an hour 

Lots of internet time reading the news, looking at Instagram photos and just going though Tick Tok van lifers. 

I get in some sort of exercise every day. Lifting weights, doing a plank and moving for at least an hour. 

What do I like to do? 

Camping

Be outdoors

X-ski

yoga

baking

home projects

A clean house, vacuum my floors daily

TV shows: Survivor, Challenge, Below Deck, late night news MSNBC

Chatting with customers

Going out to restaurants/breweries

Traveling to new places

Blogging

Emailing friends

Spending time with my family

Biking

Kayaking

Jetski or boating

Being in the water

Reading

What I need to do? 

Spend more time fixing my hair in another style. I wear my hair up 100% of the time. No style! 

Weight loss - Gained Covid stay home weight. Need to make daily changes to be more healthy and drop some pounds. 

Going back to what works for me!

Skipping breakfast since I'm not hungry in the mornings

Waiting till dinner to have my meal

Focus on more health low calorie meals

Eliminate alcohol = empty calories

Move more in the afternoons

Limit Internet and TV time

Do more hobbies and things I enjoy. 

Increase exercise, go back to morning workouts

Get outside daily to workout! When it's not below zero. 

I want this in my bathroom!!!

 I was tired of the kids bathroom sink never drains correctly since we installed the sink/counter combo. It was always dirty with standing water and hairs in the corners as the sink was square! I did even take a before photos because I am just done looking at it! 

We have Menards rebate money so we used that to buy the on sale, not 11% off counter/sink combo. It was $100 off the orig price so a good deal to purchase. Of course the semi new faucet was all corroded and we were unable to save it. Since I changed out the vanity handles with mat black, I went with a mat black new faucet. Since the towel bar at TP holder are both shiny chrome, this spring I'll just try spray painting them mat black to save a little money. 

The new countertop looks really nice in the kids bathroom. Now to fix the side wall and paint! I also never painted the toilet side of the vanity white, so will need to finish that too! 

While at Menards, we did check out the shower doors. Found two that I liked for when we are ready to do the kids shower. We plan to take out the shower/tub surround plastic combo, something I've been wanting to have done for years! Pretty much since we moved in 20 years ago! Steve will tile a new shower and make a shampoo shelf with a clear glass door. No more tub in the kids bathroom! We never used it to bath our kids. They always took baths in our big tub. We will now finish remodeling the kids bathroom before starting on ours. I'd love to get them both done this winter but I think that's too much to ask for. We have more rebate money to use up at Menards which will help pay for some of the cost of a shower door. They are around $900, so will still need to pay for tile! We do have some tile from a customer left over from a job but not sure we will use that or not? Most likely we will buy large white or gray subway tiles with some smaller tile for the floor of the shower and shampoo shelf. The bathrooms are the two last big home projects. I'm sure some day we will replace the 1/2 bathroom countertop/sink and enlarge the deck. Oh and I forgot finish the basement 100% as we still have trim and painting to do. Yes, houses are money pits with something always needing updated. Just glad Steve is handy and does this for a living so we get free labor! 

Winter Home Projects!

 I've always got home projects for Steve todo! I talked him into getting a new sink/counter for the kids bathroom even though we just replaced it I think a year ago! The sink never drained right and I was tired of it aways dirty since it wouldn't completely drain! So annoying! 

We at least can use the new/old faucet, so we didn't need to replace that. We got the 49" on sale for $312 and used Menards rebate money to pay for it! We still have enough Mendards rebate money to buy a seamless clear shower door for the kids or our bathroom. We might just do the kids bathroom shower first before ours is redone. I want to take out the kids shower/tub combo and just have Steve make a tiled shower and add a shampoo shelf. No need for a tub since no one used it. We still have a tub in our bathroom. I'd like to update that too, but we will see how much we want to spend! 

Logan was feeling a bit better yesterday, so I'm hoping today is the day he will feel well enough to open gifts. 

I'm still not sure if we will be getting together with family for New Years Day to celebrate Christmas? Don, now isn't feeling well as he had a fever all day Monday. Ugh!! Guess we will find out today! We do have one more rapid Covid test, just incase it's needed. 

My diet yesterday didn't happen but I'm trying again today! 

Steve's truck is being dropped off today to get fixed. The starter is not working the best! Lets hope its not a huge repair cost! Yikes!! 

Monday

 Just me and Steve playing around with Snap Chat filters. lol... 

Finally got most of the house cleaned up from Christmas. 

Logan was feeling a tiny bit better yesterday but did still sleep most of the day and hardly ate. Only coming out of his room for a smoothy, Advil, soup and ice cream. I'm hoping today, Day 5 of him being sick he will be improving more. Of course it is almost 11am and I have yet to see him this morning! 

It snowed last night about 2" of snow with ice on top. Crunchy, heavy snow! Not enough to ski and poor quality snow! I still got in a workout on the cross ramp, lifted weights and did yoga and a 1 min plank. 

Now I'm thinking a nap sounds good or time to watch a few movies. 

I did make some more of my favorite soup, Chicken Thai. Steve helped cut up the veggies and chicken so it really helped speed up the soup making process. I made it a lot more spicy this time with the added peppers. Not the best decision to eat a bowl before running because now I have a little heartburn going on. 

Christmas 2021

 That's a wrap for Christmas 2021!! 

We made the most of it being year 2 of just the 5 of us for Christmas. We'll get together with family hopefully next weekend when Logan feels better! We made the most of Christmas this year with opening gifts, having filet Mignon, potatoes, mushrooms with brussle sprouts. Games were a mystery gift which we made up the rules and then played some cribbage and a new Hot Seat game. 

Celina was busy in the kitchen testing out her gluten, dairy free cookies for her new home bakery business. They turned out excellent as we ate a warm Chocolate Chip cookie in a skillet for dinner with ice cream

Don and Celina opened their stockings. Logan wasn't feeling up to opening any gifts so we have all his when he is ready and feeling better. 

I probably should have bough Zoey something because she was very interested in opening up gifts. 

Poor Logan, I wanted at least one photo of him at Christmas. He came down from his room a few times for more Advil and some food, but really wasn't hungry or feeling well enough to stay with us downstairs for very long. I'll pick up some soup and other food items he can eat today as we were very limited on what we had on hand that would be easy for him to swallow. He has a very sore throat! 

I stopped over to see Kendra, Paul, Evan and Madelyn at their house. I brought the kids a few gifts to open and picked up some baking supplies for Celina. It was nice to do a quick visit while wearing a mask to limit exposure. 

Merry Christmas 2021!!

 Merry Christmas 2021!!!

The stockings are filled on Christmas morning, waiting for everyone to wake up and open gifts. 

Our Family Christmas will be delayed a week due to Logan being sick with Hand, foot and mouth virus. Poor kiddo! He helped Celina and Kendra bake their Yule logs all day Wednesday and Thursday. Ended up going to Urgent care Friday morning and found out its not strep or covid. Unfortunately, all he can take is 3 Advil every 6 hours and this is very contagious lasting up to 10 days and can be up to 3 weeks!

We will still open stocking and gifts tonight, but will wait to gather with the rest of the family until he is better, which I hope is soon! 

Christmas count down.. only 2 more days!!!

 I really only have one more day since this is the last day till we celebrate Christmas Eve!! Yikes!!! 

I finished up the wrapping last night and made one batch of thumbprint cookies. I still have to clean my own house/main level which is just clear the clutter, make more cookies, get 2 more gifts for the game and  wrap those up! Plus, make caramel rolls, and popovers on Christmas! 

In addition to all that! I am working today till around 1pm. Not sure if I'm also working Friday for an hour but I'm hoping to push that off till next week! 

The kids and Don had a few photos posted on Instagram which I did a screen shot. Turned out cute! This should have been our Christmas card photo! 

I also did a screen shot from FB, this is Shirley M. Her husband Vern worked with my Dad. They were family friends for years while I was growing up in New Hope. They drifted apart once we moved to Plymouth. I have fond memories of going over to their house on Christmas Eve, watching those film photo strips on the screen and playing with the track /and all the match box cars. We'd play scat a penny game which I can't remember. They adopted a daughter when I was around 9 years old and she was like a little sister to me. The bottom photo is a young Shirley, I'm guessing a graduation photo? She passed away last year a few days after her husband. RIP Shirley and Vern.

Celina and Kendra started a gluten, dairy free business. They started off with selling Yule log cakes for Christmas. They delivered the first order last night and have 20 more to go! A great learning experience for all the products they will be selling! It's nice to see all my kids working together as Logan also is helping out with the baking and delivery. 

Me and Evan on his birthday. Such a smart, good looking boy! 

Almost Ready! Happy 8th Birthday Evan!!

Steve spent part of Saturday tiling the back of the stove. Putting the new small tiles on the new wall shelf he made. He still has the sides to do and it's done. We aren't sure we love it. We could not find exactly the same tile color as our existing wall tile. It's close but not an exact match. We didn't have enough of the existing tile, so this is what we came up with. 

The after with the new small tiles and built in shelf for oils ans spices

The before with the granite countertop tiles as the back of the stove without a tiled shelf. 

If we could, we'd probably take off all the old wall tile, but we are keeping it since it's the entire kitchen walls. 

It's Evan's birthday today!! 8 years old!!! 

I got most of the presents and stocking stuffers wrapped Saturday. I still have at least 30 more to wrap up. That's my least favorite part todo, so I'm pretty happy we have a week to go and I'm pretty much ready for Christmas with a few more gifts to get. I'm hoping to finish up by Monday with the gift buying and will finish wrapping the gifts and doing my cookie/candy baking. 

Spending this year, we did save some by using Visa points on gift cards, giving cash so not to buy extra gifts no one wanted. We got the family practical gifts that everyone will need. Steve and I aren't exchanging gifts as trips we took are our gift and camping. We buy what we want throughout the year, so no need for extra stuff. I did purchase a few stocking stuffers for Steve, but that's it. 

We have 12 people to purchase gift for as our family is expanding. I always try to spend the same amount on family members and the same on my three kids and grandchildren. I don't have a budget we just buy and spend what we can. Plus, we buy all the food for a Christmas meal and have everyone over for Dinner. Not sure what's going to happen for our celebrating this year as Omniron variant of Covid is now taking over and will soon explode in cases after the holidays. The three dosages of vaccine will only protect us around 60% or so??? Not exactly sure of the %, but it was not 100% with the first covid or Delta variant. We all felt safe going back to crowded bars, restaurants and grocery stores and now we are back to wearing masks, not going out and considering not gathering for the holidays with family. How quickly things changed with Omniron! 2nd year in a row of Christmas that might be canceled. For now its plans as usual to gather but Tuesday nights President Biden's address to the country might change our minds about gathering. Hospitals will soon be over run in January. One step forward and many back again to get this pandemic under control. No one wants this to continue but many are against getting vaccinated. We all need to do our part to keep everyone safe. We are all tired of having to deal with this. The virus is not tired and is not letting up. All we can do is have HOPE for 2022..... 

Getting ready for Christmas 2021!!

 The years sure do tick by faster and faster! Here we are coming up to Christmas 2021 and soon to be the year 2022!

Steve and I took a short cut through our old neighborhood. The first house we built and owned on Tyne Lane. We only lived there 17 months, but it was the house we brought Celina home from the hospital, then moved when she was 2 months old to our current house about a mile away. This house all decorated was on a street next to the one we lived on. It's always fun to take a trip down memory lane, even though we didn't live there long. 

We will have a white Christmas after all. After getting 19 inches of snow and it melting. We got around 2" last night. It's not enough to cross country ski, but I'm sure we will get more between now and March. Plenty of time to ski this winter. We purchased cross country and down hill ski boots for my grandson. We had the ski's for both from when Logan was little so we are passing them on to him. I plan to take Evan skiing at some point this winter. 

I'll be making more candies today and wrapping gifts. I still need a few more birthday and Christmas gifts and then we are done shopping!! I don't feel stressed this year about only having a week left to get everything done. Some years its a real struggle to feel like I have it all under control. I think I've learned that the most important thing is just to enjoy being together for holidays. 

My Christmas's have changed over the years. We moved when I was 3 to MN from Delaware. Most of the family either lived in Delaware/Maryland or New York. I don't remember Christmas with everyone before we moved. We did go back to have Christmas in Delaware at my grandparents house when I was 3, but after that we all stayed home. Most years it was just the 4 of us, sometimes my Nana would fly out for Christmas, but that might have been only two times in all the years. 

Once I had my own kids, I started Celebrating with my husband and his family. I stopped having Christmas with my parents and sister at least 20 years ago. I think we had only one Christmas when my father was alive and Celina was a baby even though we only lived 45 minutes away. 

Steve's parents are now in their 80's, so its hard to know how many more we will have together with them. My kids are growing up and soon will all have their own families. Kendra and her family join all of us every year but no one got together last year due to covid. I was hoping this year we all would be covid free to gather. Now with the new covid Variant Omniron, its hard to know what we should do as not everyone wants to get vaccinated. 

I do love that our family has expanded to 16. It's a big change from just 4. I would love to just go some where for the holidays, some where warm instead of giving gifts. Not sure that will ever happen but I'm grateful to have a large family now and will just enjoy the years we all have left together. 

Friday! TGIF

 Well, today started off rough! One of the cats I'm watching didn't make it last night. He wasn't doing well all Thursday and I didn't think he would make it to morning. The cat was just skin and bones and old! Had been peeing and pooping everywhere for months. I had Steve come over and put the cat in a box with a towel. It will stay out in the garage till they return on Saturday. I have one more cat feeding tonight and I'm done cat sitting. 

RIP Timmy.. 12/17/2021

Misty thankfully is still doing great! 

On another note!! Got my hair cut and curled yesterday by Celina's friend that is a beginner hair stylist. She took a few inches off, gave me long layers and long face framing layers too. Plus, curled my hair. I usually wear my hair up. This was a nice change and maybe I'll wear my hair down for Christmas? 

Cute Salon, Tease in St. Paul. 

I don't have much progress to report. Steve did move the electrical wires and took out the middle wall stud  to build a square shelf for oil, salt and pepper. He just has to put on the tile and it's done! I can not wait!! One more project to check off the todo list. I'm hoping I can get him to do the quarter round trim all around the main floor next! Fingers crossed!! 

No more snow covering our deck. It all melted Wednesday. It's back to cold 25+F temps with a dusting of fresh snow we got yesterday.