Oh dear!

Well I knew it had been along time since I had written, but when I finally checked my blog, I realised that it had been forever! Sorry about that- the last few months have been kindacrazy around here- trips, 3 holidays, parties, birthdays, crafts, job, fed the ducks a few times... and the endless housework of course.

John feeding the ducks after a jog to the Lake.

Well for a quick Catch up, in November John and I drove out to Tempe AZ to watch and cheer his brother on as he competed in the Ironman Event held there. It was really impressive to see someone compete on such a huge level for so many hours. He finished in just under 14 hours I believe. John and Matt’s mom had flown in from Texas to watch the event, and it was nice to be able to spend some time with her and Vicki (Matt’s wife) at the same time.

tempe at sunrise

IronMatt!

While in Tempe, we also went to the very large botanical garden, and it is filled with cacti and all manner of dessert plants and habitats. There was also a really cool exhibit being shown, and I am unsure of the artists name, but there were large and brightly colored glass sculptures all throughout the gardens.

Also- for my Christmas gifts this year, I decided to go the handmade route, and had started all my gifts in mid October in order to finish in time (and still barely made it). I Embroidered tea towels (which took beyond forever to do) and also made a lot of homemade preserves. Triple Berry Jams, Strawberry Topping, Organic spiced apple butter, Vanilla Sugar- and on and on. The Canning was a lot of work, but was the easy and fast part of the whole project. I still ended up finishing things right up to Christmas eve, but it was nice to give things made with love instead of just buying everything from a store.

I have also been busy at the Coffee house where I work. Most of the town disappeared for the holidays, and so with all the students gone, there were only a few of us left in town to work, and so I ended up working quite a few hours there. And the week before New Years, I went to a old job to help them out there for a week.

They do a inventory once a year and it takes lots and lots and lots of counting to get it done, and they were short on help this year, so I offered to help out, and so I would work my 5 hour shifts at one job, and go work 6 or 7 hours at the other job, and then repeat over r and over for a few days in a row. I was very happy when it was all over and I could get back to my other routine (which included getting more than 6 hours of sleep a night!).

New Years was quiet. I had to work that morning at 5:30 am, and so by that night I was really tired, but John and I had some dinner, had some wine, watched “The Godfather” and we were asleep by 11 or so.

Well that is a quick update- and I hope to not be gone for long. I have lots of the “New Years” stuff to cover- resolutions, new happenings, and new directions to discuss and share. I will hopefully be able to get it to tomorrow (my day off!) but we will have to see how that pans out.

Have a great day!