Not a Wasted Word

SHU copied this format from Lisa, and I thought it would be a fun, because 2024 was actually a really eventful year for me. And while I was super impressed with Kae’s Rapid Fire Year in Review, I don’t think I could remember that much from each month (did she write those out as the year progress?!) and I wasn’t quite sure how to go back and recap the year. This will definitely help me.

1) What did you do in 2024 that you’ve never done before? My husband and I went on a six day trip to Mexico City without our kids. We’d never been on a trip without them before.

2) Did anyone close to you give birth? Nope, but very good friends announced that they are pregnant!

3) Did anyone close to you die? No, but a good friend lost her mother very recently.

4) What places did you visit? Well, we did some camping and some traveling this past year.

• Camping at Pinnacles National Park (this was actually the very end of 2023, but it started our attempts at camping)
• Grass Valley with friends for New Years 2024
• CDMX (Ciudad de México/Mexico City) with husband in February
• Camping at Joshua Tree in April
• Camping at New Brighton State Beach (near Santa Cruz) in June
• KOA in Petaluma (w/ 10yo’s friends) in June
• St. Louis (to visit extended family) in July
• Chicago (visiting friends) in July
• Maui (with friends) in August
• Camping trip in September
• Snow trip to Pioneer in December

5) What would you like to have in 2025 that you didn’t have in 2024?  A better system with my husband to make sure we’re both getting the time we need to pursue our interests.

6) What dates from 2024 will be etched in your memory forever? January 4th we celebrated our 17-15-10 anniversary. (17 years together; 15 years domestic partners; 10 years married). No other specific dates come to mind. Oh! And whatever day we saw Chappell Roan at Outside Lands! I think it was 8/11.

7) What was your biggest achievement this year?  I tested for my high blue belt. My 20 years of teaching was acknowledged by my district. I did a big re-organization of my home.

8) What was your biggest failure? I didn’t keep my home organized.

9) Did you suffer from illness or injury? I injured my knee pretty badly in late February. It was my first major injury and it required an MRI and PT and had changed the way I can move. It’s been a hard adjustment to be sure.

10) What was the best thing you bought? Hmmm. Despite the fact that the first one was broken, and replacing it was a giant PITA, I really do love my Dyson v12 Detect Slim because of the hardwood floor attachment. I had no idea how much gross shit is on my hardwood floors until that little green light showed me.

11) Where did most of your money go? Travel. And that is because we stopped paying for aftercare in the fall. Woot!

12) What did you get really, really excited about? That trip to Mexico City. Except I was also really stressed out about getting my house ready for my in-laws to stay there before we left.

13) What authors did you discover in 2024? Wow, I really don’t keep track of what I read at all (and after reading about NGS’s spreadsheet I know just how much I COULD be keeping track), but I’m pretty sure I didn’t really “discover” any authors, because I can’t think of a book I read because I liked another book written by that author. But some of the books I really liked this year were:

• Momfluenced by Sara Peterson, which led me to the first season of the podcast Under the Influence which I really enjoyed. (Turns out I don’t like to be on social media, but I like to read and listen about social media.)
• In the Dream House; A Memoir by Carmen Maria Machado (book club)
• Nuestra Parte de Noche by Mariana Enriquez (Our Share of the Night in English)
• The City and the City by China Miéville (super weird, listened to this in Spanish while my husband read it_
• The God of the Woods by Liz Moore (great audiobook)
• Listen for the Lie by Amy Tintera (please listen to this, so good as an audiobook)
• You could make this place beautiful by Maggie Smith
• Curdle Creek by Yvonne Battle-Felton (the audiobook of this is great – I loooved the first half and like the second half – I read this because my husband got it and it looked interesting

Honestly, I have no idea what I even read this year. I know there was more than this, but I can’t search my checkout history on Libby or Boundless so I’m not sure. I might keep better track this year.

14) What do you wish you had done more of? Getting good sleep? I have seem to have no control over this on though.

15) What do you wish you had done less of? Arguing with my kids about screen time.

16) How did your spend Christmas? We got home from the snow on Christmas Eve, spent that evenign with my parents, Christmas Day morning with my in-laws and evening with my parents.

17) What was your favorite TV program?  Hmmm. I’m not sure. Maybe I’m also not sure what I actually watch? I LOVED rewatching the first season of Silo with my daughter. And the first season of Severance. Our family like Monarch a lot. I don’t know if I have a favorite TV program from this year. Actually, it was probably season 11 of Vanderpump Rules. 🤣

18) What did you want and get? A renewed commitment to martial arts and the dojo. Also a ticket to see Chappell Roan at Outside Lands. 😉 Oh, and my good friend was able to join us in Hawaii this summer.

19) What did you want and not get? For my husband to support my time away from home.

20) What was your favorite film of 2024?  Deadpool & Wolverine. Fucking loved it. Would watch it a million times.

21) What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you? Went out to dinner with my friends, which is when they gave me the ticket to Outside Lands! Oh, and I turned 44.

22) What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying? Better communication with my husband.

23) Who kept you sane? My cats. And my friend at work.

24) Who did you miss? My college friends. I only saw one of them this year.

25) Who was the best new person you met? The woman who helped me with my back.

26) Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2024.  It might take a long time, but you can heal.

27) Show us one of your favorite photos from the year.

Here is the part where I confess that the this break has been very…bleeg. It has not been great. The snow was okay. The 11yo was sick and that really tainted the whole thing. Christmas Eve and Day were stressful. I have been kind of sick since we got back and the 14yo had been quite sick (sinus blockage and crazy coughing). My husband and I have not been getting along great. We’ve all been with each other 24/7 and it’s starting to wear on us.

The hot water attachment for the bidet failed and scalding water shot all over our bathroom. I had to crouch in front of the scalding water to turn off the attachment and it hurt and I got soaked. There was a half inch of water on the floor. This was after a small leak on the attachment at the toilet end (that was so infrequent we didn’t notice it), accumulate enough water in the floor boards that it was leaning into the garage. I think fixing that leak is what caused the attachment to fail under the sink. I guess our water pressure was too high for it to handle (this is not the first appliance our high water pressure has ruined). So we will have a cold water bidet.

Our two nights away from the kids at the end of this week is cancelled because my dad had been really sick for almost a week. We can’t even do anything tonight when the 14yo is at a sleep over because my MIL is sick too so they can’t take the 11yo. I guess the good news is we didn’t have anything specific planned. It would have been nice to spend some time together reconnecting after how poorly we’ve been getting along but it is not to be.

I ran today and felt awful. Well, the first third felt okay. I stopped less than on any other run! But then I had a weird coughing fit (like something was caught in my throat) and then I had a massive side cramp covering my whole right side for the second third and then I felt just regular shitty for the last third. When I came home I could’ve even do my favorite 10 minute Arms and Shoulders class with the weights I usually use! My lower back has been hurting again and my knee had felt weird ever since snow. I just don’t feel good physically at all. Which is exacerbating how bad I feel mentally.

I feel like I have nothing to look forward to this break except going back to work. Which of course I don’t look forward to at all.

It’s just not a great way to end 2024. But I guess this year has been a dumpster fire globally, so maybe it’s an apt way to end it. I was looking back at a post at the end of 2023 and I wasn’t looking forward to 2024 (mostly because of the election – god if I’d known how it was going to end up back at the start of the year, I’d have been devastated).

So yeah. I’m not in a great space mentally or I guess physically (even though I have no idea what is wrong physically). I hope things turn around in the five days before schools starts again.

At least I got the Christmas stuff taken down and put away. That had been stressing me out and now it’s done.

I’ll be posting a recap of my December goals and then maybe some thoughts for 2025 later this week. At least I hope to. We’ll see if it happens.

(And yes I realize these are all first world problem and yes I’m grateful for everything I have (which is so, so much). I’m just in a wonky head space and it felt disingenuous to post like I was feeling fine, when I’m just not right now.)

It is Friday right? I honestly have had no idea what day of the week it is, which means my mind really has been taking a break! But I feel like, as I come out of the haze that is Christmas week, my mind is starting to get into gear again. Mostly, it’s stressing me out with to-do lists and other stuff. Here is stuff I hope to get done in the next week. (I’ll admit, this is mostly an exercise for me, so make sure I feel positive about my time off at the end of it.)

PACKING UP AND PUTTING AWAY. I know this will get done, so maybe it’s silly to write it here, but I’m feeling the itch to put away the snow and Christmas stuff. I started putting the snow stuff away, and I’ve packed all the Christmas clothes that are clean. We’ll all wear Christmas sweaters to WinterFest tonight and then I’ll wash them and pack them away too, and all the Christmas clothes will be done. I’ll probably take the tree down early next week. I might wait a little longer on the lights in the outside entry way. Mostly, I just want to get the house in order again. It’s felt cluttered and frustrating for a long time, and I don’t want to start the new year that way.

PLANNING + GOAL SETTING. I need to plan for work for the next two months (to the end of Trimester 2). I’d love to get all of Tri2 in a planning document, but that might not happen over the break; as long as I get it on paper I’ll be fine. I want to set a few goals for 2025, but I’m honestly pretty shitty with goals. Did I make any for 2024? I honestly have no idea. I guess I’ll go back and check on the blog to see. (UPDATE: I did not make goals last year, in fact I categorically rejected them. Ha!) I think I’ll make some goals for the second half of the school year (first half of 2025), because August feels like a lot more of a “new year” for me than January.

CHILL TIME. I want to finish my current (physical copy) book, Tu sueño imperios han sido and most of my book club (audio)book, Remarkably Bright Creatures. I want to watch the first season of Severance with my daughter (we started last night and are on episode 3), and The Matrix as a family. I hope to hang out with friends at least once, and enjoy a two night staycation with my husband (while the kids stay with my parents).

KIDS. I want my daughter to do her shoulder exercises 5x a week. I want my son to start reading at least an hour a day. I want both of them to see some friends. I want us all to hang out some, but not a ton, because we’ve been doing that for a week straight.

WORKING OUT. I want to focus on the bike, and not running, because I’m sick of feeling awful when I run. Also, today I went to log into the bike and was informed that the account associated with it had expired. I was then prompted to up my subscription to Peloton All Access ($44/mo) from my App Plus membership ($24/mo). I also had to pay $99 to re-register my bike! I guess since it was used there was some account still associated with the bike from the old owners, and I was able to use my Plus membership to do Cycling and Bike Bootcamp classes on it for just $24/mo, but once that account expired I could no longer use it that way. I remember Sarah mentioning that it was $44 a month to use the bike, and I was so thrilled when that seemed not to be the case. Anyway, I’m spending quite a bit more to use it now, so I want to be on it. Having said that, it supposed to be sunny next week, and I’m sure I’ll run at least once. I just want to feel good when I run again. It’s been soooo long.

Annnd, I’m finally posting this at 9:48pm my time. It’s already Saturday on the other side of the country! Oh well, better late than never.

Here are some pictures from WinterFest today. Going was part of why this post is up so late.

Another Christmas tradition that I cherish (even though every year I’m so relieved to be done with it) is our Elf on a Shelf. Her name is Heart, and she has a reindeer named Toots (both names given by my children), and she has never been some snitch sent by Santa to spy on my kids. Instead, she is the distributor of advent calendars. Every day she is found in a new spot, with Toots and two little stockings with small surprises.

The little presents aren’t much. Each kid gets an advent calendar for the year and each day they get that present in Heart’s stocking. On the weekends they get a little something extra, like lip gloss or hand cream for the 14yo or a sweet treat for the 11yo.

As the weeks pass, Heart puts on different shirts. On the weekends she usually wears her robe. She also has a sled and an airplane that make appearances.

Last year I was worried I was deceiving my children, and while I made sure they now-14yo knows I’m Heart, I’m not sure the 11yo does. (When I was looking for a post with pictures of where I place Heart and Toots, I couldn’t find one, but I did find a post from 2017 where I lamented the fact that it was probably the last year my daughter would be believe in here. HAHAHAHAHAH!)

I even took Heart and Toots to the cabin with us this year. It felt too sad to miss the final three days with them, and I hadn’t unveiled her cute new monster sweatshirt yet.

Merry Christmas Eve to all who celebrate. I hope everyone has a wonderful day today, no matter what you celebrate.

No Weekend + Workout Recap today, because I need to get a quick post up about our trip to the snow (which took up the weekend). I think I’ll post a “Winter Break Workouts” at the end of the break, to see how I did while I was off.

The snow trip has been… fine to good. Probably a 3.5/5 stars. Instead of doing a day by day. I’ll do some highs and lows for the trip.

LOWS

We hit a lot of traffic on the way up and it took a couple hours longer than anticipated.

The 11yo was sick the first night. He threw up multiple times, looked awful and was running a low fever. I was worried for him, the trip, and all of us (possibly getting what he had).

The 11yo felt better on Sunday, but not great. He went to the sno-park with us, but spent most of the time just lying in the snow where we were playing.

Our sled kept deflating and the snow tube I got from the Stockton Costco on the way up wouldn’t inflate with our pump. I was super bummed about the snow tube. I really wanted to try it.

The 14yo ran the sled into a tree, but luckily bailed out to the side into the branches instead of plummeting head first into the trunk. She was fine, but her face got scratched up pretty badly.

HIGHS

There was plenty of snow. I was worried there wouldn’t be much snow at the parks because December is early in the season, but there was plenty.

The 11yo stopped puking and no one else started. All the appendages crossed that the not-puking holds.

The cabin we’re staying in is cute. There are two twin beds for the kids (instead of a bigger bed they have to share). Four logs in the fire stove keep it warm all night long.

We built a snowman, well actually a snow bunny (a la Hundreds of Beavers, the super random movie my son and husband love).we also had a snowball fight.

Yes. She has boobs. It’s from a movie. We were going for this…

The weather was beautiful. It was never too cold or too warm. It never snowed during the day and we didn’t have to put chains on the tires.

I finished a book I just got from the library. It was short, but still, I had a lot of time to read.

I packed everyone and didn’t forget a thing! Everyone had what they needed and all the snow clothes fit and did what they were supposed to do.

We had fun sledding in two different spots. We found a spot to catch air at the bottom and that was fun.

All in all it was a fine trip. It could have gone so much worse! And it distracted the kids for the days before Christmas, which was the whole point. The price of the cabin was also lower because we came right before Christmas. The kids had fun and scratched their “snow” itch. I think I’ll round my original rating up to a 4/5. The kids had fun and we made some fun memories. Also, I’m ready to go home and start celebrating Christmas tomorrow.

While the photo ornaments are very special, I also treasure the “stuff they’re into” ornaments too. Every year I get each kid at least one ornament based on something they were into that year. Some years they get more than one! At this point the vast majority of ornaments on the tree are ones I gave them in the past.

Here are some of the ornaments I’ve given them in the past.

My daughter was SO into My Little Pony for so long. And my son still loves all things Mario, including Yoshi. You’ll also notice an Elf ornament, because that is one of our favorite Christmas movies.

They were both so into the Garfield comics for so long. My in-laws kept all my husband’s Garfield books and both kids read them until they literally fell apart.

Oh my god my son was SOOO into Pokemon. He still has so many cards in his room. I wonder how old he’ll be when he’s willing to part with them. I’ve spent many an hour playing Pokemon. I’m actually pretty good when I’m allowed to play a decent deck.

The 14yo was very into Pusheen. He’s still a family favorite.

The 11yo was a big LEGO builder for many years. We have probably thousands of dollars of LEGOs under the couch, let alone in his room. When I saw these ornaments you could build and put in the globe ornaments I bought everyone I could find. We have five on our tree each year. Their red ribbons fill out the tree.

Our family was so obsessed with Shaun the Sheep, but I could not find any ornmanets of them, so I bought a set of figurines and made ornaments. I wrote a whole post on how I used to do this all the time, when the kids were young.

This year the 11yo got a Fortnite llama, because he’s obsessed with Fortnite.

The 14yo got a Hello Kitty ornament, because I desperately wanted to get her one last year, but I couldn’t find one anywhere. This year I came across one randomly and snatched it up!

This year I got my husband his first ornament, a Luchador mask to represent our trip to Ciudad de Mexico last year.

Which reminds me that I try to get ornaments from places we visit, but I’m not always able to (like in CDMX). But I have managed it on occasion.

But it’s the ornaments for the kids, that represent what they are into that year, that I love the most. Tomorrow they are both getting one more ornament from Heart, our Elf on the Shelf, because I saw them on sale at CVS and couldn’t help myself. The 11yo is getting Homer Simpson in a Santa suit and the 14yo is getting a Minecraft axolotl, because when she was younger we had to hear about how cool the axolotl update in Minecraft was going to be for a full year.

More on Heart for the next Christmas Tradition post.

I think one of the reasons I love Christmas is that we have some lovely traditions attached to the holiday. We’re not always great about traditions, but Christmas is full of them! I’m hoping to write about a couple of our Christmas traditions, but now that we’re leaving on Saturday, I’m not sure I’ll get them up. I really wanted to do this one though, so I’m making it happen!

One of my favorite Christmas traditions is ordering a new photo ornament. I have one for every year since the 14yo was born. Sometimes it’s just a random photo I use, other times the ornament memorializes a trip we took that year. For two years, I used our Halloween photo! Here are all the yearly photo ornaments I’ve made so far. Enjoy seeing our faces for once! (I don’t know what I’m okay posting photos of photos, it makes no sense, but I’m going to do it anyway).

We also have some photo ornaments of the pets. Our bearded dragon lets us put outfits on him, so we dressed him up for his ornament. We made a remembrance ornament of our cat who died two years ago, and that same year we got an ornament of our new kittens (whose real names you’ll see on the ornament!)

Every year I get to put out these ornaments and remember the special moments shown on them. Also, their red ribbons are an important addition to our tree!

All of these ornaments are from Shutterfly. I think there is one kind of ornament I have not ordered from them. I looked this year at other sites to find something new and different and nothing I saw looked very good. If you know of a site I can order photo ornaments, I’d love to know what it is! I also give the ornament I make to both sets of grandparents, so I definitely want them to be good quality.

Anyway, photo ornaments is one Christmas tradition I love. I hope to share more in the coming days.

CHRISTMAS: ALL the presents are wrapped and sorted, the ones going to my parents’ house and the ones going to my in-laws’ house. I cannot believe I got them all wrapped and sorted by Wednesday night!

SNOW TRIP: The snow pants I ordered (on deep discount) for the 11yo came early and they fit! So do the gloves I got both the kids. The pants my mom had fit my daughter and one of her jackets fits my son well enough. Also, the snow boots that were passed down to us, and that I’ve been holding on to for YEARS fit the 11yo perfectly! I cleaned out the car and charged it fully and handed it off to my parents today. My mom just got new tires on her car and she has chains for them too. Finally, a book I hoped we could listen to came off my holds list on Boundless.

WORK: All the students who were absent last week took their assessments. The two 1B classes are pretty much done filming their trailers and no one did anything egregious while they were all over campus filming. I made all the copies I need for the week we come back in January. Two students came back to visit me after their Spanish 2 final and told me they were doing really well in the class, even though it’s hard. I always appreciate hearing that. Also, yesterday was my last day of work in 2024! Woot!

HOME: The house is a dumpster fire but I’m okay with it because we spend no part of Christmas Day at our house and no one will see it in its current state except my in-laws when they feed the cats. I have to do big cleans on the cat boxes and set up the dry food feeders tomorrow. I’m not even trying to do any other kind of clean up. I’m just going to focus on packing us all up tomorrow.

TODAY: I don’t have school but the kids do. I want to be excited about it, but I know the time will be over before I know it. I have packed the kids’ cabin clothes and have a pile of my own I want to pack, so hopefully there will be some down time tomorrow. We’ll see. I hope to go for a run, but those haven’t been so fun lately. As long as I get everything done so I can go to bed at a reasonable hour, I’ll be happy.

I keep saying that to myself as the realization of all I have to get done before Saturday piles up in my brain. I literally considered bringing presents to school to wrap on during my prep period today!

Things I need to do before our impromptu trip to the snow on Saturday:

• Wrap all the presents going to my parents’ house (by Thursday actually because that is when I’m trading cars with my parents)
• Wrap all the presents going to my in-laws house
• Pack the kids
• Pack me + toiletries
• Pack snow clothes + boots
• Get sno park parking pass
• Decide on meals
• Pack food
• Find a book for us to listen to (any recommendations?)

It’s really the wrapping of the presents by Thursday morning that is stressing me out. Tomorrow is my staff holiday party so I’ll be home later than usually. I get off at 1pm on Thursday and Friday I have off, so I can do the rest then. Tomorrow I just need to lock in.

I really hope this was a good idea. I think it was, I just got to get to the good part.