The Last Day of 2020

I don't have it in me for a long, emotional post about this year.  It is what it is.  We are all still here, along with all of our grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins.  We still like each other a lot - we've survived all of the togetherness, home-schooling, working-from-home, weird schedules, canceled vacations and loads of stress.  I know that the turning of the calendar won't result in drastic changes for 2021 but some days it feels like maybe just maybe there's light at the end of the tunnel. 

In 20 years, when I look back on this year, I hope I remember all of the sweetness, too.  The daily walks with dogs and Glenn and a kid or two.  Will and his games on Madden that became our sports when there were no other sports to watch.  Reina and I reading The Ickabog and Glenn and I watching videos of hunting on Instagram.  Yes, I really did that last part.  Zooming with friends and walking outside in the cold with Vicky and cousins.  Hikes - so many hikes when Alena and then Ben came out West.  Reina asking me during a work presentation if she could have hot dogs for breakfast - the consensus of the group was a resounding "YES."  Glenn ironing fabric for me while I made masks and the little assembly line we had with Vicky and friends to get the masks made and delivered to the Foundation.   Our twice a week takeout dinners to help local restaurants and fine, some chain ones too.  Sometimes you just really need soup and salad from Olive Garden.  Socially distanced baseball games and watching the men in the family pace when Will came up to bat. Group texts with friends that helped me see it was normal to want to cry over Jr High math.  Will's elaborate back stories for all of our pets that change daily (Charlie used to be a quarterback for the Denver Broncos, our cat worked at the ball drop in NYC, Tootsie was in Isis....) 

I have many other things to be thankful for but I'm done writing because I plan on ending this year with Netflix and the Ipad and some brownies that are just out of the oven.  Here's to a boring 2021.  

How cold is it?

We are having typical Wyoming winter weather this week.  We only have about 1.5 inches of snow on the ground but it's chilly.  How chilly is it?  Well it's 9 degrees outside tonight and inside it's cold enough for Coco to tolerate a little snuggle time with Charlie.  For the record, Charlie loves the cats.  He wants to play with the cats but his version of play is not something that they are interested in participating in.  Soxy usually keeps her distance from him but Coco will let herself be nuzzled for a few minutes before she hisses, swats at him and walks away.  But not tonight.  She let him curl up on the sofa next to him and while he tried to stay awake, he eventually napped too.  

The Day After the Day After Christmas

 We had a nice Christmas, so nice in fact that I haven't had time to write about it.  This year definitely looked different from previous years.  No Pop-pop and Grandma visit, no Christmas Eve church service, no friends at Aunt Vicky's house.  But we had some new traditions too.  Delicious brisket for Christmas Eve, kids that slept until 7 on Christmas morning (!!!), a buffet of leftovers for Christmas Dinner, Zooming with both sides of the family and getting to see their smiling faces.  It wasn't an ideal holiday but we are happy that we are all safe and sound and next year's holiday is going to be especially joyful.  

I took a quick survey and here are each family's members highlights. 

Glenn's favorite gift was an electric hand warmer that Lucy and Will picked out and that Lucy plans on borrowing for cold football games - maybe even baseball games in Wyoming?   His favorite food was Uncle Matt's brisket on Christmas Eve.  He also enjoyed surprising me with a really pretty sapphire ring that he disguised in a box that looked like he bought me wildlife license plates.  

Reina loves her hoverboard but also wants me to write about the new keyboard that she received.  She has mastered riding the hoverboard around the living room and she makes it look so easy.  Its not that easy for the older members of the family.  Glenn can ride it if he has two people to hang on to and Lucy's one shot ended with her lying on her back in the hall closet after getting bucked off the hoverboard.  

Will loves his new tv that he got for gaming.  He figured out how to get NFL games broadcast and if he only had an attached kitchenette and bathroom, he might never have to leave his room.  

There are so many other wonderful presents that were gifted to us and I'll try to write more about those later.  For my part, I can't pick a favorite but filed under "gifts I didn't know I needed" Will picked out a pillow that you can set the Ipad on and it's perfect for lazy viewing in fact I'm using it right now while I also type on the laptop.  Multi-tasking for the win!  

So that's all I have for now.  We had a nice holiday.  The kids and Glenn have the week off. I'm going to work from home this week and we'll have a fun week and lots and lots of family time.  

Christmas Eve Eve Eve Eve Eve

 Reina saw a meme tonight with the above title and liked it.  A lot.  She is counting down the minutes until the big day.  I, on the other hand, am sitting in the the darkened dining room waiting for a cat to come back inside so that I can go to bed.  It's pretty cold and windy so I don't think her little sojourn will take very long but she might also be able to sense that I'm tired and I'm still working tomorrow and shall instead take her own sweet time.  Last month, I made the mistake of checking on all of the pets one night before I went to bed (did I write about this already?) and I couldn't find Soxy in any of her usual places.  She's the culprit running around outside right now, for the record.  It was a warmer than usual night for November and so I started to wonder if she'd snuck out when I was letting the dogs out before bed so I went outside a few times and called for her, no luck.  I finally went to sleep but I worried about her all night.  I woke up at 5:00 a.m. and decided to go check on her.  I came downstairs and found her in the catbed next to the printer. Long story short, she made herself a lovely little bed in the lining closet and I only know that because a few nights later, I accidentally locked her in there and found her in the morning because of all of the meowing.  Yes, this turning into a cat blog. 

She's back inside so I can stop writing now but I'm on a bit of a roll.  The kids holiday break has started.  They have two weeks off and we are going to do our best to enjoy as much of it as we can.  I'd say "enjoy every minute" but I'm the mother to a teen and a tween and let's not get ahead of ourselves here.  I'm working a few days this week and most of next week but I will be at home so at least I'll have company.  Glenn is working tomorrow and then taking the rest of the year off and is planning a few outdoor adventures for the three of them.  I'm more ready for Christmas than I've been in years.  Having to get packages ready to send all over the country instead of just putting them under the tree certainly helped my organizational skills.  Pop-pop and Grandma are staying put in Arizona instead of driving back here.  It was a tough decision but the right one.  We can see the light at the end of this COVID tunnel and we just have to hang in there until we are all vaccinated and then we can all hang out as much as we want to.  We can have dinner parties, we can go to the movie theater, we can go to Target on a busy Saturday - the possibilities are endless!  

Wyoming's case numbers are coming down and actually starting to stay down.  The Governor instituted a statewide mask mandate a few weeks ago and numbers have dropped.  We've had somewhere around 36,000 cases but the number of currently infected people is lower than it's been since earlier in the Fall.  The vaccinations have started in each county and that's great news.  In this household, we are still taking it pretty seriously and masking up, etc., but we are planning to spend Christmas with Aunt V and family and nobody better even cough between now and then.  

One more animal story.  I took last Friday afternoon off and I planned to finish up some last minute shopping and present-wrapping while the kids were in school.  Before I headed out, I took the dogs to the field for a quick 20 minute run.  We still have snow on the ground from last weekend's storm but that doesn't deter them but it does make them more tired which is a win-win for me.  I got all three dogs back in my car and headed home to drop them off before I went shopping. I looked down and noticed bloody paw prints on the seats and discovered that Trigger had just about torn one of his toenails off.  I called Glenn, he met me at home with one of his co-workers who used to work in a vet office. She confirmed that we'd have to take Trigger in because the tear was too far up his toenail to fix at home. I called the vet office and got an "emergency" appt which is super helpful but also more money. I left the other two at home, drove Trigger across town, waited with him in the vet office, left him in the vet office because he had to be sedated, raced through Target for last minute items, went back and picked up Trigger and came home.  No presents were wrapped.  No quiet afternoon to reflect on the holiday season.  Instead of last minute gifts, people will get a picture of Trigger's wrapped up foot because that's where all of their stocking stuffer money went. 

So that's where we are on Christmas Eve Eve Eve Eve Eve.  

It's beginning to look a lot like the second week of December

Apparently Christmas is 16 days away or something ridiculous.  I'm trying to wrap up my shopping for the out-of-town relatives and I'm having a modicum of success.  I have yet to wrap a present or send a Christmas card but the house is decorated and the kids are getting excited.  The older they get, the harder it is to find something to surprise them but hopefully I've managed to do that this year.  Well, since this is an honest family blog, I have to report that Reina has already stumbled upon her big present.  We were hiding it in Glenn's hunting room and she went down there to get ready to go goose hunting with her dad and there it was sitting under the desk.  Her sweet conscience wouldn't let her keep that news to herself so she told her dad and then she told me and then she apologized like 20 more times even though it wasn't her fault that SOMEONE couldn't hid things better in his hunting room.  So that's where we are.  

Tomorrow Will gets to lead the school in the pledge of allegiance and read the morning announcements over the intercom.  It's part of the curriculum for his speech class.  Mr Introvert if very ready to have this project be completed.  He's practiced the pledge several times and I think he's ready to go.  Glenn was encouraging him to read the pledge passionately and with conviction but it comes across a bit Mussolini-like when Glenn does that so I think Will is going to go a different route.  I wish I could hear it in person.  

The rest of us are getting by, trying to enjoy this wonderful season even with all of the changes and weirdness.