Tuesday night: NYE

We said good-bye to my family and promptly started to flip the house for an evening party.  They left a little earlier than normal due to weather, which was rather sad.

Anyway, we weren't sure how long people were going to stay in the evening and neither were they.  Since it was potentially a longer time than normal, Ben came up with a few Lego challenges.  The first one was "build a firework".  We took most of our bins out of the stacks so it was easier for 13 people to move around and get the pieces they needed.

The next challenge was build in a polybag.  While it seemed impossible at first, several of us got it!  A few people got it in a sandwich bag, and a bunch that just didn't care and left pretty quickly.

Kids were getting tired so we decided not to do the third challenge; we're seeing them again in a few weeks anyway, so we'll do it then.

Wednesday: Happy 2025

Happy 2025!  It was a nice day, but not all that special.  I didn't get very far on cleaning up from the party (blog post will come), but had a relaxing day.  

We worked on a new Lego set, played Isaac's new game from Christmas, and I took a nap.  I have a cold and it's been knocking me out.

Tuesday: bird

 I got my first bird at my new feeder!

Weekend: DeYoung Christmas

It was a lovely weekend.  It's always lovely seeing my brother, even though several of us had colds.  

Sunday:  We started with our traditional bagel breakfast.

Then we opened presents!  Liz got her own container of spice tea this year, since I heard she enjoys it as much as Nathan.  Ben got two boxes of cheddar penguin crackers.  We saw them in October when we were visiting without Ben, and Liz said she'd give them to Ben as a Christmas gift.  Ben is forced to love his penguins!

Isaac worked hard on 3D printing some Gravitrax piece for Evelyn and JJ.

Isaac and Joshua got a 'boulder ball'.  It's a rock climbing game and Isaac has especially been getting into it.

There was a short nap time.

And then Aunt C came over!  I see her from time to time, but it is always nice to see her.

The kids were going to watch half a movie in the evening, but then everyone was enjoying it so we watched the whole thing.  The kids also fell right to sleep - they were all really tired.

Monday morning was just some down time, and then we went rock climbing.  I don't have any pictures.  It was a nice time, but they were route setting so there weren't as many walls available as normal.  

After we got home and played a game, we got out some nerf guns in the basement.  The stealing of darts was the best part.

It was also Isaac's birthday!  It often gets down-played because we celebrate more in the summer, but it doesn't change the fact that he is now a teenager!  We were teasing him about it and he started to be all, "I'm a grumpy teenager." in a grumpy voice.  It was hilarious.  I love his sense of humor.

Saturday: they're here!

 We finished cleaning the house in the morning.  Unsurprisingly, it went faster than I expected.  Joshua was a huge help.  Then the house looked amazing!  It seems like I should do it more often, but takes family buy-in too.

Then Nathan and family were here!  We had lunch and then the kids...disappeared.  Ben stuck his head into Joshua's room and Joshua said that he and Evelyn were just talking.  

Nothing overly special happened...we talked, we ate, and got caught up.

Ben mirrored his phone on the computer and created some cool infinity pictures.

Friday: games and prep

Today there was a lot of prep and normal work.  That dishwasher doesn't empty itself.  Everyone is helping though, and we should easily be able to finish

I brought Isaac to the library for the 3D printer.  Then it had some issues.  The good part was that there was someone there to do all the troubleshooting.  But it also meant that it took significantly longer than I had been hoping.  It also meant that the area closed before Isaac's part was finished, so we have to pick it up tomorrow.

Cheryl came over in the afternoon and we played one of our new Christmas games.  Then after dinner we played Space Base.  Both were a lot of fun.

Thursday: Christmas3

Yesterday we couldn't find the present that Isaac had found and then wrapped for Larry and Isaac was rather sad about it.  We checked all the trash and all around the tree.

Well, it turns out it was left at home.  Larry kindly came over first thing in the morning on his way to his first appointment to unwrap a duck.  

I'm a little behind on everything else, but made initial progress today.  The groceries are ordered, most of the presents for this weekend are wrapped, and a tentative menu was figured out.  I also sent several emails and started to deal with this week's laundry.  Tomorrow will include some food prep and some cleaning, which will hopefully set us up well for Saturday morning when I expect we'll be doing most of the cleaning.