2021 New Year's Resolutions

Nothing panned out in 2020 as expected, including my goals. I was still able to achieve some of them - I read several books with Jackson and Brandon and I met our financial goals - but some weren't even possible - like going to the temple twice a month. This year, I wanted to keep it simple, so I'm using a four-category framework and going for goals that have a bit more time flexibility.

Physical

• Visit 5 new parks. I imagine travel will still be somewhat limited so I don't think we'll be able to get to a lot of national parks, but we have lots of state parks in Indiana that I've never been to, so I want to make that a priority this year.

Intellectual

• Read at least 5 nonfiction books. I read a lot more this year than in years' past, but I struggle to get through nonfiction books very quickly. I think I read 2 or 3 this past year, so I want to push it to 5 this year.
• Learn to play the guitar. I got Brandon a guitar for his birthday, so I want to dabble in that a bit myself, since I don't have room for a piano right now.

Spiritual

• Meditate daily. I know I probably won't do this every single day, but I want to strive for it. I started meditating a bit this past year, and I really like it and find it grounding.
• Discover my spiritual gifts. Without kids of my own, I want to make sure I'm using the extra time I have to do the most good I can. 

Social

• Meet my neighbors. We've now lived here for over a year, and I still only know the neighbors directly on either side of us. 

Feeling good and hopeful about 2021!

New Year's Birthday

We celebrated New Year's Eve with one last game night with Thomas and Madison in town - they were the last out-of-town family to leave. We stayed the night and Brandon started his birthday by going out to my uncle Julius's to shoot guns with Thomas and my dad. He got a new gun for Christmas, so he was excited to try it out.

We then headed back up to Indy and picked Jackson up to get some birthday lunch before coming home to open presents and watch football. I'm so thankful for Brandon and love celebrating him any chance I get.

Christmas 2020

This wasn't our year to have Jackson on Christmas morning, so we celebrated with him Christmas Eve morning. Jackson is obsessed with wrestlers right now, so he got tons of wrestler toys and books for Christmas and was a happy kid!

We dropped Jackson at his mom's house, then headed down to Columbus to celebrate Christmas with my family. We were fortunate to have all our out-of-town family come to Indiana this year. We were missing Jacob and his family (they were being extra cautious with a newborn at home), but we had a great evening of dinner, games, and gifts. And we got to meet Baby James - Thomas and Madison's baby - who is so sweet.

Elias stole the show after dinner - we were all sitting around the table talking, and he found this tiny goblet and was downing sparkling cider as fast as Isaac would refill it. It was so cute.

Christmas morning, Brandon and I ate our traditional breakfast nachos, then picked Jackson up and headed to Brandon's mom's house where we opened presents and spent time with his family, before stopping at Brandon's dad's house and then his grandma's house.

Jackson's haul - this doesn't even include the stuff we gave him. He is one very loved boy!

End-of-Year Celebration

To celebrate the end of a crazy year, we decided to do a fancy staycation - we treated ourselves to a steak dinner at St Elmo downtown and then stayed at the Sheraton on the north side. The food was delicious, and we decided we need to make this a yearly tradition. So this is our first-annual end-of-year celebration. Can't wait until next year!

 

Home Life

We've had to spend a lot more time at home than normal this year, but luckily, we have a comfortable home that we love!

Right before Thanksgiving, Jackson's school went back to e-learning so he and Brandon were both doing online classwork. I was not looking forward to having to manage Jackson's e-learning all day while working, but he did such a good job of keeping himself on task and on schedule. It was very easy! 

We found out the day before Thanksgiving that Brandon had been exposed to COVID, so we had to cancel all our Thanksgiving plans. It was a bummer, but my parents stopped by to bring us some leftovers from their Thanksgiving dinner with Tessa's family, and we were able to do a Zoom call to gather all my family - even those in Utah. We watched football and the national dog show and it ended up being a pretty good day.

During one of Brandon's trips to South Carolina, Jackson came to spend a couple days with me. We both worked from home in our cuddly blankets, and we headed out to do some Christmas shopping for an Angel Tree child we picked - he was the same age as Jackson, so it made it easy to pick out things we thought he might like!

We had our first snow of the season, and Jackson used his recess time to shovel the sidewalk because, in his words, "it's fun!"

Micah flew in a week before Christmas, so she, Tessa, and I planned a sisters' day. Tessa had a bunch of errands to do so we went to lunch and then ran her errands together. It was so much fun. I love my sisters! Our last errand was to go to Target, but we got stuck in a crazy slow line getting off the exit, so Tessa got out of the car and walked over to Target where we then went and picked her up. It was so funny to watch her climb down the embankment and cross the stream. 

Tampa Birthday Trip

It's been a rough year, and travel has been down a lot. On the one hand, that sucks because I haven't been able to travel as much as I'd like to. On the other hand, it's led to some pretty sweet sales on airfare and hotels. So we decided to take advantage of it, and got out of town for my birthday in November. I had a flight credit from a cancelled trip in April, and I was able to use it to get roundtrip flights for both Brandon and me to Tampa, Florida. 

It was a low-key few days without big plans, but the weather was perfect, and it was just so nice to get away. 

Our first day there, we explored historic Ybor City, which for some reason has wild, city-protected chickens roaming the park.

We rode the historic trolley from Ybor City to downtown, where we walked along the riverfront.

We got a great deal on a hotel right on the beach in Redington Beach, so we enjoyed some relaxing time along the water. I did some reading and Brandon did some fishing.

Our second day - my birthday - Brandon went fishing and I slept in and had a lazy morning in bed (my favorite!) and a walk along the beach. Then we checked out the massive Skyway Bridge, and Brandon fished off the pier. We took in the sunset and headed to dinner. 

Our last day there, we had breakfast at a local place, then visited Fort De Soto Park, where we explored an old fort and Brandon - you guessed it - fished off the pier. :) 

Our goal is to someday move to Florida, so we finished out the day exploring some of the local neighborhoods to get an idea of what living in Tampa would be like. It was a wonderful, relaxing few days with my favorite person - one of my best birthdays yet!

Veterans Day

Jackson's school did a drive-thru veterans salute for Veterans Day, and it was adorable. All the kids were chanting U-S-A and waving flags or holding signs. It made me teary to watch those sweet kids cheer on this man who I love and admire so much. He deserves all the positive attention he gets on Veterans Day and so much more. I am so proud to be his wife.