2021 in Review

Y'all! Hiiiiiii! Enough is enough already.  I hope to be back in this space more regularly - shooting for twice a month, but at the very least once a month (is that timeframe considered regular??) Anyway, I've been reflecting back at 2021, so thankful for our blessings, for our health, family, and even for the hard stuff.  That being said, I do sorta hope that 2022 is less eventful! 

A look back at the highlights of each month....

January: we got to fly to visit Grandma and Grandpa (and Aunt, Uncle, and cousins too) in Barrington, IL.  And also SNOW!

Life Lately

Happy February! Here's a little peek at life lately, primarily Valentine's Day weekend.  We are in the midst of a huge winter cold front, something that Houston hasn't seen since 1989.  Our low today is 14* (!) and the high is 20*.  We even got an inch or so of snow, which I'll be sharing on the blog soon. Unfortunately Jon's office lost power and closed, however the silver lining is that he's NEVER had a snow day, so...  :D

One of the biggest changes in our household in 2021 is we pulled Henry out of the new CC community that we joined in August, and are continuing the curriculum with just one other family.  We still meet each week (at one of our homes or a coffee shop) and go over assignments, discuss books, read papers, do experiments, you know...all the things.  I just placed a huge order with Carolina for the boys' dissections this semester.  It was actually pretty fun to unpack crayfish, worms, frogs, grasshoppers, and a pregnant shark. Biology labs are so cool. 

Our weekend was spent winterizing the house and yard, aka, wrapping the citrus trees, covering the plants we don't want to lose to cold, and wrapping all exposed water pipes (in Texas they aren't underground). The kids keep commenting that it had the feel of getting ready for a hurricane, and I guess they're not wrong.  The difference is we (Lord willing) won't be flooding!

Be back soon with snow pics! 

 

Henry's gift to me for Valentine's Day (as requested by me ;)

Happy New Year!

The prettiest cat in Texas ;)

Happy New Year! So grateful and thankful for another year.  If you're reading this, thank you! 

I enjoyed looking back over my goals for 2020, and, actually I didn't do too badly.  A few goals were to blog once a month, (haha, such a low goal for myself), and to read 12 books.  I'm alllll about a few attainable goals, and am happy to say that I achieved both things. *bows* I actually ended up doubling my reading goal and rediscovered my love for historical fiction. 

As far as blogging goes, this year my goal is to blog TWICE per month.  I know.  Hold your applause, please.  Along those lines, I am working on a new blog, which will "launch" lol, hopefully, by the end of February.  The new one won't be family centered, but will help me move in a new direction with my kids getting older.  I love blogging, and the hobby that has been - I've been here for 13 years! So, yeah, I'm excited about that! I've even started a blogging calendar for myself. Super official. ;)

Some other things that I was able to check off the list in 2020 was getting all caught up on all my doctor visits and well checks.  Included in that, but much more fun was finding an esthetician, which included getting a few facials and a chemical peel.  If only I could go back in time to my sun baking days and reverse that damage, then I'd really be all set. 

2020 was also the year of Disney for our family - getting to visit so many times really was a dream come true. We hope to go back this year for their 50th, but we're also looking forward to hopefully visiting Hawaii.  We haven't been there since 2011, I think?? HOW CAN THAT BE POSSIBLE? We have a few free airline tickets that we need to use already, so hopefully that trip will happen.

Havalah and I did a full Whole30 in 2020, as well as two short ones.  We both loved it and how we felt afterwards, so we're putting that on our calendars again for 2021, starting in a few weeks!

House goals for 2021 include the finishing touches on the kitchen, new bathroom lights for all the bathrooms, painting all the doors and installing new doorknobs, and lots of little projects that probably don't need to be recorded here lol.

I am SO looking forward to seeing my sister, Mary Beth in the next few months.  I can't wait to hug her neck in person.  The last six months have been, well, really hard.  She's on the other side now; full hysterectomy, lumpectomy, 12 weeks of chemo, and a mastectomy DONE, and healing like a champ. So proud of her.  

So, happy new year to you! Thanks for reading.  {{hug}}

A Day in the Life Fall 2020

Hellooo! I was once again inspired by my good friend, Whitney, to write a Day in the Life post.  If you don't read Whitney's blog, you should! We became blog friends waaaay back in 2013, when she gave me tips on moving across the country with a cat, lol, and through the years have become real life friends.  Whitney is sweet, smart, organized, generous, and so friendly.  In this day and age where most bloggers are just trying to make a name for themselves, Whitney is so grounded, and I love that about her!

What's up Wednesday

Hiiiii!!! What's new? The biggest news around here, at the moment, is we are back in school! This is a different year for us because H & H are at different CC campuses.  This wasn't an easy decision, and honestly, we're still not adjusted. Sniff sniff.  Another fun development is Henry has started working on dual credit.  He's currently taking Western Cultural History.

Jon has been working SO hard on our kitchen!  He's closing in on building an enclosure for our vent hood, then we'll order our open shelving, then begin work on the pantry, which is the final step!  I am thrilled to have a working, functioning kitchen again after 4 years of working with a 2 square foot section of countertop, and all walls torn down to the studs. Yuck.  I'm on cloud nine, y'all, and can't wait to share more in the coming months.

July!

Ahh, I love July! It's like Saturday of summer.  Long, hot, lazy days.  I always feel like this is the  month, when the kids have fully settled into our summer schedule (it always takes at least a month of the busyness of the school work load to wear off). We settle in to our routine of swim, play games, hang out, watch movies, repeat.

July is also typically when our families come to Texas for a visit! Yay! This year we were able to visit Jon's parents in beautiful Barrington, Illinois. A few months ago they relocated there from Edmonds, Washington.  They moved to be near Jon's little sister, Hilary and her adorable family, and they couldn't be happier!  :D We loved seeing everyone, swimming/canoeing in the nearby lake, and of course, eating way too much!

In case you wondered, the plane was very empty - we didn't mind a bit :)

beautiful Chicago

A day in the life

It's been a long time since I did a day in the life post, so here we go!  This was a typical day for us, nothing too special on the calendar. So in case you've ever wondered, here's an example of what we do all day ;)

I'm up at 6:45 and head towards the kitchen to make tea and check in on the few blogs that I still read. 

(Sidenote: I was telling my husband how much I miss the old days of blog reading.  Most blogs now, are filled with affiliate links and lots of swipe-ups, not the personable blogs that they used to be. What happened?  Just me? My fave blog is here, in case you want to take a look.  Whitney has become a good friend of mine - I think I started reading her blog in 2012 or so.  I just love her - and her blog!) 

Anyway!  So I drink my tea and slowly wake up for about 30 minutes and then head to the kitchen to check on all my ferments.  Fermented food has become a big part of my diet in the last few years (still acclimating my family to the idea of fermented food), and I'm currently enjoying kefir, viili yogurt, and kombucha.  I hope to add fermented veggies to the list this year, I need to read up on it.  So, most days my kitchen looks a little like a lab lol.  

Life Update

In an effort to try to update what we've all been up to, consider this the cliff notes edition. :D
2019 was a year full of the unexpected.  Right before the new year I tore my achilles playing pickleball with Henry, which as it turns out, isn't a quick fix.  I did my best to ignore the pain for as long as possible, until Jon dragged/convinced me to see an orthopedist who broke the bad news that the injury was quite bad.  It turned out that my other achilles was only hanging on by a thread as well.  I underwent a series PRP injections, was basically on bed rest during this time, ended up attending physical therapy, and wore a full length boot for the better part of 7 months, (I actually wore a hole through the bottom of the boot!).  After 6 months of injections and therapy, thinking it was healed I went in to find that there were actually new micro-tears in the tendon. So....I started visiting a chiropractor whose goal was to heal the diseased tendons, which will hopefully keep this from  happening again. I still haven't gone back to any sort of exercise except for swimming.  Hopefully this year sometime.

In January I was so fortunate to become acquainted with an employee from glassybaby, a company that has been near and dear to my heart for 17 years.  Not to be dramatic lol, but in some ways this was life changing for me.  My new acquaintance and friend, Anja, was in charge of the national road shows, and I became her Houston contact.  She invited me on several occasions to work with her at roadshows, learning the ropes and eventually was able to host my own popups and go on to work at their month-long Houston pop-up in December.  It has truly been a dream come true, and I hope that they return in the future and I can keep my working relationship with the company.  In the midst of a hard year physically, God was faithful to provide me with this amazing opportunity.

Hi!!

Y'all! Hi! It's January, when I annually promise myself I'll blog.  I like blogging.  I love writing about my family, my house, my homeschool, my life.  It's a head scratcher as my kids get older, wondering what direction this blog can take going forward.  And I'm not sure what the answer is honestly.  That being said, I've promised myself that I'll blog this year at least once a month.  (It would help if blogger would help a girl out with mobile blogging!) I need to be brave, carve out time, loosen up, (photos and words don't have to be picture perfect, right?), and just show up.

So, see ya around here again very soon.

Happy New Year!

xo,
k

Life Lately - October 2018

Hi Y'all! I'm trying desperately to keep up on this little old blog.  I'm toying doing the photo a day December challenge, but maybe I'll tweak it so that it's not quite the same as last year.  Riveting information, I know, ha!

October was a fun month, with Houston gracing us with gorgeous and slightly cooler temperatures.  We purchased matching coats this fall, and actually got to break them out a time or two.  Whoohoo! We celebrated Henry's birthday at the beginning of the month, with his main present being tickets for Monster Jam at NRG Stadium.  He and Jon usually go to the Pit Party beforehand, where he gets to meet all the drivers.

Late in the month we tagged along with Jon to San Antonio while he attended meetings. While he was busy we went on a historic Mission Tour. Following the Mission Trail, we started with the Alamo, in the center of town, and worked our way out of the city, seeing six Missions in all.  We were there just a few days before Dia de los Muertos so and saw many ofrendas at the Missions.   Also along the way we stopped into Lulu's for one of her famous three pound cinnamon rolls. While I was expecting this to be dry and cheap-y tasting, it was actually served fresh and warm and really very good! Jon surprised us with dinner reservations at the Tower of the Americas, to celebrate our birthdays.  While in SA we usually eat Texmex (duh), but this was really fun - and a little like being back in Seattle at the Space Needle, (except the landscape is a wee bit different ;)

We finished off October at a Ted Cruz rally, where we were so fortunate to get to hear President Trump speak.  His energy and enthusiasm were off. the. charts. He spoke for almost TWO HOURS. That was a lot of fun, and definitely felt like a once in a lifetime experience.

Anyway, y'all, thanks for stopping by! Hope to be back soon!

twins :)

Henry made me breakfast in bed on my birthday! 

the annual post Halloween candy trade

while the boys were at MJ, we had a little girls' night

Celebrating Five Years

Celebrating 5 years of Texas living at the same fast food Tex Mex place where we ate when we first rolled into town :)

Five years ago this month we arrived in Texas.  We moved here on faith, feeling God's call and blessing for our little family pack it all up and move south.  We knew God was calling us to this new place, even though we didn't yet know where Jon would work, in what city we would put down permanent roots, where we would find the right homeschooling co-op, but feeling at peace nonetheless.  

Texas, we love your people, your climate, your chill atmosphere, and you have exceeded our hopes and dreams in every way possible. There are times when we still pinch ourselves that we live here.  We are so thankful to be Texans!  

That summer life (lately)

I don't know why time insists on going by so quickly, especially in the summer! There has been some daytripping, embroidery classes, drawing, model making, movie watching, swimming, baking, go-kart building, flower planting, reading, day-camp counseling, school planning, friends visiting, roller coaster riding, bug collecting, fruit picking, book writing, but mostly we've just been over here soaking up all that is summer.  Lazy, s l o w, HOT, wonderful summer.