Hello!

So many posts have gone through my head, I just plain haven't felt like posting anything here lately.  I intended to, then life happened, and well, I didn't.  So.  Merry Christmas a little late. Happy New Year a little late.  Happy 8th birthday to Ben.  Might as well be pre-emptive at this point and wish everyone a happy Valentine's Day and a very happy early 10th birthday to Alex, because I'm not sure when I'll sit down and update the blog again.

To recap, fill in, catch up, all that jazz...

Had a lovely Christmas here in TX.  It was very warm.  Grandma Rita was here, and we all had a fabulous time.  I think the kids were very happy.  This seems to be the year that they discovered that mom & dad are really Santa.  The best part is, they don't really care, and are very happy to keep on playing along.  Makes it a little more fun actually.

Kids are doing well in school and piano.  Work is going well for Mike.  I seem to be busy, but who knows what I'm ever actually doing! It's about time for another big house project, but that's a post for another day.

The weather has mostly been warm.  The drawback to a mostly warm winter is the mostly part.  Because on days when that mostly goes away, the sort of cold feels REALLY cold.  Like today.  Yesterday was up to 76 and sunny.  Kids wore shorts & tees to school.  Today topped out at about 52, warm for all those east coast people sitting under 3 feet of snow, but feeling terribly icy cold to us longtime Texans. Instead of shorts, we are bundled up, even wearing coats today. But, it will be warm again, and soon.

Along with the good comes some sadness too.  Everybody knows by now, but I'll post again anyway.  We lost both Tucker and CoCo recently, just 10 days apart as a matter of fact.  CoCo's loss was very unexpected - her epilepsy sent her into a series of violent seizures that we couldn't stop.  It was a horrid way for her to go, but she wasn't alone. Most importantly I like to think we gave her a good home and loved her madly.  Losing Tucker was just as devastating if a little more expected.  He was very old, and that hit him hard in December.  We did not expect for him to make it to Christmas, and he hung on for another month.  He went peacefully, with all of us with him. He's got CoCo to take care of now and we'll meet again someday.  He gave us 16 wonderful years.  Arthur is the only 4 legged friend left for now.  He's a bit lonely, but is hanging in there.  Overall, the house is far too quiet and I miss the chaos of a trio of dogs.  In the words of Winnie the Pooh "How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard."

I've got the urge to travel and no plans to do so.  Time to plan some trips. We may head out to western Texas this weekend to see some caves.  Thanks to Ben's school project for clueing us into a little adventure.  If we go, well, maybe there's a blog post in there. In the meantime... here's a final thought.