Winter

It's a quiet winter but we're enjoying what we can!

January brought me a late Christmas gift of a "new" to me van!  

For the dog who hates water and hates cold she sure jumped right in.  If Libby does it, Minnie follows!

 

BDFF

 

While Aliyah has been working hard getting close to show weekend Max was kindly invited to check out the ice sculpture show in Carlisle with the bubble buddies!

 

Valentines decorations, Valentine brownie sundaes, and home made super bowl pizzas

 

We've really been enjoying the snow this winter.  It gives us a fun excuse to play outside all the time!  And we have a sled dog:)

 

 

   

New office

Since everyone is home a lot more often now (the kids were fully virtual for several weeks around the holidays) Nate thought it might be nice to have a sperate office (instead of just our bedroom).  The only empty room was a storage one that you could barely even walk in.  But I took that on as a challenge and managed to get rid of and reorganize stuff to turn this into his own little office downstairs!  Of course it wasn't complete without a mural my Aliyah!

 

Needed a little room still for storage but the curtains cover it up nicely!

Meanwhile, Max got his nerf wall in the basement!

And we got a real bedroom, used solely for sleeping and not working!  So much more room with out the desks in there!

 

Christmas Break

It wasn't our usual visit but we were very happy to get to see Grandpa Ken and Grandma Diana in an outdoor Christmas exchange.  We were thankful for nice weather to do so!

Enjoying the break and nice weather

 

 

Because what else is there to do?!  Aliyah wanted a bit of a change and rarely slept in her top loft bed so we brought the old bed back up and did some room rearranging.  She loves it!

  

 

Aliyah has such a heart for animals.  She emptied her whole piggy bank, and used a gift card she recieved for Christmas and went to PetSmart and bought as much as she could (post Christmas sales) for dogs at an animal shelter, toys, collars, leash, etc.  She was very happy to make the delivery and we're very proud of her:)

 

NYE

2020 is surely a year we're like to all forget.  Loosing my mom was the hardest thing we're ever had to deal with.  She wasn't just a weekly phone call and holiday meal kind of mom, she was a see and talk to every single day one.  The loss has been great.  My family has been amazing.  Whenever I just don't want to do holidays, or days in general, they keep me going.  The extra family time we've had this year is truly a blessing!  We miss our friends SOOO much and can't wait to be able to gather freely with friends and family again.  We're also very thankful for our "bubble buddies" so we don't completely loose ALL social interaction and so the kids have some friends to play with.  We split NYE, had a yummy take out dinner at the Cole's (puppies got treats too) and then they came over for some games.  We made it till midnight, just to officially make sure 2020 was OVER!

 

  

 

 

We made sure to eat a lot of sauerkraut this year, we need a much better year for 2021!