Goldie Has Her First Birthday

In the blink of an eye a year has past and Goldie is now a one year old.

Melissa may go a bit overboard with decorating and commemorating the big day but in the end we'll all be glad we have the sweet memories.

This was the perfect kid's birthday party. Only close family. When you add in Violet, Lincoln and Hazel....well that's enough kids for me.

Happy Birthday Goldie Celine. Could you slow down just a bit! 

2022 Year In Review

The best thing to happen in 2022 was the birth of Goldie Celine Taylor on January 5th.

It's hard to believe in a few days we'll be celebrating Goldie's 1st birthday.

We've watched her grow and celebrate milestones each and every month - all the firsts, sitting up, crawling, all the fun interactions with her siblings and all the holidays. 

One of her favorite things to do is play out in the garage. This must be a gene passed down from Jamie.

Goldie hasn't started walking yet but she's real close. She's mastered stair climbing but is still a bit hesitant on the way down.

My new house is pretty much completely decorated. After the move in rush right before Christmas last year, I wasn't sure if everything would find a place. But boxes are emptied, window treatments and pictures are hung and new furniture set in place. The only thing that wasn't complete when I moved in was the landscaping in my backyard. This is what my backyard looked like when I moved in.

Now there's a  privacy fence, retaining wall, sod and a wrought iron fence. I'm still trying to figure out if I'm going to do a little landscaping above the retaining wall or if I can talk the HOA in to making it look a bit nicer.

And speaking of landscaping, for all those in the neighborhood that thought their view of the swamp (they call it a lake) was the best, I now have the largest yard with sod and trees all down the east side of my house. There's even talk of the HOA putting in a gazebo. So now who has the best lot in the neighborhood!

For the past couple of years I've had a birthday theme. Why I do this I have no idea. This year's theme was blowing out a birthday candle. Jamie's birthday was special because it was his 40th. Teresa also had an interesting Beddian birthday - being the same age as the last 2 digits of your birth year. I'm skipping any type of theme for 2023. The pressure is getting too much for me to handle.

I was also able to do some traveling. My friends, Debbie and Robin, took what was usually our yearly trip to New Smyrna Beach Florida. This time we were able to take a day and travel an hour up the coast to visit St Augustine.

The Taylor's, Teresa and I also took a trip to Santa Rosa Florida. So many things to do and see and not quite enough time to do it all.

In October I went to visit my friends Frank and Gloria. Besides seeing their beautiful condo on the strip it was a very profitable trip to Vegas. Something not many people can say.

Let's don't forget that disastrous trip to Colorado. The trip itself was great. Courtney was there and we did some paddle boarding, shopping and a lot of eating out.

And then there was the drive home where I dodged several pieces of big rig tire debris and the debris won. Tore up the whole underside of my car. Having a son-in-law as great as Jamie Taylor came in handy when he hitched up his trailer and traveled 800 miles round trip to rescue me from Burlington, Colorado.

I can't end the year without at least mentioning my effort at health and weight loss. I must have lost and gained the same 10 pounds 3 or 4 times this year. I went back to the gym and Michele and I challenged ourselves to walk 52 one mile hikes. I might have fudged a bit on the locations but I did log a little over 2,000,000 steps which more than makes up for the 52 miles of hikes.

I'm not making any New Year's resolutions for 2023. I never stick to them anyway. I'm hoping 2023 brings me a stress free life. Maybe I'll take a yoga class. There I go, already putting pressure on myself. Oh well...........Happy New Year!

Christmas 2022 & Goldie's First Christmas

After weeks of preparation - decorating, thinking of gift ideas, buying gifts, wrapping gifts, preparing a dinner menu and doing meal prep - it's all over in about 3 hours.

I wish there was some way I could figure out how to have everyone unwrap gifts individually so we could actually see what everyone got. But how do you hold off these sweet little faces while one of their siblings is opening their gifts and the others are sitting by watching.

Add that to the fact that the older "kids" usually have the same items. So my only solution is to let everyone just go for it.

While there may be chaos and confusion there's never enough presents (for the kids) and too much food. I think next year I'm going with pizza and wings. Easy to prepare and the left overs are easier to heat up for a late night snack. Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!

2,000,000 Steps for 2022

I finally crossed the finish line with 2,000,000 steps for 2022.

I thought I was way ahead of Michele until I saw she had 200,000 steps more than me. I hate always being second.

While I thought I could take the rest of the year to relax, Michele has created a new virtual challenge for us walking the Colorado Trail - 567 miles. We were supposed to start the first of the year but now I find out she's starting the day after Christmas. We'll see who makes it to the end first. Challenge accepted!

Goldie's First Visit to Santa

Yesterday Goldie had her first encounter with Santa.

Instead of the usual crying, kicking and screaming, she just gave him a little glare like "who the heck are you".

Today was trip number 2 for a Santa visit. Goldie still did well but Hazel's not feeling it. She has to be in just the right mood in order to get her picture. I'm sure she'll be all smiles when she sees all the presents Santa is bringing her.

Jamie Turns 40!

Tonight was our last birthday for 2022.

Jamie turned 40 and I got my last birthday candle blow out. A family dinner at Iron Horse was his big celebration Next month is the big 40th birthday party for both Melissa and Jamie. Now on to a new theme for 2023. Any suggestions?????

Happy Birthday to Me

It's true that birthdays just become another day as you get older. The only difference in today is that I ran errands in the morning and waited around in the afternoon for everyone to come to go out to dinner. Not much different than most of my other days.

I did my 2022 "blow out the candle" picture although instead of a cake I used one of the free beignets you get from Red Door Grill. I should have thought that through a bit. Melissa brought these beautiful Nothing Bundt Cakes but I decided to use a glob of dough powdered in sugar to blow out a candle.

The kids bought me some new ear buds and tomorrow Michael's taking me to the store to buy the special charger and show me how to use them. My iPod nano from 2006 just isn't cutting it anymore.

While Teresa and I snuck a little sip of a new cocktail I made called a cinnamon roll (Rumchata and Kaluha) before we went to dinner, Violet and I did a cheers with lemonade and Dr Pepper. Now if that doesn't make me seem old, I don't know what does.

Maybe I need to make a bucket list of things to do on my birthday. With all my luck on my next birthday there might be a snow storm raging outside. So I guess I better add "Watching it Snow" to the list.