Fargo

If you're not watching this new season of Fargo, you should. It's really good. 

Strange Package

We got an Amazon delivery addressed to a former employee (gone for at least 3 weeks). I opened it. 

That face/head is the size of Korra's. The pink kit is full of fake eyelashes. 

???

Cookie Season!

 Korra's got her cookie website up and running and made her flyer.  I printed out a few today and we'll put them up in the neighborhood this afternoon.  Her troop wants to raise money towards a Disney trip!  Send me an email if you want to buy some cookies.

Back To It

 Nate and I got back into the regular swing of work yesterday and Korra went back to school today.  It's been a little bit of a rough transition, but even as I type that, I think about how much easier it was to come back to this job compared to going back to teaching after Christmas break.  Sometimes I think I'm ready to go back to teaching, but moments like this... I might need another year.  

Home Cleaning

Came home today to a complete mess thanks to Alex. We had the foresight to move the Christmas tree into Korra's room and close that off, but he still managed to pull down/knock over other Christmas decorations AND found a canister of oatmeal that was on top of the kitchen cabinets, drag it down, tear it open, and leave oats all over the dining room. 

Ugh. We spent quite a bit of time cleaning up and then just went ahead and packed up all the Christmas decorations and the tree. Sad but easier than trying to fight with a naughty cat. 

Happy New Year

Cousins

Korra loves time with her cousins so much. They've been down at the creek with their new walkie talkies, playing with Lego, pretending to be spies or cats, drawing and occasionally arguing. I'm really glad she's been able to have time with almost all of her cousins over this Christmas break. 

Kindle

As much as I love to read, I've only recently decided I wanted an eReader. Nate got me one for Christmas and I've spent the past few days figuring it out and downloading LOTS of books. Thankfully, yesterday was Stuff Your Kindle Day and Amazon had hundreds of free ebooks available. AND 2 digital books I've had on hold at the library for months became available!  Yay for new books!

Less than 2 Hours

It makes me really happy that we can drive to the cabin in a little less than 2 hours. 

I'm a little bummed to have only slept in my own bed for 2 nights before traveling again, but I know we'll have a wonderful long weekend celebrating Christmas and New Year with Nate's family. 

100 Books

It's not QUITE the end of the year, so I think I'll finish one more, but GoodReads just put out their 2023 Year In Books and I've read 100 books this year.

My average book length was 371 pages.

My favorite books of the year were:

• Ship Wrecked
• House in the Cerulean Sea
• Thank you for Listening
• The Book of Flora
• Remarkably Bright Creatures
• The Measure
• The Scandalous Confessions of Lydia Bennett

11 hours of sleep

I fell asleep by 8:30 last night and even though I woke up a few times, I slept 11 hours and woke up feeling so much better.  I'm pretty much recovered but Nate's still feeling rough. 

Fingers crossed he'll be on the mend tomorrow. 

Super Weird Dream

I just woke up from a dream where Nate and I were both pregnant. Our OBGYN was completely unconcerned about the "rare but totally normal male pregnancy" and kept insisting we'd discuss birth logistics "when things got closer to showtime." She wouldn't answer my questions about how Nate's pregnancy occurred (patient confidentiality?) and in typical Nate fashion, he wasn't concerned and didn't want to bother the doctor. Said doctor put on a puppet show to illustrate a point I don't remember and marked the fundal height of the babies with a sharpie on our shins instead of telling us things like due dates or weeks of gestation. Additionally, these appointments were occurring in a tent on our college campus during a reunion and I knew that very soon I'd need to tell a whole bunch of people we hadn't seen in years that Nate and I were both pregnant and we'd adding two babies to our family at an undetermined date.  

Nate Gives the Favorite Gift

Sick Christmas

Korra is over her cold but Nate and I woke up feeling absolutely awful. 

Being sick on Christmas sucks. 

Christmas, Day 3

 We had pancakes with whipped cream for breakfast. The weather was gorgeous and warm today (65 degrees). The kids spent time time playing at the park. The kids opened our Christmas Eve book gifts and spent some time reading. We watched Elf and had spaghetti (hold the maple syrup) for dinner and cupcake cones for dessert. 

Christmas, Day 2

Nate and Chris decided to head into town to meet a friend, go to a distillery, and play some games at an arcade. 

Laura and I took the kids to the park and did another Christmas craft. 

In the evening we had pizza and watched Home Alone before making ice cream sundaes. 

Christmas Celebration, Day 1

A picture of the cousins in their new matching jammies. 

Crafts

Even Great Grandpa enjoyed playing games. 

We watched A Christmas Story and had Chinese food for dinner and "oh fudge" brownies for dessert. 

6 Hour Drive

After working way to hard this morning and then scrambling to finish packing and getting the cats settled, we were able to leave by 2:00. Remarkably, the drive was really smooth. Very little bad traffic and even with 2 stops, we made it to my sister's house in just a little over 6 hours, which is really great time. 

Hoping we sleep well tonight and wake up feeling healthier in the morning. 

It got me

Korra's been sick since Friday night.  She's still feeling extra tired and snotty.  I've managed to avoid getting it until today.  I've been drinking extra water, doing sinus rinses, washing my hands, even taking some of those Emergen-C supplements- but today I woke up with a runny nose and cough.  I don't want to be sick over Christmas!

10 PM Work Call

I got a call from an unknown number at 10PM.  Obviously, I didn't answer, but they left me a voicemail so I decided to check it,.  Good thing I did because it was the hotel in California, where I had booked 3 hotel rooms for coworkers this evening,  calling to tell me that they needed a credit card authorization form filled out since I wouldn't be the one staying. I booked the sites and put in my credit card information through their website but apparently that wasn't good enough?  I've booked a handful of hotel rooms for staff before and never had this issue- and when I mentioned that to the hotel worker who was on the phone, she assured me this is standard policy for all hotels and clearly I was the one who was out of line for being annoyed and frustrated.  Ugh.  And apparently my coworkers came to check-in during the 5 minutes I was filling out the form and so she had them all pay for their own rooms. And now I'm all riled up instead of being ready to go to sleep. Grrr. 

Stupid Cats

Mrs Reynolds pooped and puked in our room.  Alex knocked down the Christmas tree and broke 3 ornaments.  

Christmas Pizzas

Even though Korra still has a terrible cough and Nate and I both had to work today, we managed to be a little fun and festive with dinner. 

Christmas pizzas (snowman and Christmas tree in case you couldn't tell). 

Illuminights

We decided to skip the Botanical Gardens this year and try the Christmas lights at the zoo instead. Korra felt well enough after resting all day (and a healthy dose of cold medicine) to walk the whole route and really enjoy it all.

Snuggly Alex

I love it when Alex snuggles with us. Mostly because then I know where he is and that he's not causing trouble for a few minutes. 

Sick Korra

Poor Korra. She woke up at 3 am with a 101 degree fever, headache, and throwing up. We had lots of plans for today- hanging out with new friends, a sleepover for Korra, and a graduation party for me and Nate. 

Plans are now to stay home and hope no one else gets sick and that we're all healthy by Christmas.