Pretty sure we’re in the holidaze portion of the season, right?

Hope everyone had a wonderful holiday or is still enjoying a wonderful holiday season!

Ours was nice. I worked Monday and Tuesday (more on my work to follow) and really most of December so things were a bit chaotic but like always “Christmas came just the same.” While J didn’t play in the band this year (the church had a bigger choir and the contemporary band this time), we all still went to the candlelight Christmas Eve service which I loved.

Christmas morning, we had my husband’s brother over for breakfast (my sister-in-law had to work at the stadium later so it was just him), followed by opening our family gifts, and then, we went to my brother’s home for Christmas dinner. My brother’s spaghetti dinner did not disappoint! Nor did his homemade limoncello, something new to us. It was a nice day.

Now we’re all off work for this week between Christmas and the new year. And I’m spending some time today to do a little catching up with things.

So if you are wondering….

Where I’ve Been?

Well, I did something a bit crazy around early November. I like to say I lost my mind the week of the time change and full moon (though I did discuss this with my husband a bit). Some of you might remember I spent a good deal of time working full-time in a classroom last spring leading up to pre-k graduation. And of course, I always work full-time hours in the summer.

The classroom I spent a lot of time in during the spring was losing another teacher and I was struggling with the idea of those kids going through yet another teacher/change. Now, you’ll need to refer to the lost my mind sentence above. Yes, I agreed to be in there full-time through the end of the year. No longer am I subbing but rather I’m a full-time teacher. My parameter was through the end of the year and then, we’ll re-evaluate.

Fun fact: husband thought I meant end of the year-2025 while I meant end of the year-school year. SIGH. This is because I told him he had to talk me out of it if I ever had any crazy ideas about doing just what I’ve done. Ha!

Time Management Skills

I have none. Well, not true. I can manage time at work. However, at home? Not so much. Thus, the complete silence around here.

Though some of the silence came from a bit of emotional upheaval/sad news from this fall as well. First, our lovely little gray cat, while still with us, has taken a turn and it not doing so well. Out of the blue back in September, the vet informed me she had a mass on on her abdomen but without doing further invasive tests no way to know if it was cancer or not. When the vet didn’t offer any referrals, I kind of knew. He said it could be a month or a year. As I said, she’s still here though not quite as bossy as she used to be.

Then, in October, we lost my father-in-law. Unexpected in a sense but not completely as he was 85 & not in great health. Mostly, I need to say here that family is complicated (most his children were not on speaking terms with him at the time of his passing) and keeping the peace (waves at you all) between two families (his wife and her daughter & my in-laws) is exhausting!

Final Thoughts

And now, my time is apparently up as my husband is wanting to play his video games (I can’t concentrate while he’s doing that).

Regardless of how much I post, the blog’s going to be here in blogland for another year at least. Really, I do want to do better with this. My blog came up for hosting renewal in November and I almost let it go. However, I just couldn’t do it. I still do miss this (and anyone still reading!).

Not sure what to write about now that I’m done with the hot chocolate trials for the year. Back to regular coffee in the morning. Had a Dr. Pepper with my lunch (that’s rare but it sounded good today).

Trying to decide whether to have a theme for my Wednesdays moving forward, used to do wellness Wednesdays a while back, or just skip it. Every blog post doesn’t need a theme.

For today, just some random photos from this early afternoon. I woke up and the weather was glorious! Sunny and in the 50’s (it’s in the 60’s now). Ran to Menards for bird seed, a new birdfeeder, and finally, they had some early spring flowers out! Did I need any of that outside of the bird seed? No. Did I buy it all anyway? Yes.

Came home and still managed to fill 2 yard waste bags in the time before our trash service came today. Go me! I was excited about that one.

New Front Yard Flowers

Finally bought a hanging basket of pansies. They take the cold if the temperatures dip back down again. The sunshine yellow called out to me today.

And a container of columbine flowers, another one that can take a dip in the temperature.

Small floral project

They had small containers of hyacinth on sale in Menards and so I thought they might look fun in my teacup planter.

We’ll see how it looks after they bloom. What do you think of my dragonfly art? It was a rain gauge but the glass broke while I was cleaning things on the front porch this morning. Keep it there or not?

After lunch, I went back out to do a bit more and the weather? My weather?! What happened?

Chance of Rain?

This morning it looked pretty much like this:

And this afternoon, after lunch, the sky suddenly looked like this:

Reminding Myself Rain Helps the Flowers Grow

My Bleeding Hearts are coming back!

Cat’s Corner

Nothing to do with the rest of this post but here’s a photo of an uncooperative cat.

Time to go see if it’s the 50 percent rain or 50 percent not rain out there…..

Do you have a favorite spring flower?

This post is a little random today.

Starting off with this wonderful cinnamon roll (and coffee, always coffee) that I had for breakfast.

My husband had to work this morning and thinking I had to move my car (snow day problems) so he could get out, I decided to go to the grocery store since we were out of a few basics. And not so basic things as well. I ended up going to two stores since my non-regular store was having a sale on a few things we really enjoy (and blueberries!). While I love my Hy-Vee so much, I’m sorry to say their bakery stinks. Might be a good thing as I’m never all that tempted. I can’t seem to make it out of the other store without something. See case in point, picture of cinnamon roll.

Smells so good!

I’m not a huge fan of Target candles but J gave me 2 of these little jar candles for Christmas. And this one smells so good and has impressed me with how it fills the whole bedroom with scent.

An Unexpected Surprise!

I planned to only work a few hours in the afternoon yesterday but ended up going in earlier. And 2 of the sweetest little girls (sisters) could hardly wait to hand me this card. They had them for all the teachers in that classroom and included me! Really made my day.

As if the sweet words written above weren’t enough (they were!), the card also contained a coffee gift card! (Note: the card is signed as well but I’m not showing that part for privacy reasons)

Christmas lives on!

The poinsettia my husband brought home as surprise around Thanksgiving is still going strong. I don’t why but that makes me happy.

Now, if it could just talk to the Christmas cactus about blooming times…

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Not really too much going on around here today. My coworker mentioned it looked like it would be a cozy weekend in as we were leaving yesterday. I think she’s probably right. There’s a chance of rain (yes, rain) later this afternoon. No idea what that’ll do to the 5 foot drifts where they plowed the snow. Or the roads for that matter. Probably going to be a football watching weekend over here. And I do need to spend some time getting the house back in order and doing a bit of laundry.

Otherwise, I’ll probably be enjoying another cinnamon roll maybe with a cup of tea and finishing up the last of the cozy romance book series set in Iceland. How do you plan to spend your weekend?

While we’re waiting for snow-maggedon over here in KC, I’m still pondering my word of the year for 2025.

Right now, we’re getting ice. It’s actually pretty nasty out with lots of major highways shut down. I’m very glad I ran to the grocery store this morning (we were out of milk anyway) and that we’re all safe at home tonight. No exciting pictures to share, just a couple of plant pictures I took maybe yesterday when the sun was out for a few minutes in the late morning/early afternoon.

Back to my word of the year for 2025. As I said, I’m still pondering. I have narrowed it down to the following choices:

Open

Being more open to whatever opportunities might come my way. Also being open with others, sharing what’s on my mind. Taking chances.

Savor

Slow down and notice things, make a point to enjoy the year. A direct attempt to not look up and go “where did this day/week/month go?” like I often did in 2024.

Ask

Ask for the things I want and need without fear. All that can happen is an answer of no.

Trust

Just trust that everything will work out. Fun fact, I took a word finder quiz and it gave me the word surrender. That sounded a bit too hard but I don’t know is that the same as trust? Hmm…

Joy

Sort of explains itself, I think. Though a phrase, joy in the journey keeps springing to mind.

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So as I ponder which one gets most of my focus in 2025, tell me did you pick a word for the year? What was your choice?

Or if not, do you have any suggestions for me or favorites from my choices listed up there?

If I want to be technical, we’re still in the Christmas season. Since tomorrow starts a brand new year, I just wanted to take a minute and share some things about my lovely Christmas season of 2024.

I think we’ve all had some hard Christmas seasons by now. If that’s you, I pray your next Christmas is a truly wonderful and magical one. Remembering the hard ones whether there was illness, grief of loved ones, or financial hardship, or even something else that I’m forgetting here, probably gave me a good reason to sit up and take notice of this Christmas.

And no it wasn’t “perfectly perfect” as I didn’t even get a chance to read Mooseltoe (look it up if you have young kids!) to my preschoolers. However, it was full of fun and love. And I’m sharing the highlights here so I can remember them. I just hope you’ll enjoy reading about a few of my special Christmas season moments.

Christmas Season Highlights

Random photos sprinkled in for fun.

I enjoyed joining in with Tamy over at Chasing My Life for Blogmas until life here got busy (good busy not bad busy) and I fizzled on blogging.

That was sometime after my birthday which falls in December. It was also a wonderful day (I can’t even begin to share how unusual that is…): on my own Christmas shopping and peppermint coffee, easy dinner night of sandwiches from Subway followed by a fun game night with the family and the most thoughtful cards and gifts!

A surprise outing with my husband, pizza and then, we drove around looking at Christmas lights! A fun street renamed Santa Claus lane where all the neighbors had blow up Santas, then Gingerbread lane, etc.

Time with girlfriends touring local homes some historical decked out for the holidays. Another girlfriend’s White Elephant Christmas party, so much fun! The 5 pound package of pasta I wrapped as one of the gifts brought lots of laughs. More time shopping with my husband.

Christmas Eve breakfast with my brother-in-law and sister-in-law, we hosted last minute but it was so nice to spend time with them. And as always, a beautiful candlelight service at the church (J did indeed play).

Christmas morning with lots of gifts and laughter. A Christmas morning phone call from my brother who lives in Texas. Christmas dinner with my other 2 brothers and sister-in-law, her sister, and my niece. Of course, we missed the family who opts out but still had a fun time with amazing food and conversation. Just listening sometimes can teach so much. (Lesson for myself)

This week with lots of lounging, television, and togetherness. (Okay, I’ll be honest a bit much togetherness at times but overall it’s been great)

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I’ll end here by saying Thank You for reading along, bearing with me as I disappeared for long stretches here and was entirely too slow to respond to comments, and did not visit my fellow bloggers nearly often enough. Thank you for all the kind words and encouragement you share in the comments. So nice to read and often a lift just when I need one.

Happy New Year! May 2025 be full of magical love, kindness, and blessings for all of you!

Hope everyone who celebrated had a great Thanksgiving. I thought of this blog and all of you reading it (Thank you if you are still hanging here with me through the silences) when thinking of thankful things yesterday.

My fees for some sort of the behind the scene magic of this blog were due recently and I considered letting the blog go as I’ve had trouble keeping up lately. However, I decided in the end it brought me too much joy when I did hop on here to let go of it just yet. I’ll have a bit more time during Christmas break.

And I do like to blog during the holiday season. Be ready for a 2 post day from me as I plan to join Tamy over at Chasing My Life for her Blogmas.

If you’re wondering, yes I know it’s technically black Friday but we can’t call it that in KC when the Chiefs are playing the Raiders (Their colors are black and silver).

On to my random thoughts.

You don’t have to like someone else’s politics to still love them.

This thought occurred to me yesterday while having Thanksgiving with my brother. He graciously hosts every year and to say our politics are a bit different is an understatement.

We had a great dinner including an order for me to bring 2 chocolate pies to Christmas (the pie went fast!). Lovely conversation about many non-political topics, we both love plants and gardening, birds, and sports. I enjoyed talking to my sister in law about teaching (she taught middle school for years and has good stories) and my late nephew.

The one big argument on the afternoon was actually over Tyreek Hill, LOL. And in the end, we just agreed to disagree.

Another family member chose to estrange themselves from most of us over politics. And thinking about it made me sad. If I’d have passed on dinner simply because of politics, I’d have missed out on spending time with people I love and some very yummy food as well!

Maybe my viewpoint is different because our house here is divided but please, don’t let politics blind you to loving and spending time with your family.

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Love the people around you and don’t let politicians in far off places stop you from doing it. Just something I felt compelled to share this morning.

Oops, once again I seem to have disappeared. I just can’t seem to get back into my blogging rhythm over here. And also, I feel as though I’ve typed that sentence in a previous post. Recently.

So much for a slow September, here we are at almost the end of it. I worked a lot more than I expected during the “slow” time. Guess I’m going to have to make an effort to create my own slower paced schedule for a bit.

Anyway, I do have a plan to get back into blogging regularly in this space and spending some time checking in on all my favorite blogging buddies (I apologize as I’ve not kept up well with that at all either).

October is the unofficial 31 days of blogging time. Used to be official with a site to link up to and all that. However, I just like to do it on my own now. And I’ve decided it’s exactly what I need.

One month, 31 straight days of blogging, one topic (sort of).

I’ve decided to get back to the roots of this blog and keep my 31 days in a chit chat style. So, starting in October, I’m going to do 31 days of questions!

Topics that might come up if you and I were sitting have a cup of coffee (or tea or whatever your favorite beverage of the moment might be….maybe we can pretend were out having margaritas if that’s more your style).

So as just a preview (and because I’m not quite ready to go back to cleaning the house/laundry), here’s one for you.

31 Days of Questions Preview

I don’t have any fancy graphics made yet and I may change the title. Or I might leave it as it’s pretty straightforward. Anyway, here’s an idea of what I’m thinking of doing every day in October.

Spotted this huge rain cloud at dusk one evening and was fascinated by it. I could see the lightning within the cloud striking at different points.

Have you ever watched a storm cloud where you could see the lightning in it before? Are you a fan of a good thunderstorm?

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So be ready to grab your coffee/tea/margarita/water and join me in October for some fun questions and (hopefully) a few answers!

My answers: I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a cloud like that before though my husband thought it was much less fascinating so maybe I have and simply forgot. And yes, I do love a good thunderstorm as long as we’re all safe at home. Driving in one, not so much of a fan.