Lydia is incredibly festive, and is very insistent about properly celebrating holidays. As a result, Lily and I were up at midnight, and I did our annual banging of the pots and pans on our porch to ring in the New Year. Even though I cherish my sleep, I do love that tradition, and I’m grateful for Lydia’s persistence in helping us make a memory. Here is a video:
Lily and I got up around 9AM today. I ran Basil hard with my Dogout workout (run to park, 4 times around the softball diamonds and 30 pullups and then run home), and Lily did the stationary bike. Then I worked with Ammon on school work and got ready for the day while Lily started on lunch. She made the most incredible mushroom Polenta and beet & feta salad and I roasted chicken-sausage. We set the table nicely, and it was so fun to have a nice family meal on New Years’ day. We went around the table talking about our favorite day from the previous year. The kids all mentioned Basil, and Lydia also said Disney World. Lily’s favorite memory was Chicago with the older girls, and my favorite memory was backpacking with the kids. Then we talked about goals for the New Year. Lily wants to be alive and healthy in one year. Mary wants to travel outside of North America. Lydia wants to get better at dancing, and Ammon and Clarissa had silly answers. My aspirations are in yesterday’s blog.
After lunch, we all watched the 1990’s movie Sabrina, with Harrison Ford in it. We want to watch a lot of movies set in France in preparation for our Paris trip in the Summer. Lily watched that movie a lot growing up and loves it, and I enjoyed it a lot also.
Afterwards, I worked hard getting all the Christmas decorations put away and organized, and I also organized the garage. Lily worked even harder working with the kids on their instruments, getting them back into the swing of things after having a break from serious supervised practice. Then I played with Ammon, Clarissa, Lydia and Basil. Ammon built a castle/fort out of the couches and blankets and such. We pretended he was a bad-guy, Clarissa was the Queen, I was a wizard, and Lydia was in charge of Basil who had to lick someone’s face if they were dead to bring them back to life. We pretended to fight Ammon, the bad guy, for a solid twenty minutes before we wrapped things up and put kids to bed. When the older girls went to bed, Lily read to them the Shakespeare play As You Like It in preparation for them all seeing it with Amy and her children in February.
Lily and I then cleaned another hour or so, and then wound down (I watched Seinfeld while she continued cleaning and then she read Big Magic).
Today was super productive…almost too productive, meaning I know I will be very tired tomorrow. I have my sights on a lazy Sunday tomorrow. Happy New Year!